The late comparitive Mythologist Joseph Campbell spoke of, 'participating in their landscape' as he described Peoples. We could use more participation in this endeavor.
2
The hickory trees of northern Maryland woods are dying rapidly from infestations of Hickory Bark Beetles combined with Ceratocystis smalleyi cankers. Upwards of 20-30 very large trees near my property are dead or dying... and I think of Sonnett LXXIII everytime I see them:
"That time of year thou mayst in me behold
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,
Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang."
"That time of year thou mayst in me behold
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,
Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang."
5
I heard about an area called Esteban's Pines that was never logged on that peninsula that juts out into Lake Superior on the north side of the UP of Michigan. Isle Royale is just to the northwest. I made a special trip expecting huge trees, verdant canopy, open spongy floor - a majestic forest. It wasn't anything like that. It was beat-up with dead and half dead trees obviously diseased and stressed. Wind and ice storms had torned off limbs with long shards of bark peeled down. As they fell more damage was done to neighbors. There were trees 5-6 feet in diameter but in tough shape. This was not a majestic like forest, more like a bombed out cathedral. It had a elegiac quality to it.
It was clear that this forest was at the end of its life. What was to rise from this detritus was unclear. It seemed that, left to natural forces, this forest was going senile. If it had been managed by good forestery practices it would have had a much longer and productive lifetime. Trees in a park, along a boulevard are different but they also have a lifetime and suffer illness and plagues.
As we dominate this planet we need to figure out how we can help nature sustain this enviorment that nourishes us.
It was clear that this forest was at the end of its life. What was to rise from this detritus was unclear. It seemed that, left to natural forces, this forest was going senile. If it had been managed by good forestery practices it would have had a much longer and productive lifetime. Trees in a park, along a boulevard are different but they also have a lifetime and suffer illness and plagues.
As we dominate this planet we need to figure out how we can help nature sustain this enviorment that nourishes us.
6
“When the green hills are covered with talking wires and the wolves no longer sing, what good will the money you paid for our land be then”
― Chief Seattle
― Chief Seattle
15
I was fortunate enough to attend Penn State back in the early '80s, when the giant old elms still lined each side of the Mall that ran from the steps of Pattee Library all the way down to the gate onto College Avenue. While I didn't have a camera most of the time as an undergraduate, my brother started school there the same year I graduated & when I visited him that fall I took some random pictures of campus, including one of the elms wearing their October yellow, never thinking that the campus landscape would change so drastically. After reading this article I pulled out the photo & looked at it for quite a while. Solastalgia indeed.
4
When Sandy knocked down an 80 foot oak in my front yard three years ago, I planted a young American elm. It's at about 25 feet now and looking gorgeous. It comes from a nursery in Georgia and is a clone of trees along an Elm Alley just two miles from my house. They are called "Princeton Elms" and are moderately resistant to Dutch elm. The key is to keep them healthy in the first place and I treat mine twice a year for insects and also fertilize twice a year.
9
I remember trees, wide as a bus, maybe 100 years old being cut down in Salt Lake City when I was a young girl. These trees were probably planted by the pioneers but modern people didn't have any use for them; maybe because the root structure pulled up side walks or got in the way of a new subdivision. It was a crying shame to see these centurions leveled. Still makes me weep.
15
My hometown was full of elm trees - most streets were lined with them. A few of them have been immortalized in The Godfather. I showed my boyfriend the place where Michael and Kay walked along that tree-lined street, and the majority of the old trees were gone and the ones that remained were ragged and dying.
I experience rather severe solastalgia (finally someone's given it a name!) so it wasn't easy being in the middle of a drawn out elm die-off when all the trees that defined the atmosphere of the town were elms.
Now I wish my hometown would step up and develop a cohesive plan for replanting so we can have all elms again instead the smattering of random species being planted by homeowners, and for the one street which was replanted with all elms, get the power lines underground so you don't have one side of the street with huge towering trees and the other side with stunted pollarded trees. Sigh.
I experience rather severe solastalgia (finally someone's given it a name!) so it wasn't easy being in the middle of a drawn out elm die-off when all the trees that defined the atmosphere of the town were elms.
Now I wish my hometown would step up and develop a cohesive plan for replanting so we can have all elms again instead the smattering of random species being planted by homeowners, and for the one street which was replanted with all elms, get the power lines underground so you don't have one side of the street with huge towering trees and the other side with stunted pollarded trees. Sigh.
5
Twenty years ago Pinellas County Florida was home to thousands of backyard citrus trees; orange, grapefruit, lime... today most all of the older trees are gone killed off by disease.
2
The ash grove, how graceful, how plainly tis speaking
The wind through it playing has language for me;
The wind through it playing has language for me;
4
We had lots of beautiful elms in the Akron, Ohio area. The parochial school for girls is called, "Our Lady of the Elms."
In 1964, my depression-era father was fortunate enough to purchase an estate of 8 acres. The first order of business to cut down 30 plus trees afflicted with Dutch elm disease. It made an impression. Back then it was okay to dispose of them by making a fire. The logs burned incandescently hot. The tree surgeon was some non-abstemious guy from Amish country. He spit tobacco and said, "Yeah yep, you could really roast some wieners in there."
Two decades later, my mother's rural cousin gave us some chestnuts from a grove he tended in a remote area. I knew the fate of the American chestnut trees. I took a bite of delicious dressing containing a morsel of chestnut, thought about the elms, and gave thanks.
In 1964, my depression-era father was fortunate enough to purchase an estate of 8 acres. The first order of business to cut down 30 plus trees afflicted with Dutch elm disease. It made an impression. Back then it was okay to dispose of them by making a fire. The logs burned incandescently hot. The tree surgeon was some non-abstemious guy from Amish country. He spit tobacco and said, "Yeah yep, you could really roast some wieners in there."
Two decades later, my mother's rural cousin gave us some chestnuts from a grove he tended in a remote area. I knew the fate of the American chestnut trees. I took a bite of delicious dressing containing a morsel of chestnut, thought about the elms, and gave thanks.
7
We have one white ash thriving on our property. I can see its' fifteen year old crown on a hill among young persimmon, cedar, sweet gum, cherry, and willow oak. Heavy with seeds every year, it seems to have temporarily escaped the notice of emerald ash borers but I know its only a matter of time.
Curse short-sighted public officials without the inclination to require a vigorous policy of import controls and inspections. Americans can't even bring themselves to protect this source of the Louisville Slugger.
Curse short-sighted public officials without the inclination to require a vigorous policy of import controls and inspections. Americans can't even bring themselves to protect this source of the Louisville Slugger.
10
This exquisite, elegiac piece resonates deeply and gives me a word to capture the grief I feel when I look at the scarred hills around me, littered with the skeletons of ponderosa pines, most of which are now so crumbled that it is really their ghosts that remain in my memory. I did not notice the author's name when I set out to read the essay, but felt no surprise at all to learn that the genius behind one of my top three books of 2015 is the writer.
7
just two days ago I was asked to write a letter to the Georgia State Department of Forestry to object to their plans to cut another stand of old growth tulip and oak trees. Their reason was that they wanted to increase grouse habitat. Not the right way to go about it when there are plenty of previously cut areas that could be recut and only have mediocre trees instead. But I'm sure the driving factor is that clear cutting large old trees will bring in more revenue from the sale of the timber!
11
i grew up on Elm St. in a boston suburb and it was one those towns that once upon a time had elm trees lining the main street. the hurricane of 1938 took down a lot of them. i just drove through that town on my way home from work and i can remember the trees along the main street that are long gone, because they were friends. we were familiar with their shapes, their bark, the odd growths that one in front of the house had, the little secret hole in another one. the dogwoods my father planted in our yard 55 years ago are gone, and the maples along the sidewalk are gone too, but there are other trees that have grown and matured since i have been out of the neighborhood. one of my earliest memories is watching out the back door while men cut up the fallen maples after a hurricane in 1955. every time i smell freshly cut wet wood i go right back to that scene.
6
I wish I had been alive to see the immense white pines that covered the state of Maine, before the King's Navy's broad arrow marked the greatest of them to be felled for ships' masts. I do remember the majestic Elms that lined the street my grandparents lived on in Maine. Their shade was exquisite in the hot summer. My son can see them only in fading photos.
10
The tree photo captioned, "American elm" is not one.
5
HawksAloft of Liverpool says, "The tree photo captioned, 'American elm' is not one."
Doesn't look like the elms I remember from Central New York, either; the trees in the background look more typical. But if you google American elm pix, this tree and others with this habitus come up.
So, if it isn't an American elm, what is it? Anybody?
Doesn't look like the elms I remember from Central New York, either; the trees in the background look more typical. But if you google American elm pix, this tree and others with this habitus come up.
So, if it isn't an American elm, what is it? Anybody?
1
Can't see it very well, but it could be a Liriodendron.
1
We're already doing the Great Forgetting (or Never Knowing) of the natural diversity and incredible vitality that used to characterize the communities of Earth's creatures.
However, there are a few things that give a measure of hope. Here's one: I live in a part of the U.S. where green ashes, planted as much as a century ago, are by FAR the dominant town/city/neighborhood tree, and with the emerald ash borer approaching, they're almost certainly doomed. But -- the city forestry staff here are encouraging (in some cases, in the city-owned boulevard strips, requiring) that resistant strains of elm be planted. In 50-100 years, assuming the climate will allow it, there will be an urban forest of elms here.
However, there are a few things that give a measure of hope. Here's one: I live in a part of the U.S. where green ashes, planted as much as a century ago, are by FAR the dominant town/city/neighborhood tree, and with the emerald ash borer approaching, they're almost certainly doomed. But -- the city forestry staff here are encouraging (in some cases, in the city-owned boulevard strips, requiring) that resistant strains of elm be planted. In 50-100 years, assuming the climate will allow it, there will be an urban forest of elms here.
11
The American Chestnut was an anchor in the habitat and for that reason it makes perfect sense to find a resistant solution. The concept of either/or: prevent new or emerging threats or resuscitate past trees makes no sense. Do both. Such efforts are sequential in time and space. As you bring back one, a new threat requires the cycle again.
American Chestnuts nuts are edible and the wood fantastic.
American Chestnuts nuts are edible and the wood fantastic.
10
This article reflects the daily grief that I feel, for the beauty of our world, for my children,for the plants and animals.
l live in the NW now.My favorite view has always been the Olympic mountain range, glowing with white even in late summer. That started changing about 3 years ago - now the entire range is dull brown. The snowpack is gone; the glaciers are melting.
When my young adult children discuss having children - the future is the main subject. I don't know what to tell them.
If you read reputable scientific sources, catastrophic climate tipping or collapse is coming. It is predicted now, by 2045 - which means it will be sooner, as all the other changes are accelerating.
l live in the NW now.My favorite view has always been the Olympic mountain range, glowing with white even in late summer. That started changing about 3 years ago - now the entire range is dull brown. The snowpack is gone; the glaciers are melting.
When my young adult children discuss having children - the future is the main subject. I don't know what to tell them.
If you read reputable scientific sources, catastrophic climate tipping or collapse is coming. It is predicted now, by 2045 - which means it will be sooner, as all the other changes are accelerating.
20
The Olympics for years have been my favorite Lower 48 mountain range. I was shocked and saddened to see that there was a relatively serious forest fire on the WEST side of the range this summer. Man o' man, what's it going to be like in twenty years?
2
Dr. M of San Franscisco speaks of "the daily grief that I feel, for the beauty of our world, for my children, for the plants and animals."
I share your grief. The overarching avenue of elms on South Street in Auburn live now only in memory; the monarchs floating in clouds across the Texas garden became a few hardy travelers; evergreens above the Clearwater are succcumbing to insects and disease as well as fire. My children don't even speak of children except to say that the future looks too desperate. Now I'm wondering if we ourselves, not to mention our children, will live a normal lifespan before drought, famine, and resulting mass migration make life a living hell. A grim vision, to be sure, but given the denials at the Reagan Library of what is happening before our eyes, it looks all too realistic.
I share your grief. The overarching avenue of elms on South Street in Auburn live now only in memory; the monarchs floating in clouds across the Texas garden became a few hardy travelers; evergreens above the Clearwater are succcumbing to insects and disease as well as fire. My children don't even speak of children except to say that the future looks too desperate. Now I'm wondering if we ourselves, not to mention our children, will live a normal lifespan before drought, famine, and resulting mass migration make life a living hell. A grim vision, to be sure, but given the denials at the Reagan Library of what is happening before our eyes, it looks all too realistic.
8
Alas not many people actually want trees to achieve maturity or for "them to tower above us." Far too many just want to cut them down..most often for profit...some times for safety. I am sad at safe parks that lost their masters.
8
A lovely commentary on the mutability of landscape, and thus of life. . . Now and then I activate Google Earth and zoom in on a particular oak tree still living on the lawn of my boyhood home. Though covered in the knots and whirls of old age, the tree has survived the vicissitudes of beetles, weather, and time. For a moment time whirls back, and I climb its solid trunk.
16
Mt. Mtichell in N.C. along the blue ridge parkway is one of the highest Mountains. There was a tower that you need to clinb to get views of the the Mt. ranges. There is no need to climb the tower anymore because ALL the trees are gone, all dead. Joyce Kilmer park was full of Old Growth trees. Huge, they had never been timbered, now dying. Go soon as they won't last much longer.
A touching essay about trees and the complete destruction of life on our planet. Your children won't have time to wonder about the loss of the
trees and fauna they will be struggling to survive as the planet turns hot and the oceans rise, drought, all wildlife gone. we are the last generation to have had a chance to see our beautiful world now slowly being destroyed by the human infestation.
A touching essay about trees and the complete destruction of life on our planet. Your children won't have time to wonder about the loss of the
trees and fauna they will be struggling to survive as the planet turns hot and the oceans rise, drought, all wildlife gone. we are the last generation to have had a chance to see our beautiful world now slowly being destroyed by the human infestation.
13
This is a tragedy, and Ms. MacDonald writes eloquently of it. No, I'm wrong. It is not a tragedy, it is THE tragedy. We are killing our Earth.
24
The pine/fir forests of Idaho, Washington, Montana, and Oregon have been devastated by bark-beetles. My heart aches to see this.
7
So many living things I miss, but there are survivors--I pray we celebrate the tough survivors instead of trying to destroy them in a vain attempt to return to the world of our childhood. Only the strong will survive the anthropocene.
3
I know and love the graceful forms and generous canopies of old, native elms in the urban "forest" of Washington, D.C. but have never seen the American chestnut, once abundant in the forests of the eastern US.
I have often wondered what the forests were like when abundant chestnuts still stood tall and fertile. Like the author, I reflect on coming generations who will not know the experience of beholding our plants, insects, or animals--our stately pines, graceful ashes, luxuriant hemlocks, our colorful pollinators, our talkative, melodious or quick-witted birds.
We humans appear to be inherently unable to prevent the destruction of the very environments we treasure--a tragic flaw, tragic to all.
I have often wondered what the forests were like when abundant chestnuts still stood tall and fertile. Like the author, I reflect on coming generations who will not know the experience of beholding our plants, insects, or animals--our stately pines, graceful ashes, luxuriant hemlocks, our colorful pollinators, our talkative, melodious or quick-witted birds.
We humans appear to be inherently unable to prevent the destruction of the very environments we treasure--a tragic flaw, tragic to all.
11
Say rather: We humans appear to be inherently unable to prevent ourselves from destroying the very environments we treasure.
2
Growing up in Kalamazoo in the early 70's, Dutch Elm disease was all around and my mother and grandmother would talk at length about the blight and loss of these beautiful giants. There was one in the woods behind our house, stark and white without any bark, surrounded by healthy trees, that scared me. I had asked my mother what happens when trees die, and she'd replied almost offhandedly that they eventually just fall over. Several nights later I woke her up in the middle of the night to ask, as she remembered it: how do dead elms fall theirselves? (I was 3 or 4 years old). She couldn't comprehend what I was asking at first and then couldn't believe that I was so concerned about dead elms. But of course I had internalized her angst and combined it with my fear of death and the unknown and had a dead elm nightmare. Now I feel nostalgiac, like the author of the article, for the landscape of my childhood but also for my long-dead mother who so loved Michigan elms. She and they taught me in important early lesson about seeing what is all around you and treasuring what is most familiar.
11
Nice mention about The American Chestnut Foundation and their backcross breeding efforts!
10
Trees are the lungs of the planet. Every loss, every extinction of a species diminishes us as humans and endangers us - literally. As the landscape becomes mono-cultured (i.e., brutalized into sameness), so it goes for our lives.
When we allow ourselves to become disconnected from nature we merely speed up to the time when we too will be extinguished as a species. Humanity's ultimate extinction is arguably inevitable, but we could/should try taking our foot off the accelerator.
When we allow ourselves to become disconnected from nature we merely speed up to the time when we too will be extinguished as a species. Humanity's ultimate extinction is arguably inevitable, but we could/should try taking our foot off the accelerator.
14
It's a tough road to travel. Once the scales fall from your eyes and you are aware of the plants and animals around you, you undoubtedly recognize their peril. Driving through the Meadowlands to the NJ Turnpike a few weeks ago, a friend remarked "how beautiful" looking over the endless field of invasive Phragmites and I was almost jealous of her naivete. It can be depressing. But it's important. It's our duty to be the people to speak up and remember the way things were, so that we can instill their loss in the minds of those capable of stemming the tide of development. Also, overall, knowledge of the natural world make life so much more fascinating and beautiful. People, compared to trees, can be so dull.
9
There's a line in David Mitchell's novel "Black Swan Green": "Trees're always a relief, after people."
1
A temperate forest is occupied by trees as well as animals, fungi and soil microbes. I'm not aware of any disease that brings down acres and acres of tropical tree canopy in native rain forests. It appears that for undisturbed forests the greater the diversity of tree species the lesser effect by introduced tree diseases. This is another reason why we should immediately end tree plantations in northern forests. The so-called best practices has been quietly destroying our northern species' forest. I long for forest diversity again. I cringe every time I drive by Massachusetts state forests.
8
"some commentators regard them as a diversion: They believe it would be better to put resources into preventing new diseases than attempting to cure old ones..."
Alas, the idea of prevention of new invasions, or newly evolved pathogens, is pure delusion. Globalization and the increasing movement of people across borders - many with no care for plant quarantines - insure that diseases will continue to move.
Remember, however: wherever that pathogen came from - it was in evolutionary balance with its hosts - or it would not exist. Recreating the balance - works. Proven.
As you can see here: http://badgersettresearch.blogspot.com/2015/09/chestnut-harvest-looming-...
On the farm of the founding president of the American Chestnut Foundation - big chestnut trees - that live with the blight.
Alas, the idea of prevention of new invasions, or newly evolved pathogens, is pure delusion. Globalization and the increasing movement of people across borders - many with no care for plant quarantines - insure that diseases will continue to move.
Remember, however: wherever that pathogen came from - it was in evolutionary balance with its hosts - or it would not exist. Recreating the balance - works. Proven.
As you can see here: http://badgersettresearch.blogspot.com/2015/09/chestnut-harvest-looming-...
On the farm of the founding president of the American Chestnut Foundation - big chestnut trees - that live with the blight.
3
Very thoughtful piece, thanks for sharing! The US Forest Service has several research scientists looking at the opposite of this issue... they are working with people to understand how planting trees can help with human and community loss. Check out Restorative Commons: http://www.treesearch.fs.fed.us/pubs/18810
4
This is a beautiful and touching essay, one that makes me miss the trees that have disappeared from my life. When I visit my dad's old neighborhood in Fort Worth, Texas, the shade trees in the house yards are dead for miles. When I drive through Colorado whole mountainsides are made up of thousands of dead trees. There is a canyon at Navajo National Monument where aspen trees grew because the canyon stayed cool year round, even though it was the desert. Now those aspens are dying. Nature is telling us something. Will we listen?
23
Globalization !
4
Will we Listen? You know the answer to that. Does it need to be said ? NO - we won't listen. It is too late already. The Human Baby Making Factory Churns away Globally as we read this.
For some only Human Life is apparently "Sacred". Somewhere along the way those humans Forget that Other life needs to exist on this Planet also.
This Article - so Sad beyond telling, yet so True
For some only Human Life is apparently "Sacred". Somewhere along the way those humans Forget that Other life needs to exist on this Planet also.
This Article - so Sad beyond telling, yet so True
Tree lovers who related to this poignant article might also enjoy this series of short (2-3 minute) podcasts and written pieces about 'tree's I've loved' - stories of the trees we've connected to as individuals ... plus a longer podcast exploring the longstanding human connection, and ambivalence to trees, going back to the time of Gilgamesh. (top three pieces are longer works, the rest you can dip into)
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/projects/trees/
The idea was to engage the heart, as well as the intellect, concerning the death of trees, whether deliberate or indirectly as a result of human activity. If we emote to these stories of trees loved all round the world, we may remember our own loved tree... and then might then step forward to take responsibility for more distant forests of this planet. But it starts in the back yard...trees of this planet.
Recommend also Forests: shadow of civilisation by Robert Pogue Harrison, Prof of Literature at Stanford.