Friday, January 23, 2009

Once Mighty, Now Fallen

We've been doing more "property improvements"....
Have you noticed that my definition of improvements always involves removing things? Like the cedar trees, the fountain, and the fence?
Well, we've been at it again.

BEFORE:

AFTER:

At first glance, the "Before" picture actually looks better, because of the insanely green spring we had last year. And now our yard looks all stumpy. (Note to self: Nag the husband into doing something about that.)

But due to the wind storm we had the end of December, the huge cedar tree in our front yard had to come down. I knew it was getting old and had a hollow spot in it, but about two weeks after the wind storm, I walked out to the mailbox and as I walked under it, I was like, "Why is that creaking and popping so much?"

So I looked up, and there were about three cracks running up and down the tree, and the whole crown was twisting side to side in the breeze. Being that it is a 40 foot tree, and it is rooted only 15 feet from our house, I went inside and immideately made an appointment to get it cut down.

Once the guy came and cut it down, we found out that pretty much the whole trunk was hollow. It wouldn't have lasted another wind storm.

Bad thing is: no shade. Our front yard looks huge now with all of those trees gone, but this end of our house is going to be hot come summer. We were going to wait until some trees were established before we cut that big cedar down, but oh well. Better no shade than a damaged house.

Any reccomendations for a fast growing shade tree? I'm thinking a sugar maple.

1 comment:

Doug or Janice Rhodes said...

Ask your father-in-law to dig up the little trees around here again. Have you noticed how big our "little" maples are now??