Tree Down, Hedge Havoc

Eight years ago today our caretaker, Doug Decker, sent me an understated message — almost deadpan, if a text message’s tone might be so qualified — about a tree that had succumbed to high winds. Sadly, climate change has made these occurrences increasingly frequent. With frequency comes familiarity, and with familiarity comes not quite indifference but a degree of dispassion. Even nonchalance. But the second part of Doug’s message grabbed my attention. Tree down, hedge havoc. That’s my sum up. His words appear shortly.

It was March 17, 2017, and Susan and I were in Santa Fe, New Mexico climbing Sun Mountain with her cousin, Cali, and her cousin’s older daughter, Emma. St. Patrick’s day with an altitude adjustment and a panoramic high desert view. Bluebird sky, temperate, challenging but mostly unpeopled ascent. Happy dog. Happy guests. Happy hosts. All good. Until Doug’s message dinged on my phone. Accompanying his phlegmatic update were a couple dozen photographs (including those in this post) documenting the damage.

Doug: Just to let you know about a tree that came down and knocked some of the hedge row down north of driveway.

Geo: Wow! Major damage.

Doug: Yeah, that huge maple knocked everything down in its path.

Geo: You’re doing the right thing. Show me photographs once you’ve got it cleaned up so that I can assess the damage to the cedars, and I’ll make a decision on how to proceed once I can see what it looks like. I did love that big maple tree, so it’s disappointing, but glad it didn’t smash the stone wall.

The privacy hedge bordered the north side of Rosslyn’s front lawn. It was already mature when we purchased the property in 2006. Over-mature, really, like a similar hedge that grew west of the ell, edging the driveway as it arced toward the carriage barn. In both bases the arborvitae (often referred to colloquially as cedar in the North Country despite not actually in the genus Cedrus). And, as is want to happen when combining overgrowth (height), underdevelopment (roots), and wind, the overachieving hedge stock had begun succumbing to gravity long before we arrived.

The driveway hedge was gone by 2017, removed once too few arborvitae remained to even suggest a hedge. And enough holes in the hedge along the north side of the front lawn had prompted conversations more than once about the inevitability of replacing the hedge. But the arborvitae (and a few other miscellaneous evergreens that had been planted over a couple of decades to fill gaps in the hedge) offered an agreeable screen. And we both recognized that replacing the hedge would result in at least a few years of sparse screening as the trees established, thickened, and began to put on height.

And there was another challenge. Whitetail deer love to browse arborvitae in the late winter when food is less abundant. Replacing the hedge with younger arborvitae would result in a feeding frenzy in late February and early March. We could wrap and fence, but nature tends to win.

All this by way of backstory for St. Patrick’s Day 2017 when Doug’s message and photos arrived.

The overgrown hedge with underdeveloped root balls (common with nursery grown hedge stock) had gradually been admitting defeat, one stem at a time. Now a massive maple had accelerated our timetable for hedge replacement!

Thank you, Doug!