OK, I confess- I am passionately, and up until now, quietly, working to remove toxic chemicals and toxic practices from the wonderful world of arboriculture (the art, science technology, and business of tree care). Most of us think trees are good, but we don’t all know why. We also don’t, for the most part, think much about them until they fall down, break something, turn brown, begin to lift the driveway, or start dripping sticky stuff on our cars. Sadly, most of us don’t know how to care for our trees and other landscaping. We trust that the mow and blow guy is a genius in all things and would never dream of doing anything to hurt our precious plants. This may not the way to handle these leafy creatures that can shelter, cool and please us, and make our properties look spiffy. We probably spend more time deciding where to eat lunch than we do making sure that the landscape we are responsible for, that we paid for, is well cared for by people who truly specialize in such things.

 Not to say that there aren’t mow and blow guys who know about trees, but I guarantee they are not likely to know the latest and most prudent practices of eco-friendly landscaping. Perhaps you have had such an experience in your own yard, where your prize ornamentals were all treated equally-sheared off at the knees, sprayed with who-knows-what and left gasping for proper attention. Proper pruning will never look bad.

It is finally becoming “chic” to be ecologically responsible for your trees, for your property-no matter how large or small. Many of you have been doing this forever-greenies to your souls. Not using toxic chemicals and unnecessary fertilizers on your trees and other landscape plants is the way to be “IN“, although millions have been living this way for totally different reasons having nothing to do with popularity-only a growing sense of comman sense. I assure you, this does not mean that you have to have a shabby looking landscape, insect riddled gardens, or anything less than absolutely beautiful! There are hundreds of very fine products out there that work without polluting the water sources, giving your children and pets cancer, killing every earthworm for miles, or murdering the birds that come to your place looking for a snack.

There are amazing professionals–gardeners, arborists, ecologists out there who specialize in these marvelous things and can guide you towards healthy and beneficial personal green spaces. You will have the best of gardens, “Eco-Chic” gardens, environmentally responsible practices abounding, birds galore (without hanging feeders), butterflies, ladybugs (without buying them in bags) and your friends, secretly jealous, because you thought of it first.
 2010 Shades of Green Horticulture

Think of a tree. When you think of a tree, you tend to think of a distinctly defined object; and on a certain level, it is. But when you look more closely at the tree, you will see that ultimately it has no independent existence. When you contemplate it, you will find that it dissolves into an extremely subtle net of relationships that stretches across the universe. The rain that falls on its leaves, the wind that sways it, the soil that nourishes and sustains it, all the seasons and the weather, moonlight and starlight and sunlight - all form part of this tree. As you begin to think about the tree more and more, you will discover that everything in the universe helps to make the tree what it is, that it cannot at any moment be isolated from anything else, and that at every moment its nature is subtly changing.
– Sogyal Rinpoche, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying

Have you ever noticed a tree standing naked against the sky, how beautiful it is? All its branches are outlined, and in its nakedness there is a poem, there is a song. Every leaf is gone and it is waiting for the spring. When the spring comes, it again fills the tree with the music of many leaves, which in due season fall, and are blown away. And this is the way of life.  ~Krishnamurti

In my nursing school choir long ago, we sang a song called “Green Cathedral”. It was about a forest where one could go and commune with Nature, or a Higher Power, or just sit there and be with the trees. As I think of it now, it was a hymn praising the magnificence of trees and their profound effect upon us. Many years later I still love the words:

I know a green cathedral,
a hallowed forest shrine. Where trees in love join hands above
to arch your prayer and mine.

Within its cool depths sacred, the priestly cedar sighs.
And the fir and pine lift arms divine
unto the clear blue skies.

In my dear green cathedral
there is a quiet seat.
And choir loft in branched croft where songs of birds hymn sweet.

At the time, it was just a slow song with high notes that I could not hit as an alto. I remember looking out the window of the dormitory, wondering how long those gigantic trees with huge white flowers and equally huge shiny dark green leaves had been growing there. I found out later that they were  southern magnolias  planted before the Civil War. And so my fascination with trees began. And although I did take an extended detour before becoming an arborist, I still think of the magnolias on Monument Avenue in Richmond, Virginia in fall, my favorite season of all. The magnolias are in bloom here in Placer County too, and the leaves of liquidambar, pistache, ash, maple, and pear are beginning to hint at the spectacular show to come.

So here is my first fall article, a compilation of Odes to planting and honoring trees-trees that make shade, trees of brilliant color, trees that feed us, trees that shelter and feed the wildlife so abundant and diverse, little trees to put in pots, big trees to make bold statements, trees to build a cabin or secretly protect a nest of robins.

• Trees are the best monuments that a man can erect in his own memory. They speak his praises without flattery and they are blessings to children yet unborn.

                                                                                                Lord Orrey, 1749

• Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.

                                                                                                Warren Buffet

• A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in.

                                                                                              Greek  Proverb                                                       

• Even if I knew tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.

                                                                                                Martin Luther (1483-1546)

• A man does not plant a tree for himself; he plants it for posterity.

                                                                                                Anonymous

• As the poet said, “Only God can make a tree”, probably because it is so hard to figure out how to get the bark on.

                                                                                                Woody Allen