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Conservation Commission

Conservation and More

              by Bruce B. Beckley

Issue #32, August 26, 1997
The Savin Tree

A savin tree marked one of the bounds nearly 100 years ago when the Moose Hill Wildlife Sanctuary was established. The savin, now commonly known as red cedar, wasn’t the only interesting tree on that pioneer preserve. In the backyard, summer camp groups met under a scion of the Washington Elm that had stood in Cambridge and down the Big Pine Trail was, you guessed it, the tree that even a century ago was called the Big Pine.

Trees become a part of us, a part of our homes, and a part of our lore like the Charter Oak in Connecticut. Once as we crossed Montana, the Big Sky Country, I was impressed with the space, the stars at night and the absence of trees. Trees were so scarce that homesteaders were rewarded for planting groves such as the groves that now have become shaded rest stops along I-94. What place in your family’s lore do trees have? Consider planting a tree with a child so the two can grow together.

In our family, we kids grew up knowing trees. We knew which wood could be split and which you had to unscrew. We learned that trees take time. Newcomers from the city would come and hurry to scalp the land to get a view of the lake. It took us two decades of pruning lower branches to achieve the view and keep the forest canopy. Where we live now no one tree is distinctive. Instead, singularity has been replaced by a variety of over two dozen tree species on the lot from apples and ash to tupelo and walnut.

Trees are special and fun. Hemlocks are my favorite – easy to climb, pungent after the rain, and with a green softness whether in filtered sunlight or snow. Carolyn and Ted travel a lot. To pass the miles, they will pick out a tree far down the road and challenge the other to identify it long before the car can cover the distance. Francie Nolan’s special tree grew out of the concrete of Brooklyn. "… Some people called it the Tree of Heaven. No matter where its seed fell, it made a tree which struggled to reach the sky. It grew in boarded-up lots and out of neglected rubbish heaps, and it was the only tree that grew out of cement. It grew lushly, but only in tenement districts…"

(Hum, we had one behind our home in New Canaan. Now there’s a condo where our house was. I guess the tree knew.)

Trees are the subject of much literature and advice. Joyce Kilmer’s Trees concludes "…Poems are made by fools like me, but only God can make a tree." Mary Carolyn Davies wrote in Be Different To Trees ,

The talking oak to the ancients spoke.
But any tree will talk to me.
What truths I know, I garnered so.
But those who want to talk and tell,
       And those who will not listeners be,
Will never hear a syllable
      From the lips of any tree.

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Geneva, Illinois Voters in this Chicago suburb authorized $16,000,000 to purchase 400 acres from a developer to save tax dollars and preserve dwindling open space. The vote was something like 4,800 in favor and 200 opposed. Folks there have the message.

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Finally, the writer of Proverbs 15:4 has one for this columnist:

"A gentle tongue is a tree of life."

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