In defense of ‘trash trees’

Apparently, they do need defending.

A couple of weeks ago, on the radio from Austin, a Texas tree specialist used that expression dismissively, as in cut ‘em down, get rid of them. They are eye sores, good for nothing, so do just that.

That attitude was out of character for a preservationist. Just because they don’t all come from the nursery, gussied up for the grounds at the Governor’s Mansion, is no reason to not let them in.

Take a poll.

Ask the hawks that majestically swoop down patrolling the open pasture lands for a meal. They can be seen resting, scanning the horizon from the tops of some of these trees. Others – like natures juke-boxes the Mockingbirds – use the scraggly branches as defensive territory to nest.

While they and competitors spar for the best spot, they leave behind seeds that magically grow, and whose fruit wind up as dewberry pie.

These often misshapen, randomly located rest stops in an otherwise uniform, expansive panorama should be celebrated for their pluck.

[See the image above of one that stands at attention, stubbornly refusing to just go away.]

Next time you’re out in fields communing with the silence of the wind, the warmth of the sun, give these less-than-beautifuls their due.

They are part of Nature’s endless cycle of life too.