You may think nothing much happens in Witter Springs. You couldn’t be more wrong. We have our share of excitement and fireworks as much as in the big city. An example is what happened last week. A tree fell down. It was not just any tree. It was the largest tree in the grove of oak trees that have been growing in back of my house since before I was a gleam in my papa’s eye.
There are 16 oaks out there in the back pasture. They cover an area of about 2 acres and they sit on the north side of my hayfield. When I go out to service my well, which sits in the middle of the grove, that walk is pleasant. The trees make nice shade, they keep the grove 10 degrees cooler on the hottest summer days and they are nice to look at.
The first I heard of the catastrophe was when my neighbor, Linda, called me.
“Gene, did you know one of your trees fell down?”
I did not. I never heard the sound of the crash. I am a sound sleeper. It must have happened during the night when I was asleep. I went out to the field right away to look at the damage. That tree had, very considerately, expired and fallen in a direction away from my all-important well and well motor. I was relieved. If anything damaged the well motor or the pipes out in my back pasture without my well I would be in the soup for certain.
This particular tree was an anomaly. It was the largest of the oaks; 6 feet in diameter at its base and more than a 100 years old. What made it most unusual of all the oaks in back was that the trunk was one of twins. That is, the fallen tree and its brother had grown out of the same root base. Both trees were about 80 feet tall. The oak that fell had split cleanly at the base as though a giant ax had cut it vertically. Besides laying all the way across the entire grove it stretched into the hay field. The corpse looked like a pathetic beached whale.
Nothing much changes in Witter Springs. When one of the giants fall it is a source of mystery and speculation. Like the time the 200-year-old oak in the next field fell down. It fell five years ago and I told that story another time. My dear wife predicted the fall a day before anyone suspected that tree would give up the ghost. The bones of its remains are still out there in the field for anyone to see its dry woody corpse.
Unlike that old graybeard of a tree, which fell because it was rotten at its hollow core, this latest arboreal fatality was a perfectly healthy oak tree. There was no wind to speak of the night or day before so I figured it was the weight. It’s misfortune was that it grew up leaning outward more than its twin. As it grew older and added tons and tons to its trunk and branches the added weight pulled it off center. The giant split at the base like a wishbone.
The happening got more complicated. The tree fell into my hayfield. That was a true misfortune since my hay crop pays my taxes. The space the branches cover cut 40 bales of hay off my crop. It had to be cut up and the branches had to be moved away from the hayfield before spring when the grass begins to grow.
I had just put my chain saw away for the winter. Until that happened there was no reason to take my trusty chain saw out of hibernation until next spring. That’s when I planned to prune the orchard and the pines around my house. I had all the firewood I could use for several winters so I didn’t need the wood.
Linda solved my problem.
“I can use the firewood. My son, Thomas, will cut the tree up for you and move the brush off the hayfield.”
Great. Linda bakes me wonderful apple pies and I owed her big time. I was happy to give her the firewood. This morning, while I was down by the barn watering some trees, I heard Thomas’s chain saw working. He was at work sawing up the fallen tree and I heaved a sigh of relief. My hayfield will be ready by spring.
