Tree Trauma

Well, yesterday was the most unpleasant day I've had in a while. The tree trimmers were here to do a pretty drastic cutback of our hazels and Philadelphus, and they did not disappoint. They arrived about 8:30 a.m. and they worked without stopping until about 3 p.m.

I pretty much left them to their own devices, except for stepping outside now and then to see how things were going. I figure, they're the professionals, and they don't need me hanging over them nagging about every little root and twig. But I kept up a constant watch from the house.

The whole experience made me feel invaded. Like, my private space that I tend so carefully, where I know the story behind every plant, seemed really violated. This was partly because they were fairly rough about removing branches and they did some damage to our other plantings. I know we lost at least one rose bush, broken off at the base, as well as at least one flowerpot, and there are countless little plants that were trampled and may or may not come up again in the spring. At least it's October and many of them were dying back anyway, but still, it was on the whole a very unnerving experience.

Granted, they had to remove a lot of stuff, and overall they did a good job and did what needed to be done. But geez, it was stressful.

Before:

After:

These are pano shots so the garden is a bit distorted. That clump of trees in the center are the hazels, which as you can see we reduced in both height and density. I'd say they took about half of the trunks out, which will give that side of the garden much more sun. We'd actually lost some plants in that bed because it had become so shady, so hopefully this will make a difference.

The biggest Philadelphus is just to the right of the hazels, and that has been cut down by about two-thirds, almost to the height of the fence. It's just a collection of sticks now. As a result we can see more of the houses and rooflines in that direction, and our next door neighbor will get a lot more light, too. It should leaf out from its lower height come spring, unless we've traumatized it so much that it just gives up the ghost, and that wouldn't be a terrible thing.

I have to go out there today and do some more cleanup and damage assessment. And I have to write the landlords and fill them in on the work -- since they're splitting this expense with us.

I'm happy to see that this morning, there's been no reduction in birds coming to our bird feeders or other wildlife activity. I was worried about how removing so much dense foliage might affect the birds.

On a brighter note, we got out the "staffy pajamas" we bought for Olga a couple of years ago. Bailey seems to like them a lot more than Olga did!