What's Left

This is what is left from Marilyn's tree adventure yesterday. I thought the information that this stump gives us to be quite interesting.

First, you can count the rings and I come up with 46 - 48. Marilyn told me the tree was planted a little over 40 years ago. The tree was probably a few years old when it was planted - so, that works. The distance between the rings also tells an interesting weather history. These rings are pretty consistently spaced. That means the weather (rain and temp) were pretty consistent over the life of the tree - that works too as San Jose's weather is rarely extreme. I actually believe I can see a few rings in two places that are closer together than the others. These match up pretty well with two droughts we've had over the last 40 or more years. During times of less rain, a tree will not grow as much, hence the rings will show less distance from one to another during these times.

The heart of the tree has a dark star or spider look from the center - I have been told that this is the heart of the disease the tree had which was weakening it. The bark is also very thin - this is not normal with this type of Ash tree. I'm to understand this is also an indicator of the tree being infested or diseased. Finally, the base of the tree had lost all of it's bark and the cambium was entirely exposed. This is what led the aborists to target the tree for removal. It was over 60 feet tall and had a girth of 38". If this tree fell over in a wind, it would do serious damage to whatever it hit (the front window of the house was in the direction of the tree's lean). Every year hundreds of people die from injuries as a result of trees that topple over in the wind or fall over from disease or poor conditions. Another interesting tidbit; most private lawsuits between neighbors are sponsored by something to do with trees...

The hummingbird has already found a new tree for it's elevated perch.

Marilyn is sad, but it was for the best.