Friday, September 11, 2020

Trees...

See that conifer wedged between the neighbor's dark leaf maple and Clifford, our Magnolia macrophylla? The one directly over our garage? It's not our tree, it's in the backyard of our neighbors to the south, well the trunk is, all the branches seem to have grown out over our property.

This is what it looks like now. Late last week it came down, well, actually "it" was two fir trees and a pine, lined up east to west, what you see in the photo above is the eastern most tree. But they're all gone.

Here's the "before" view from the patio, looking south, over the shade pavilion.

Here you can see all three trunks, they'd been limbed up a bit in the past, mostly by Andrew as the limbs were laying on our garage roof and down over the fence.

Here is a better view of the third trunk, again all of this is our view looking south.

Here's our view from the back garden looking west. I've added this image to share the fact there used to be a third tall Douglas Fir tree between the two you see here, it was cut down in around 2007 to make room for the shared garage of the two homes that were built behind us. While we fought, and mourned, the loss of that tree, losing it let in a lot of sunlight, we have a much better view of sunsets than we would have had otherwise.

A little backstory on the latest tree removal...our neighbors—not the same homeowners who planted the trees—had contracted with a tree guy to remove the pine and drastically limb up the two firs, as well as remove a few limbs on their huge maple, they wanted a little light! When we floated the idea of paying to have the two firs taken out they were agreeable, after all as I mentioned the limbs of both trees were over our property, not theirs. We really appreciated their willingness to go forward with the removal, these trees dropped so much litter and created such extreme shade on our side, I was thrilled to think of them gone.

Of course I was not thrilled at the idea of conifer needles, cones, and possibly branches falling into the garden while the work was being done. So I pulled the plants that could have been toppled and we hung tarps to catch the debris.

Fancy!

There's the tree guy (Clayton) up in one of the firs doing his thing. He was amazing! Very little debris and no large branches fell onto the tarps.

This was the way things looked when I went in for lunch—that day was was the beginning of a hot stretch so I'd spent the morning out watering, and yes, watching.

After lunch here's what I came out of the back door and saw. Yep, that's Clayton way up at the top of a 40ft+ tree.

And here's the shocking light that greeted me the next day.

I have never seen light like that around the shade pavilion.

I could not stop staring, it was amazing.

Sunlight!

Photos of this area always had an off quality to the light, and frequently were blurry. Not anymore!

Yes I am smart enough to realize that a sudden change like this could be really bad for the plants. I know the light they'll receive is within the range of what they can tolerate (they'll be so much happier now!), but it is still a shock, since they've been in such deep shade.

The Podophyllum plieanthum are gonna be the most upset. Just in the first afternoon they had a bit of leaf burn. However I'm confident that next year when they leaf out they'll build up immunity (ha!) and be able to handle the brief bit of direct afternoon sun.

All of Clifford's leaves are facing north, it will be interesting to watch them re-orient, will they do it this year, before they fall? I wondered this as I took this photo last weekend, not yet knowing there was an intense windstorm headed our way and many of Clifford's leaves would be pulled from the tree.

The jungle cactus and tillandsia perched on Clifford's branches are also getting a lot more light.

It's nothing short of incredible, well, to me.

As I wrapped my head around the new normal I was also a little concerned about the upcoming heatwave. Temperatures in the high nineties and triple digits were forecast. Thankfully I would be around to keep an eye on things.

But then the forecast started to change. There would be wind, a lot of wind. Wind gusts that were extreme for later in the season when trees are bare, not in early September when they were still fully loaded with leaves. How would Clifford handle the wind without the buffer of the three conifers he's grown up with, right next door?

The wind kicked up late Monday afternoon and our power went out Monday evening, it was out for a few hours. Our local power company is very good about placing automated calls to let you know when they expect power to be restored, and then checking back to see that it was. The "power back on call" is what inspired the title of this post. The recording went something like this: "Your power should have been restored at...(9:25 pm)...the suspected cause of the outage was ... (TREES)..." it's a "fill in the blank" sort of recording where the time and cause are in a different voice than the basic information. The way the word "TREES" was pronounced said it all. Poor linemen, they must be so tired of the problems caused by trees.

I spent a lot of Monday night looking out the bedroom window watching Clifford's branches whip around, wondering if any would be left the next day. Thankfully only a few branches actually broke, and those were skinny ones that had a heavy seed pod at the end (no photos I'm afraid, they went out with the yard waste bin on Tuesday). There are a lot of magnolia leaves strewn around the garden now though, along with maple and dogwood from next door and Albizia julibrissin leaves from my tree. It's a mess...

The branches of the poor Paulownia tomentosa are almost stripped bare now. With the single digit humidly (and continued wind) when I took this photo on Tuesday, the 8th, the leaves were limp.

Paulownia leaf down.

The fuzzy opuntia (Opuntia orbiculata perhaps) has responded to the wind and the low humidity, poor thing.

Naturally the big leaves on all of my Tetrapanax were tested—with sustained wind speeds in the 20-30 MPH range for over 24 hours with gusts to 50 MPH.

And there were tillandsia down all over the garden.

Here's the biggest accident... a vent planter full of bromeliads fell off the fence and took out a dish planter on its way down. I'd pulled all my ceramic hanging planters but thought the fence planters would be okay. Thank god this was the worst of it, well, besides the overall mess that will take me days to clean up.

Surprisingly the jungle cactus all stayed safely tucked in their perch.

Out in the front garden the neighbor's conifer dropped a ton of needles, and their dogwood added leaves to the mess.

Right now these leaves are so dry that even when touched very softly they crumble into a million pieces. You know I want to get out there are start cleaning up. But...

The same day (Wednesday the 9th) I took the photos above (with the clear blue sky) the smoke later moved in. The wind, super low humidity and dry conditions all around our state—along with next to no rainfall since June—meant fires were popping up everywhere. Fueled by the wind, the fires are burning out of control, so many homes, and entire Oregon communities have been wiped out. Unprecedented numbers of people are evacuated. It seems the entire west coast is on fire and it is horrific. The light on Thursday never got brighter than this.

And the odd sepia tone to the light made the worsening burns on my podophyllum leaves even more dramatic.
As I hit "publish" on this post so many people I know are packed and ready to go when they are told to leave their homes. Others have had to leave already. Some have found homes for their animals, some have not. Some don't have a clue what they might be returning to. Some know there is nothing to return to. The forests are burning, the suburban trees are burning. My fingers are crossed that with the winds calming, the increased humidity, and the rain forecast for next week the tide will turn and preserve what is still standing.

—   —   —

 Weather Diary, Sept 10: Hi 81, Low 61/ Precip 0

All material © 2009-2020 by Loree Bohl for danger garden. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited and just plain rude.

28 comments:

  1. Fingers crossed for rain for WA and OR! The fires look as bad up there as they do down south here, or even worse. Here winds are shifting and the smoke has moderated a bit but the fires rage on.

    Time will tell if the plants in that area need to be changed, but on the whole the area looks much better (less cave-like). All that wind damage/mess--a way of life here in the Santa Ana Wind season. "Oh, what's been smashed today?"

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    1. Yes, time will definitely be the only way to learn what the plants think about their new conditions. As for the fires, well, it's just horrible.

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  2. I thought of you this morning when I heard the news that there were evacuations in the Portland area. You've faced both good and bad by turns this week it seems. I can appreciate your joy over the new light and, after an adjustment period, I'm sure the plants will welcome the change as well. I'm sorry you were hit by severe winds and I mourn the fires and the terrible air quality with you.

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    1. Luckily for us we're miles from the evacuation areas, not so for so many friends and colleagues. The air here however...it's just miserable.

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  3. Here in Phoenix our skies are totally dim with smoke. The smoke is very high in the atmosphere so we can not even smell it but we have had several dim smoky days do far.

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    1. Good that you can't smell it, here, even in the house, I feel like we're sitting around the campfire.

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  4. Looks like you will need your shade house in the future to give you some respite from your new sunny garden. I am amazed at watching those tree guys do their work. Most of them have been so careful about our plants. Glad to know you are OK. The ghastly fires are a concern even to those of us who live far away.

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    1. I watched him swing a branch back and forth getting the "flow" just right for him to drop it where he wanted it. Very impressive indeed.

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  5. Sorry to hear of the conditions down in your area. Very scary indeed! Always pros and cons to removing trees: shelter vs light; privacy vs planting space, etc. However, I think the removals are a boon as it makes for a much cheerier space. Thought your talk on Wed was very interesting.

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    1. Thanks for the kind words regarding the talk, I am so glad you were able to attend!

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  6. What a transformation - your shade pavilion is now really needed! It looks so different, the light and airiness is perfect.
    The news from your state is pretty horrific. My thoughts and prayers are with the thousands who are displaced. May rain relief come quickly.

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    1. I am so thankful there is rain in the forecast, now let's just pray it's actually rain, not dry lightening strikes.

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  7. There is not much more exciting than a neighbor tree that is de facto your tree going away. I've bee keeping track of the fire news out of Oregon for the last couple of days-since ours here in my county are mostly under control-but the smoke and the ash are still floating in from both north and south. Those wind events are the devil-and wildfires here have become an annual, instead of an every few years event. I was happy to see the NOAA forecast for rain in the PDX area Monday and beyond and I hope it happens for you.

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    1. Ya we're all counting on the rain showing up, I pray it's enough to actually do something for the fires.

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  8. I have mixed feelings about tree removals. Some is necessary, other not so much. And there is the question of what to do with shade plants that get a lot more sun. I was surprised to see the jungle cactus intact; I thought it be scattered to the wind. The shade pavilion does look wonderful with the added exposure.
    I heard on the radio that the air quality in the PNW is currently the worse in the world. As the fires in Oregon seem more unpredictable than ever, I hope you stay safe and don't need to evacuate.

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    1. There are definitely those that get carried away with removing trees, but these should have never been planted where they were. That said I am looking at my own cramscaping ways with new eyes...

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  9. Your post is about so much more than trees...I was delighted to hear how you were able to let the sun shine in. Doug firs and other conifers seed freely and suddenly they're way too big, blocking all the sunlight and shedding pollen, sap, needles everywhere. And they fall down in the winds. It's always a sad thing to remove them. I think you did the right thing. You really capture that transition from light to darkness in the ensuing days so well here. Take care. Hoping this smoke goes away soon so we can get back into the garden.

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    1. Me too, or even open a window! I miss being outdoors.

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  10. Blimey Loree!

    What a rollercoaster of emotions you have been through in a very short space of time.

    I hope that things settle down for you soon.

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    1. Well put Adam, it has been a rollercoaster!

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  11. It takes a lot to find you hoping for rain...and a lot to propel Portland into the national news outlets. I'm pulling for some boring old normalcy. Stay safe!
    rickii

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  12. Oh! So sorry about the damage. But that new light is like stepping into another space. Great idea. Love that!

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  13. Hi Loree! Your post reminded me of the shock I and my plants experienced in 2013 after our neighbors' huge alder was cut down. Then, my shade garden suddenly turned into a sunny garden; I remember crying while looking at all the plants scorched by the afternoon sun. With time, we managed to return some shade to that corner, but several plants clearly benefited from additional sun and perform even better now. I hope all your plants will be happy under the new conditions! That corner looks great with some sun!

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    1. Thank you Tatyana! There is still a big maple to provide some shade in the summertime, so I think they'll be fine once they've been able to adjust.

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  14. I wish we could go back to the days of ONLY dealing with a pandemic... so much simpler! I hope your friends make it through all this craziness. This post reminds me of a 3 act movie script - it just needs a third act where the problems are resolved.

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    1. Seriously! (only the pandemic) Unfortunately we have yet to progress to the third act, even now...

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