Felonious Pruning
Category: Kitchen Sink... Local...
Posted Tuesday, August 10, 2004 at 09:29 PM [GMT-6]

A disturbing trend is taking place in our previously quiet little neighborhood. Audacious assaults are being perpetrated upon the most helpless of our citizenry: our plants.

Abbye and I were presented with a most disturbing scene as we entered our park early this morning. A 15' ash tree was laying helplessly on its side, its trunk neatly severed at the four foot mark by some drunken yahoo with a bow saw who evidently found an opponent with an IQ to match his. (I suspect the bow saw, because there wasn't enough sawdust at the crime scene for a chainsaw diagnosis.)

Felling trees in public places in west Texas should be a capital offense, like horse thieving was in the good old days. Those in their right minds don't take trees for granted out here on the plains; none occur naturally, unless you count the occasional overachieving mesquite. To mortally vandalize a large healthy specimen is just downright nasty.

Unfortunately, this isn't the only example of recent crimes against foliage. A couple of weeks ago, sometime during the night, another apparently drunken yahoo drove his vehicle across our front drive and halfway through our hedge, taking out two 15-year-old elaeagnus pungens. What's worse, they were in the middle of the hedge, leaving me no choice but to remove three more plants in order to salvage the bed. I've checked every vehicle in the neighborhood for tell-tale fronds stuck to a bumper, but finding the culprit is a lost cause.

I won't say that these events have caused me to lose my faith in humanity, because I never had much to begin with. They're simply reminders to never underestimate the stupidity of yahoos. I just wish Audrey II was around to inflict a little floral justice upon the offenders.