Now that temperatures are dipping down below freezing, this is where the buzz saws are going to start meeting the tree bark.There seems to be some level of contentious debate amongst city, state, and federal officials on how to best go about this harvesting of infested trees, here in Worcester.
Where, on the one hand, the feds seem to be leaning towards wiping out 20,000 trees this fall, our local guys, on the other hand, are more interested in saving any trees that might not be infested at all. The real poser in all of this is, "What's the cost of erring on the side of caution?"
Well, I'm glad that I don't have to decide. It's bad enough that there are now 4,500 trees that are definitely identified as having been made into homes for the Asian Longhorned Beetle. But I do tend to think that chopping down another 15,500 trees for "suspicion" might just give the word "overkill" its most accurate usage ever.
3 comments:
Remember the consequences if we're wrong here, Jeff:
the northern hardwood forest
Yup. The cost of erring on the side of caution is a whole heck of a lot more than 20,000 trees.
Yeah. It stinks that it's *our* 20,000 trees, but when you think of the White Mountain National Forest, or the Canadian maple industry, or the hardwood forests of Maine, it pales in comparison.
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