Englewood, FL - They made their protest signs
with 8x11 inch paper, taped on rulers or whatever was handy in their desks at
Englewood Elementary School. During recess, 8-10 fourth grade girls,
marched around a gnarled and knotted slah pine chanting, "Save our
tree! Save our tree!" The boys did not join in, but they knew
better then to mock the procession. They kept their distance, perhaps out
of deference to the message on one sign and its accompanying chant, "Don't
cut it down or we'll pound you to the ground." It was Tuesday.
The day before, the kids had rushed back to class with alarming news.
Someone had chopped down three of the pines that towered over their
playground. A fourth marked with a big X, would soon follow, they
reported. One of the boys had collected an armful of pinecones. He
said he was keeping them as the last living things to come from the trees.
They did know they had lost their shade, the playground looked bare, and they
wanted to do something about it. The news spread quickly to parents.
One of them asked a deputy sheriff who stays in a trailer on the school campus,
if he knew anything about it. No one told him anything, he said. If
they had he would have moved his car, which was crushed by the largest of the
trees, a 150 year old specimen with a 36-inch diameter, as it fell. It
turns out the school had valid reasons for removing the pines. Winds
during the last few weeks had damaged them, Principal Melida Barton said
Wednesday. A closer examination had revealed a disease, difficult to
cure. Barton said she had the trees cut quickly to try to keep the disease
from spreading. A rotten core caused one tree to split and crush the
deputy's car as it was cut. "I'm thinking, Thank God I had it taken
down or it could have fallen on some children," the principal said.
The ruckus over the felling may have surprised Barton, but it really shouldn't
have. In the United States, we've always taken our bounty of resources for
granted. Now we're beginning to see that clean water, clean air, animals,
plants and even room to move are not infinite. This is what Englewood
Elementary has been teaching its children through the traditional curriculum and
through special activities such as enviromental and history fairs. Judging
from the reactions to the tree-cutting, the kids have learned their lessons
well. If schools around the world are having the same success, there's
hope for the planet. Englewood Elementary students have planted trees for
years, before it became vogue. Now, the kids are going to plant trees
where the old ones stood. They couldn't save the pines, but they know why
and they get to do something about it.
-Eric Ernst, Sarasota Herald
Tribune
