[ECOLOG-L] Tree hazards and their management Re: [ECOLOG-L] Tree stump removal in sensitive area

Sun, 20 Jan 2013 16:49:01 -0800 

Nirmalya and Ecolog:

Contradict what?
People get killed and injured by falling trees and branches--true or false? The victims don't give a damn about the statistics and they and their loved ones don't care about how small the odds are. (Anecdote: A year or so ago a tree fell on a woman walking her dog, so humans are not the only casualties. Park officials were not blamed for failing to remove a potentially dangerous tree in a high-traffic area and they got away with blaming "God" again. The truth is that such bureaucracies refuse to scientifically analyze tree hazard potential, largely because it is politically risky. The lawyers [perhaps realistically] cynically point out that if an assessment program is in place, the responsible entity is more likely to lose in court, where if they do nothing the victims get nothing because it was "God's fault.")
Chatterjee knows that I am not advocating wholesale tree slaughter and "blaming the trees"--if those implications aren't a straw-man army, I don't know what is. He knows that I am restricting my point to the original issue (but openly and properly generalizing as to how similar cases should be handled) of whether or not it would be a good idea to leave a dead tree standing where it could cause damage, while acknowledging the value of snags to cavity-nesting birds.
In the forest, by all means leave the snags where the probability of damage is infinitesimally low, but take down trees that have a higher likelihood of falling or shedding branches than their healthier brethren, such as private gardens, public parks, and streets where the probability of damage is higher. This is not restricted to wind-related falls and limb-shedding, but certainly the probability is high under windy conditions--the laws of physics cannot be violated, and are not subject to legislative or administrative, or political veto. Trees with compromised root systems or branches do not require wind to fall.
I never did "blame the trees" and Chatterjee knows it--or if he doesn't know it . . .
In fact, the whole point IS human incompetence (NOT "blaming the trees"), and incompetence is knowing that a hazard exists and doing nothing about it. And leaving a snag (or other structurally compromised tree) standing until it falls in an area where the probability of its doing damage when it does is high, should fall into the category of criminal negligence, particularly in cases where the tree in question is under human management. That may or may not be the case with the tree presently in question or not.
Maybe "what we have here is a failure to communicate." Assuming the worst in the absence of evidence does not advance communication--it tends to cut it off. Let us try first to find common ground rather than resort to divisive devices. I look forward to discussing THE ISSUE to a reasoned conclusion, and leaving the personalities out of it. 

WT

"Anecdote is the singular of data." --Author forgotten
PS: I hope that Chatterjee will delineate his alternative to hazardous tree management clearly.
----- Original Message ----- From: "Nirmalya Chatterjee" <[email protected]> 
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, January 20, 2013 12:32 PM
Subject: Re: [ECOLOG-L] Tree stump removal in sensitive area



Sorry to contradict you here Wayne, but your argument is anecdotal and
seems to be as straw-manly as GWPatton's - people who work in the Forest
Service are likely to get injured by trees, (lethally or otherwise) from
falling branches, trees etc. - there's a term for that - occupational
hazard. That doesn't necessarily mean that the general populace has the
same odds of facing such an injury.

2010 CDC data indicate 4.88% accidental deaths (at #5 reason), and ~80% of
those were due to poisoning, accidental falling and motor vehicle related,
that pushes other reasons to sub-1% levels. Wind related tree failures
caused 31 deaths/year from 1995-2007.
http://www.bama.ua.edu/~jcsenkbeil/gy4570/schmidlin%20tree%20fatalities.pdf.

That's 407 people in 12 years, don't blame the trees here. Blame human
carelessness, thoughtlessness and Nature's unmitigated fury (the last
cannot be controlled). Trees would be the means here, not the cause. My
point being, yes there are some activities which cause people to be injured 
- but this always begs the question of what the odds are. As for the
irrational fear of urban people to dying from tree-related as related by
GWPatton - in my anecdotal experience, yes such fears exist. And trees are
easy to pin the blame on, they aren't vocal about it, and with urban areas
heavily paved and a whole gamut of underground disturbances related to
utility lines etc., it is expected trees don't really find the unfettered
access to the soil to stabilize themselves as evolution and Nature
intended. The solution lies in learning to think more holistically instead
of knee-jerk reactions, which many tend to do.

And talking to "victims" of tree-fall injuries or their family members to
get your ideas about its dangers is not proper science, neither is hearing
anecdotes from of the likes of you, both would be called biased sources. I
am yet to hear families and victims of auto accidents stopping riding or
driving cars (in significant numbers), post-accident. Or people stopping
use of household poisons because some one they knew mistakenly drank rat
poison. As scientists it behooves us to keep emotion out of science.

NC

On 19 January 2013 23:11, Wayne Tyson <[email protected]> wrote:


Ecolog:

I know I won't convince "Me" that while public safety concerns about
falling trees (and dropping branches) might sometimes be exaggerated, the
truth is that trees do fall and break and people die from it, and it is
only prudent to get the dangerous ones down before they fall down. "Me's" point is also irrational, on this basis, and using straw-man arguments does not advance the issue, it only adds an emotional component. He knows damned 
well I did not imply that every tree that falls is going to kill someone;
thankfully, even in heavily-used areas such deaths are somewhat rare, but
that does not mean that dangerous trees should not be removed. Talk to the 
families of the victims and tell them you stopped the tree that killed
their loved one from being removed. In my area, a public protest prevented 
a severely leaning large tree that showed clear signs of root failure
opposite the direction of the lean from being removed. Those people should 
have to face the families of the victims, but "God" will be blamed, as
usual. What poppycock!

WT

PS: I have lost one friend to a falling tree, almost another, and several
people have been killed over the years in my community by falling trees and 
branches. While running a tree survey strip when I was in the Forest
Service, I was narrowly missed by a big widowmaker, and I saw a logger's
body being carried out with his flattened hard hat where his head used to
be. A widowmaker. That's how frequently falling branches kill people in the 
forest--there's even been a name for them for years.

----- Original Message ----- From: "Me" <[email protected]>
To: "Wayne Tyson" <[email protected]>
Cc: <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, January 19, 2013 8:20 PM
Subject: Re: [ECOLOG-L] Tree stump removal in sensitive area
Omg. The moment it falls, someone is in the perfect position to be fatally 
injured. That's the reason there is a war on trees in the Washington DC
area. There is this unreasonable perception that something that looms over 
us is out to kill us. Parks here have trees near paths cut for the same
irrational fear.  Yet you can go to other states like NY or ME and find
that there is no such rampant tree culling. There is a distorted perception 
of risk to me versus averaged risk to populations.

Geoff Patton
Wheaton, MD

Sent from my iPhone

On Jan 19, 2013, at 12:23 PM, Wayne Tyson <[email protected]> wrote:
Good idea in the wild, but in a place where there are lots of people, one
has to think of what it hits when it falls after the roots rot enough--it's just fine until that instant when the last bit of rot or burrowing rodent 
or whatever cuts the last bit of dead tissue--and BAM! Somebody's dead.
Drawing birds and other creatures into the urban context is wonderful, but I worry about the populations of predators like domestic and feral cats and the lack of understory for laddering fledglings up off the ground when they 
make their first hard landing. Context is everything.

WT

----- Original Message ----- From: "eann" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, January 19, 2013 7:02 AM
Subject: [ECOLOG-L] Tree stump removal in sensitive area
Rather than worry about stump removal, why not cut the tree off higher up 
and leave it for cavity birds?

Ann
~*~  ~*~  ~*~  ~*~  ~*~  ~*~  ~*~
E. Ann Poole, NH-CWS
Poole Ecological Consultancy
PO Box 890, 741 Beard Rd
Hillsborough, NH  03244
(603)478-1178
[email protected]
www.eannpoole.com
~*~  ~*~  ~*~  ~*~  ~*~  ~*~  ~*~


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