new life for old trees

12.19.13.2.7 1 Manik 5 Cumhu
2473 days until 12-21-2012

I don't blog news stories much here (I'd probably get more traffic if I did), but this one touched me. It's actually been on CNN.com for a few days but I didn't click on it until this morning.
It's about all the ancient live oak trees which were uprooted during Hurricane Katrina last year. I think about trees. I worry, for instance, about the really big old tree behind the new movie theater here in town. They remodeled the old-old Kmart into the theater and didn't touch it, and now they're building something next to it, and it's still okay. But someday I might go by and see a "cut me down" ribbon around it, or worse, it will just be gone. Maybe I'll go take some pictures of it. When I had to have the big old tree in front of my house cut down because it was dying and had become a menace to my bird room, I wept to hear the chainsaws, even though I had made the call for them to come and take it down. Turns out I did the right thing; the tree was rotten all through down to the base. Doesn't mean I didn't feel bad. (No different from putting a sick pet to sleep. But don't get me started on why we can't put sick humans to sleep.)
Anyway, a lot of 200+ year old trees got taken down by Katrina. We all saw the pictures of the devastation down there, but I hadn't realized a tree that big and that old could be uprooted. Apparently they can, and they did.
But when I clicked on the story's link "Katrina trees will get new life on historic ship" I thought it was going to be that they were planting baby trees (like the acorn from the Charter Oak tree which was planted in front of my old elementary school). But that's not it at all.
They are using these downed oaks to rebuild old wooden ships. Right here in Mystic. (Well, it's an hour away, but compared to Louisiana, it's right here.)


Live oak trees, many more than 100 years old, are connecting residents of storm-ravaged Mississippi and experts at Mystic Seaport, a Connecticut maritime museum.
Hurricane Katrina uprooted hundreds of live oaks, but the trees will not go to waste. They'll be used in the restoration of the Charles W. Morgan, one of the last wooden whaling ships in the world. The Morgan was built in 1841 and made 37 voyages before retiring in 1921.

I think that is so cool. Better than going through a wood chipper.
(The photo is from CNN as well.)