Just outside my accommodation in college is a rather fantastic old tree. Perhaps not Ireland’s greatest but pretty close in my opinion. See the picture above? Have you ever seen such a magnificent specimen before? Unlikely I would say. It stands head and shoulders above all other wood plants in the area. It was one of the few pleasant sights that graced my eyes before heading into another frustrating day of college labour. Until today that is.
Before I get to the crime, here’s one more picture I found on my hard drive that I took a long time ago. There is a bit of halo-ing in the shots but I had taken them when I first started experimenting with Photomatix and would too often set the light smoothing too low, but that’s another story…
Below is the current state of the tree – a travesty in my opinion. I don’t care what reasons were given to prune with such savagery (dead branches? – no way, tree was too big? – the bigger the better I say, tree shaping? – are you kidding? I can shape better craps.)
It will probably take decades for this tree to grow back to it’s former glory and I see no benefit from its mutilation – just one of the many things in life to irk my senses.
Wow – that is super-sad! That was a beautiful tree!
Hi Rose. I actually saw it being cut down branch by branch that faithful morning, it was unbelievable!