Eden Keeper

03/15/2025

This Bradford pear hate week severe storms are expected along with request for prays for the storms so for me that means praying that Bradford pears get blown down. Please replace with natives such as serviceberrry, wild plum, mayhaw, etc.

04/27/2022

I saw a bucket truck for sale. Prediction: if the buyer also owns a chain saw he will think he is qualified to top trees. Unfortunately, that is an illegitimate service that most of them specialize in doing. The typical rational for topping trees is to prevent storm damage, but since it looks identical to repairs (clean cuts relative to the rough breaks) I call it tornado chic. Besides that topless trees are obscene. Another bad sign is literally nailing ads for that to trees. Also beware of yes men agreeing with anything the customer says rather than explaining what is best for the tree. One of those my dad hired after an ice storm removed nearly all the green from a pine tree rather than saving as much as possible; my dad had asked if cutting flush with the trunk was best for any partially broken limb so that's what was done, consequently the tree died sooner. Later the bucket truck was inadvertently used as a catapult, it didn't go well. I've lost work replacing trees when one flyby night tree service provider lied about being insured. They didn't know how to make a tree fall in a certain direction, which was obvious based on the stump profile: notch too narrow (once closed it became a pivot), no step up to the back cut (the step prevents kickback), and no hinge to control the fall (they were using ropes to pull, the wrong one had the most tension, and the illusion of control is lost when such ropes go slack. When I point this out those problems on other stumps those responsible all get defensive since that is how they are being trained to do it and have (luckily) not had an accident.

03/31/2022

Even though Eden Keeper isn't a tree service here are some questions to ask when when selecting one:
Do they specialize in tree topping?
Is a sign advertising the business nailed to tree?
Are they licensed?
Are they insured?
Are they yes men?

The correct answers are: no, no, yes, yes, and no with good reason.
Tree topping is an illegitimate landscape practice. In the long run it makes the problem it supposedly solves worse if it doesn't kill the tree first. This problem is preventing storm damage, but since a topped tree looks exactly the same I call it tornado chic. Besides that topless trees are obscene.
If going to the expense of nailing signs to trees such as along the highway right of way imagine how much worse they will treat a tree if getting paid (see the above example).
A license is specifically required for tree surgery, and getting it involves passing a test.
Insurance it important just in case. I was once scheduled to replace some trees that were being removed by a tree service company. The first thing the homeowner asked them was if they were insured. When a tree was dropped on her heat pump the first thing they said was that the lied about being insured. What she was going to pay me instead went to her insurance deductible. This doesn't even get to the unsafe techniques they used that caused the tree to fall the wrong way.
You don't want yes men who will do whatever the customer says no matter how bad it is for the tree. The worst I saw agreed with a client who asked if removing all of a broken branch was best for a pine tree. This resulted in flush cuts that removed about 90% of the needles, which effectively killed the tree.
In addition you want somebody such as an arborist who actually knows things about trees rather than the only qualifications being owning a chainsaw and a bucket truck. I now of several instance where a tree was needlessly cut an/or wasted because they didn't even know what kind much less how rare and/or valuable it was. This included an American chestnut tree, what could have arguably been the national champion mountain camellia, and over 2 dozen black walnut trees with 2 feet diameter trunks. I calculated value and if done on halves the owners share should have been a 100 fold more than was paid to those cutting the trees into firewood lengths that supposedly got hauled to a dump thus if so that was all they deserved.

02/22/2021

I noticed that as gardening season is getting close people are starting to circulate do it yourself (DIY) recipes for herbicides/pesticides/fertilizers. To show how absurd and thus useless these typically are here is a collection of recipes I found online that use variations of the same ingredients:

DIY Herbicide
1 gallon Vinegar
1 cup Epsom salt
¼ cup Dish soap

DIY Pesticide 1
¼ cup Epsom Salt
2 gallons Water

DIY Pesticide 2
1 Tbs./ ¼ tsp. Vegetable oil
1 tsp./2 tsp. Dish soap
1 pint/quart Water
Apply 2-3 times per week

DIY Fertilizer 1
1 tsp./Tbs. Epsom salt
1 quart/gallon Water
Apply every 10/30 days

DIY Fertilizer 2
1 Tbs. Vinegar
1 gallon Water

Notice the differences in concentration both between and within each category. Those online sources (unlike the posts) all had caveats that included warnings about safety, i.e. need for PPE, etc., and how plants could be damaged by respectively being too close to the DIY herbicides as well as from over use of the DIY pesticides and fertilizers (long term use would be especially bad if instead using table salt as some variations list as the ingredient). I previously debunked the common claim that the DIY herbicide is cheaper and more effective than the most popular synthetic chemical herbicide (besides also debunking claims about it being a carcinogen and toxic since the rates of a cancers it supposedly causes doubled 15 years before the use quintupled thus the claim violates cause and effect while the toxicity actually lower than that of lactose even at the respective amounts in typical spray concentrations and milk). The price claim is valid for on ready-to-use that comes with a sprayer rather than mixing concentrate in your own sprayer the same as with a DIY recipe. I even tested the DIY herbicide and it didn't work. The surviving weeds actually came back bigger and stronger as if being fertilized and protected from pests considering how the same ingredients are used in the those DIY formulations.

08/22/2020

Earlier this week I noticed that a couple relatively new local tree service companies were advertising by nailing their (political campaign style) signs to trees along the public right of way. Since they would do something that bad for trees at their expense it reminds me of how much worse is typically done a your expense. The illegitimate practice of topping is first on the list considering how that is the most prominently featured service offered by nearly all of their existing competitors. Often they are yes men who will do whatever the homeowner wants whether it is good for the tree or not, even if they know better, which often doesn't seem to be the case. This makes me wonder if they are even state licensed for tree surgery, and if so how they actually got it considering the testing requirement. Consequently, it seems the only qualification of some is owning a chainsaw and a bucket truck, especially when adding safety and ethical issues such as where another one cost me a job since the pay instead went to the homeowner's deductible after a tree was dropped on the HVAC unit, thus narrowly missing the house, and forced an admission to the lie about being insured.

08/13/2019

Just saw a local ad for living privacy screens. The tree spacing in the offer is 5 feet (those shown were planted even closer to a fence), the cost is $15 each ($10 for tree and $5 for hole), and delivery free for orders over $225. There are several problems with that starting with a landscaping rule of thumb to dig a $50 hole for a $10 tree. The type of tree offered is considered mature at 50 feet (despite specimens over 150 feet still growing a foot per year being known) so the spacing is way too close, which is why this exact type of screen notoriously dies out especially in hot dry years. When something is "free" it is being paid for some other way. If I was doing such a screen I'd start with at least 4 rows with 2 or 3 times the spacing in a hexagonal grid then take out 3/4ths (2 rows and every other one in the remaining rows) of them when they touch and another half (one row) when they touch again. This gives much more room for the roots (to get water etc.) and effectively keeps the maturing screen closed despite the heavy thinning, which also makes them less susceptible to the disease that kills the stressed trees and often entire plantings at a time.

04/10/2019

I was going to divide a clump of native cane, but it decided to bloom instead so I'll wait and propagate by seed instead. This is the first time I ever saw the blooms other than in an herbarium collection so a few samples may be take for that.

07/20/2018

When looking for a specific type of plant while going through some old photos I instead found these from a job gone bad, although that was for reasons unrelated to the tasks it resulted in me no longer accepting such clients unless paid in advance. One part was removing this shrub on what happened to be about the hottest day of the year. It illustrates several examples of bad landscaping as explained in the description of each photo.
Such bad landscaping is so prevalent that it has a rule of thumb saying landscapes need replaced every 15 year. The real reason is a consequence of poor planning coupled with a lack of care, i.e. expecting it to be no maintenance. This results in the eventual need for excessive maintenance and/or the loss of plants due to everything getting too overgrown and competing with each other for light, water, etc.

03/09/2018

This tree was damaged by a tornado over a year ago. Imagine the broken limbs being gone and notice how similar the appearance is to a tree that got topped. Yet avoiding such damage is ironically a typical reason people needlessly have trees topped (an even worse reason is preparing to sell the property). In actuality the water sprouts that grow in response to topping are much more likely to be broken off than the original limbs. This is because the attachment is only as deep as how long the branch has grown. That along with several other detrimental consequences is why topping trees is an illegitimate landscape practice, which is unfortunately still provided and even advertised by most of the tree service companies in this area. Because topping trees effectively looks like tornado damage I call it tornado chic, although topless trees are also considered to be obscene.

03/04/2017

My gut reaction the first time I ever saw a Nandina (in front of Houser Hall at the University of Alabama) was why would anybody want to have such an ugly (leggy, etc.) and obviously poisonous plant in a landscape.

Last April, Decatur resident Charles Reid found a flock of dead cedar waxwings outside of Decatur High School’s front entrance.

07/05/2016

Why this was unnecessary.

06/16/2016

A storm came through before dusk. It looked much darker than the photo shows. Considering how the wind was roaring in the distance at the time the photo was taken it was probably the most significant impact. The most notable damage observed was broken limbs or trees nearly all of which were Bradford pears, which is a reminder that serviceberry is a much better choice for several reasons besides being resilient against wind.