Fallen friend: The honey locust tree, autumn. Photo / Greg Dixon
We didn’t see it fall. We didn’t hear it fall, either. This somehow made the whole affair more wretched.
It was an early Friday evening and outside, a nor’wester was throwing its weight around after a wind warning had been issued earlier in the day: it was nothing we hadn’t had before.
We had retreated inside despite the heat, closed windows on the windward side and gone about our usual business for that time of day: I was watching the telly as the domestic goddess was preparing dinner while listening to yet another true crime podcast.
Neither of us was much more than 20m from the scene, and yet neither of us was aware it had happened until I rose from the couch to join Michele in the kitchen.
I looked out the window and couldn’t believe what I was seeing: half of our wonderful honey locust tree was on the ground. I called Michele over and we both stared at the terrible sight, then gave each other a hug.
For gardeners, the loss of a mature tree is always distressing. But to lose a tree which is a central focus of a garden or a lawn is simply devastating. The honey locust has been growing in the centre of our largest lawn since old Albert, who once owned Lush Places, put it there some 20 years ago.
It was a clever piece of planting by a clever plantsman. Not only does this American deciduous tree have a slender, graceful growth pattern, its leaves turn a wonderful, luminous gold in autumn.
And through summer – at least a hot, dry one like this one – its high canopy and feathery leaves offered a splendid patch of dappled shade. Under its sheltering arms we have enjoyed drinks with mates, read quietly alone and, when the weather suited, had long Christmas lunches. And now, half of it was lying on the ground.
Janet, who lives around the bend with Blokesy Stokesy and has saved trees of her own that have been badly wind damaged, came over to offer advice and consolation. She was moved almost to tears by the damage, which left a metre of main trunk exposed.
Could we save the half still standing? She thought so, if we stuffed sphagnum moss in the cracks of the torn wood, used a heavy-duty tie-down to pull it together and applied pruning paste to the wound. Stokesy reckoned I ought to trim the remaining crown, too, to balance the weight of what remained, which seemed sensible.