A Very Good Thing
We are stewards of what we have been given on this great earth. I feel that this earth can always use another great tree. My Dad had a love for Black Walnut Trees. I don’t think it was all about the fact that the walnuts could be harvested and used in Mom’s kitchen, he just liked them. In 1988 when I first happened upon my home here on Stauffer Avenue, within the first year my dad brought me a Black Walnut seedling. After my Dad passed in 1992 my brother Michael brought me one more of the trees that Dad had started in a five gallon pail. Both trees are doing well and I am sure they measure well over fifty feet in height. It’s a good thing that we realize we need trees and their leaves to filter our air.
Squirrel’s Addition of a Black Walnut Tree
Over time I have planted a Northern Red Oak tree and also an Ornamental Crab Apple tree. The Mountain Ash tree made it only twenty years and I have since realized that they do have a hard time in Minnesota. As we added a variety of blooming shrubs in the backyard it became a quest to see which blooming shrub should be the next to be added. I think the biggest success story needs to go out to a friendly squirrel. In the far backyard is the most beautiful Black Walnut that I have nurtured since it was just visible above the grass. This tree has been so successful I found another little fledgling just this week that is a now being sheltered from the ever aggressive lawn mower.
It is very rewarding to see additions to the yard come into their own. Mother Nature at her finest is a very good thing.