A Conversation about Ben the Oak

It all started on a walk with the dog. This particular morning the world was awash with litter following a storm the night before. I spotted a fallen oak branch alongside the road, lying amidst the undergrowth, and attributed it to a storm fall.

Days later, I noticed it again and wondered why it hadn’t begun to dry out… the leaves were still vividly alive. A week later I began to explore for an explanation. Looking up, I observed no oaks in the area that would account for a fallen branch. I plunged into the greenery around the branch and realized that this wasn’t a broken branch, but a sapling. Some squirrel had hidden an acorn between the roots of a pine. The acorn sprouted and grew in an inhospitable environment. The lack of optimal light resulted in tall, spindly growth as it reached for the sun from its shady birthplace.  When the storm pushed it over by its top growth it hadn’t been able to raise itself back to a vertical position. But it now had access to better light, and chose to thrive from its new position. The side branches began to grow upward.                     

My new friend, now dubbed “Ben” (informal for “Ben Dover”), stooped cheerfully to greet me the rest of the summer. As his leaves colored for the cold, then withered, they remained on their stems, as is the custom of oaks.

Recently I needed to hire some men to help with yard work around the house and my busy brain saw this as an opportunity to fix Ben’s situation. I would have the workers come over to Ben and tie him to the trunk of his host pine tree. This would provide the opportunity for him to resume his upward growth.

Fortunately for Ben (and me), the work date was delayed by a week. This gave my busy brain some more time to cogitate.  I had recently read an article by some botanist about how mankind was overly intrusive in Nature. Humans will plow up a perfectly good meadow to replace it with a “better, native” assortment of plants, AKA, “meadow.” Useful, bio-diverse hedgerows and groves of trees are erased for a better view. People introduce monocultures of plants for pollination, disturbing an already working system. This scientist was no fan of our intruding where we weren’t needed. 

It made me think more profoundly about my friend Ben. His life had started because of the random actions of a wild animal. The storm had randomly shoved him to a better environment to thrive in. He had spent the summer adapting slowly to improved conditions, contorting his direction to a better one. He is perfectly healthy as far as I can tell.                                                                                                               

How did it become my mission to interfere? Standing him back up to a vertical position puts him back into the shade. So then what? Should I cut down the pine foster tree? Does Ben need a protective fence or fertilizer treatment? Pesticide? Where does it end? I think that anonymous scientist planted a seed in my busy brain, ergo: Mind my own business and stay a casual friend.

I will still walk past my neighbor Ben every day, but as a friend, not a colonist. Maybe we should all take a minute to think before we fix something. Especially when it isn’t ours to fix.                                                     To learn more about oaks, listen to “Nature Calls, Conversations from the Hudson Valley,” episodes 85 and 100, at:    https://ccecolumbiagreene.org/gardening/nature-calls-conversations-from-the-hudson-valley