When a tremendous limb of the Great Oak came down in July, we mourned losing a piece of this wonderful tree. And then we got to work. First, we consulted with several local arborists and determined the rest of the tree to be in good shape. In the spirit of conservation we wanted to minimize our impact, so we kept as much of the material in place as possible, and got creative with the rest.
What’s happened since July? We chipped the smaller limbs and spread them around the base to maintain soil health. We cut the biggest limbs and placed them around the tree for seating for education programs, and for adventures in climbing, hopping, and balancing: kids love it.
We’ll use some of the wood to heat the lodge this winter (we installed a wood-burning stove last year so that we can heat with a renewable resource). We even inoculated a few logs with lion's mane mushroom spores to try our hand at growing mushrooms. Although we were saddened to see the Great Oak getting smaller, we were happy to give its wood several new joys and incarnations.
