The Deforestation of Buffalo by the Weight of Snow

[mickeyd]

The juice is back on in some spots, but 200,000 people are without power, because so many individual lines to each household are down. Friday while I was in Allegheny, 300,000 homes were without power.

All the trees were fully leafed. The heavy snow collecting on them made the boughs too heavy, and the boughs inevitably broke.

Let me give you as perfect a picture as I can:

Think of the days after Xmas and New Years when everybody throws out their Xmas tree. You drive through a neighborhood and see one tree on most lawns. Today, it looks like everybody's lawn has become an entire LOT selling Christmas trees. There are that many neatly sawed trees, trunks, boughs, limbs, needles, cones, and leaves on every lawn every where.

Buffalo is a really old city full of magnificent ancient trees, the majority of which have sustained some damage, but they will grow back. Too many sidestreets are too full of tree debris for school buses to get by; many live power lines have yet to be re-connected, making walking in some places hazardous. The schools are therefore closed, for both safety concerns and because many of them, like mine, have no power to operate. We're all keeping our senses of humor and there's been no looting. Even the anti tree-hugging contingent feels bad about the trees.

When Mother Nature wants to do some pruning...............Sweet Jesus, get out of the way.

Please keep our trees in your prayers,

Thank You

XXOO

Michael

 

[oxydolfan1]

A similar, horrible thing happened north of Hemmingford, Quebec a number of years ago, after an ice storm....I remember all of the orchards, upended.

That whole storm was quite a nightmare up there for them, at the time. I remember we sent crews up there to help them out (as they always send crews down here, for our hurricanes and all..)

 

[perc-o-prince]

Buffalo

Hi Michael,

I was born and raised in Buffalo, and went through '78 in Cheektowaga and the one in, what was it, '85?, on the East Side of Buffalo.

The one thing I can say is that the people there were generally extremely helpful and family-like with each other when things like this hit. I remember walking to the store with a friend to get a few groceries (forget getting cars through for days) and getting some for the next-door neighbor, an eccentric older lady living with her not-so-all-there daughter. All she wanted was a pint of schnapps. She said she had all she needed for a while, and to let her know if we needed anything!

Ah, Buffalo! I still have my 1984 Dyngus Day button!!

Best thoughts to you all,
Chuck

 

[gansky1]

This happened in Omaha, October 1997. Shed a tear for the lost trees, but as you said, they will come back. It makes you appreciate the rebirth and renewal of nature even more.

 

[toggleswitch]

These are the times when I believe homowners who live where heat is crucial to survival should have a small generator to fire-up their electrically controlled fossil-fuel heating system, or at least have a decent solid-fuel (vented) heater/stove.

 

[mickeyd]

Yes, Greg, we have marveled at trees so old and sturdy that one can walk down the middle of a street during a rainstorm where the giant botanical beings crisscross in the sky, and NOT GET WET for quite a while.

Oxy, Thousands have come to help, and from Canada, too.

Perc, I wanted to come out this summer but my mom was ill; next time, I hope to be there. You can't take the Buffalo out of the boy.

Toggle :"homowners" Is that a new blend of homo weiners or homo winners? Either way, it's pretty funny.

http://thank You, Gentlemen

 

[polkanut]

Something similar happened here in Wausau about 3 yrs. ago in July. A couple of tornadoes went through the north end of town, including 1 of our 2 cemeteries. Many beautiful evergreens, oaks, and maples were uprooted and many old monuments were damaged as well. It took 2 yrs. worth of work, but it is finally back to a semblance of normalcy.

 

[petek]

Sometimes you never appreciate all those old trees till they're gone or you don't have any. The house we just bought is in a neighborhood with lots of big oaks and maples and just looks so beautiful, especially coming from our last place where we barely had any trees whatsoever. A group of people just this late summer did a tree count around here because they are getting concerned that as the old oaks and maples die off, people are replacing them with non native, more ornamental and faster growing trees that will never duplicate the "look" of the area.