My orchard is 20 years old now, and I've started thinning out the non-productive trees. They've had plenty of time to show their stuff, and the ones that haven't performed get the axe -- or in this case, the chainsaw. This tree was a Hunza apricot, with supposedly edible kernels. Planting it seemed like a good idea at the time. Unfortunately our spot is a frost pocket, and early-blooming trees like apricots always get blasted by late frosts. Not only did this tree never bear, but it was crowding out a pecan tree on one side and an apple tree on the other. So off with its head! We can always use the firewood.
I cut up the branches where they fell, and the resulting configuration reminded me of dinosaur bones. You could pin the firewood together with rebar and display the resulting "tree" in a tree museum, just like the Joni Mitchell song.
A nice little haul of firewood. While I'm on the subject, I highly recommend the gigantic dinosaur skeleton on display in the Albuquerque Natural History Museum. It's spectacular -- no bones about it.
