Dendrophobia is described as the fear of trees, from the Greek root dendro meaning tree + Phobia meaning irrational fear. Martinez has long suffered from this difficult-to-treat condition. And yesterday we were informed that the transported willow shoots laid down by our noble volunteers Saturday were being dug up. Because of concerns that they would cause flooding.
No, I’m not kidding.
Now disappointing a bunch of beaver supporters is no big deal, and the city is free to do it with impunity. As they have shown, over and over again. But these trees were planted with the authority of the SF waterboard with a grant through the California Urban Streams Partnership. And it is a slightly bigger deal to disrupt their work. And to exhume the trees they have planted. I’m not sure what will be the immediate outcome, but I’m sure they’ll be another shoe, and I’m sure it will drop. Stay tuned.
In the meantime, this is what they were not alarmed about on the very same day, filmed by Bonnie Logan up where we saw the beavers last by the Junior High.
If you’ll notice the stiff trunks in the middle of this flow are NOT willow. And are NOT bending with the water. In fact, some of them broke and washed downstream creating further hazards as they went. Willow has actually been shown to bend in high flow and increase the velocity of the water. But that only matters if you care about facts.
Which the Dendrophobes obviously don’t.
