"I see the light!"

Darkness

When we moved to this house in 1987 there were little trees planted in the paddock next to us.  I recall we thought that the land belonged to the City Council and it was full of dock plants, so we tethered our milking goats there away from the trees. We had a knock on the door a few days later. It was the owner and his comment was, "I love trees and hate goats. Move them." So we duly apologised and obeyed. He was a woodworker/joiner and had planted 50 acres of trees of various sorts. We got on fine with him. He trimmed the trees and kept possum numbers down. But the trees grew and began to shade us considerably. We were aware that they would be harvested at some stage. He, however, sold the property to a man who did not have the same care for the trees. They kept growing well past their harvesting date and they became a real problem. The little cones the trees produced blocked our gutters, their pollen settled on our cars and in our lungs, and we lived in cold wet darkness.  We asked when they were coming down. We were not listened to. We wrote letters. Our neighbours who were also shaded, pestered the man.  We went to the city council authorities and the regional council authorities. Each claimed it was not their problem.  He had said he was working on it, but nothing seemed to happen winter after winter. In the end we went to a community law office and asked what we could do. We were given a procedure to follow and wrote a letter threatening legal action. (We really could not afford legal action though?) Well that seemed to get him into gear and we saw a succession of contractors visiting discussing amongst themselves how they were going to harvest them. 

Light! Warmth!

Then eventually last Friday an excavator and men with chainsaws began the process. The section next to us is to become the "skid" where they will load trucks. On Friday the trees next to us came down. We discovered what we were missing out on! The sunshine made our house warm! On Saturday we sat out on the deck for afternoon tea, basking in the sun. The hillside of trees will come down eventually, clearing the horizon and enabling us to have more warmth in winter when the sun is lower. 

Just now we are delighted! There will be inconvenience for awhile as trucks come and go, chainsaws buzz and excavators do their thing. The outcome will give us a much more pleasant existence, increase the value of our home and we'll be able to grow more vegetables.  We'll have to move from our acre as we age, but at least we'll have a few years of comfort. 

Another good side is that the guys doing the job have been pleasant to chat with. They have got rid of one of our trees in our front yard and are promising to deal to another that I have been working on.

Our house in darkness at midday in July 2016. It is a sunny day.

                                        The same day from the sunny golf course opposite.

The excavator and two men with chainsaws clear the trees next to us.

                                    The expansive view we now have from our lounge window.

Sun shining in the evening!

                                   It was almost dusk in this photo. You can see the house now, it is no longer hidden under vegetation.