The Birches bite the Dust, literally

Robert Frost was right about birches . 

..."swinging doesn’t bend them down to stay
As ice-storms do. Often you must have seen them
Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning...

though once they are bowed
So low for long, they never right themselves:"

 

While I love my three birches in summer, winter has taken its toll more than once.  My tall white birch lost its leader many years ago.  I explained this to my son when he called last night to say that one of his white birch trees fell over.  He actually lives in a subdivision called 'The Birches'. 

 

On the positive side, it did not hit his house.  We can leave it on the ground until spring and then cut it up.  Plus, it is now easier to remove the Christmas lights, so he says.  

 

I told him to remember the time I had to call someone from the Town Hall down the road to come pick me up for work because my gray birch tree was hanging over the driveway and I could not get my car out.  I wished him a good night and we hung up.  I thought nothing more of it.

 

So, imagine my surprise when I looked out of my door last night and saw this at midnight:

 

 

I was hoping and praying that the birch was just bent and would survive.  Alas, that was not the case.  This morning it looked like this:

 

 

One of the three main limbs was completely broken.  I tried cutting through the wood with my tree saw but finally gave up and called the neighbor to come over with his chain saw.  When we were done removing enough to gain egress to the street, we had firewood, or potential firewood.

 

 

We still need to remove the large limb.  When we do, I may find that I need to remove the entire tree.  One limb heads out at an almost 90 degree angle and the other is bent pretty far down .  It may look a little strange once we remove the main limb.  We'll just have to wait and see when spring gets here.  Whenever that may be.

 

I can't help but wonder if I had gone out early last night and shaken the branches if the tree would have been OK.  Well, no use crying over spilt milk.  Or broken branches.