Glad you got that out of the way so your wife could get through. On top of that, you now have some great firewood.
Here is a hickory question. I have 21 acres and a few, probably less than 10, really nice hickories. 3ft diameter, over 50 years old. The national guard practices at a neighboring field, paratrooping from helos. One missed his target and dropped into the top of one of these hickories. While I wasn't home, they came back and cut the whole tree down to get his parachute, without asking. I support our armed forces, but this seems like a waste. Why not send a technical climber up to get it, and why not ask? What would you guys do?
First step is to carefully craft a letter to the National Guard unit. You will need to find out the value of your tree as well. I would think that the National Guard does not have the right to enter private property at will and damage personal property. Did they damage any other trees in cutting down your hickory? If so, then you would want to file those under the property damage as well keeping in mind that it is the value of the fully grown tree as you lost the future value of those trees.
If it was my property I would want to cuss some people out. Property rights is a major part of our laws. Let me ask this; would anyone be OK with someone entering their home and busting up their furniture? Of course not; and we shouldn't be quiet just because it is some government agency.
I think you have to do something, contact them at least. What if someone is assuming that all of that land belongs to the guard ? Today a chainsaw tomorrow a team of dozer's. Could have just been some Yahoo idiot in charge. They have deep pockets to say I'm sorry with.
I'm all for our armed forces but no way could I agree with this treatment of your land. I would definitely make them buy that tree and for starters I would require a minimum payment of $500. Remember, you cannot grow those trees overnight! Besides, I am one who really takes offense when someone enters my property without permission. It is not public property; it belongs to me and the good Lord and I pay the taxes every year for this priveledge. The payment to you of that tree would put up a red flag for future operations and perhaps stop any future operations of that sort. After payment has been made to you and an apology, if you wish to return the dollars to that National Guard unit, that would be fine too. But first, I would definitely make them pay as they do not have the right to enter onto your property for this. If time of war that is a different story. Or if the soldier was in grave danger, one could overlook it. Still, they could get a bucket truck to get that chute down...
Sorry to have stolen thread a little here. I will plan to reach out to the Guard unit. Less about money and more about preventing recurrence. Will post a new thread if i get anywhere. Thanks for feedback.
I finally got all the small branches piled up and cut the usable ones to firewood length. I bucked the trunk and I found a knot hole and carpenter ants about 2/3 of the way up. Knowing the tree was on a death spiral makes me feel better than loosing a healthy tree.
Yes, finding those ants is never a good thing. Good thing you got the tree when you did lest it become a threat.
Some Terro works nicely too for ants as they take it back to their home with them and kills the whole lot.
