Natural Pruning

 

Adventure Location:

Decatur, Alabama

Date: August 28, 2023

Let us talk about Natural Pruning of trees tonight. The wonderful hike and bike trail here at Point Mallard park is well maintained for the surface of the trail but Mother Nature takes care of the tree pruning. The winds that whip through here often keep the bad branches etc pretty well blown out of the vegetation. However the vegetation gets to go any where it pleases when it comes down from the trees.

And yes it does fall on the trail frequently.

See the top of the tree gone. See all the dead stuff at the bottom. That stuff was originally on the trail and a couple of walkers like the OFM got it moved off the trail. And yes that happens fairly frequently along the miles of this trail. Only the large trunks get to wait for the maintenance folks to chain saw them up and carry them off. And yes in windy weather a person on the trail had better watch for limbs getting knocked out of the trees and whaping you walking by. Usually it is the 3 inch limbs and smaller that get broken loose and fall in usual wind speed when walkers are out here.

But we have seen much larger chunks of trees come down also.

The trail crosses and runs along a lot of waterfront area. Along the waterfront dirt you will see trees leaning out over the water at many locations. Eventually you will see one go down while watching.

The OFM has seen it twice in our 12 years of coming here. We quit counting the number of smaller limbs we have seen hit the trail.

Still, this is our favorite set of trails in all of our travels for exercise walking or just great pleasant scenery and nice HELLOS from the other walkers.

One other thing, by choosing your enjoyable trail section carefully you can safely and comfortably navigate with crutches, wheel chairs, baby carriages and other mobility assist items thanks to the paved sections of the trail system.

The OFM often talks of the back entrance to the campground for bikes, golf carts, walkers etc. But not motor vehicles. Well today he remembered to take a picture of that entrance to show you what he means.

This entrance opens right behind the big soccer field in the park and is very convenient when walking to a soccer game or the water park or other fun things to do in the main park areas.

Everybody be safe and try to have tooooo much fun tomorrow.