310 



Bulletin 256. 



adverse city conditions. Societies should take all precautions necessary 

 to safeguard their trees against any of the possible detrimental influences 

 arising from electricity in any form, and by so doing avoid complaint 

 against companies for injuries to trees for which they really are not 

 responsible. 



(c) Injuries incident to the presence of electric and telephone wires. 

 Aside from the fact that street trees may suffer much damage 



from the effect of gas 

 on the roots, and 

 from the burning ef- 

 fects of electricity, 

 there is a third and 

 perhaps more im- 

 portant source of in- 

 jury. This is the 

 wholesale slaughter 

 of beautiful avenues 

 of trees in both city 

 and country, in order 

 to open a passage- 

 way for the wires be- 

 longing to a corpora- 

 tion, the members of 

 which plead immun- 

 ity because of the 

 nature of the utility 

 they are providing for 

 the public. Equipped 

 with spiked climbers 

 and an axe or a saw 

 (usually the for- 

 mer), the employees 

 open up spaces in the tops of trees through which wires may be 

 carried (see Fig. 225). Lacking in appreciation of the beautiful 

 and practicing no economy, these men may disfigure trees which 

 have been the pride of a community for years. They cut the trees 

 back far enough to insure no immediate contact with the proposed 

 line of wires, and thus may leave them in such a weakened condition 

 that, should they ever recover from the shock, they could never 

 develop into an\'thing other than diseased, deformed or dwarfed 

 specimens. (See Fig. 226). 



Fig. 226. — A row of trees dehorned in order to permit 

 the unobstructed passage of overhead wires. 



