My apple tree is very old.  It has been on this property for several hundred years.  It was once a support for a barbed wire fence.   Part of this fence is still inside the tree.  I can imagine seeing the horses and other animals it may have housed long before cars were invented. 

It has been a home to many animals and birds throughout it's long life.  The holes in the trunk are evidence of that and there are some vacant birds nests high up in it's sturday branches away from potential predators.  

It has produce thousands upon thousand of bushels of fruit throughout it's long life in feeding kids, parents, grandparents, great grandparents, and so on.   The ants and other bugs on the tree have fed wood peckers and other carniverous birds for a long time now.

It has been a victim of lightening, many times through the years, sometimes losing a large part of itself as a result, yet there are still partially broken branches on the tree that, despite just hanging down, still seem to get enough nourishment to produce a countless number of leaves and new apples every spring!  I would leave them hanging because I didn't want to bother with cutting them.

The cold frosts of autimn has now stripped the tree of it's leaves showing it's old ragged and tattered limbs.  I remember my wife would repeatedly tell me to cut down this old tree. I would always answer...."I can't....I just can't cut down that old tree!"  So every spring,  I continue to pick up broken branches and limbs that have fallen from the tree, after being severely punished by the ice, snow and wind during the brutal Maine winter.  But in the spring....Then the new growth comes, and the sweet nectar from the apple blossums nourish the many, north bound,  humming birds, orials and the new born butterflies and honey bees!  It's a beautiful site!  

i am going to keep this old tree, for as long as I live!

God Bless

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