By Kathleen Wiens
My family and I moved to Lake Oswego in 2015.
One of the reasons we fell in love with LO is the large beautiful trees in the community. We were thrilled that our home had an incredible heritage redwood tree in the front yard and worked with Bosky Dell Natives to create a gold certified backyard habitat. I went to Humboldt State University and it was there that I fell in love with redwood trees and hiking in forests.
In the spring of this year the redwood tree in our yard lost a large 75 foot leader branch and after many consultations with arborists it was determined that we needed to take down this tree. It was a difficult thing to do since we loved and cherished this redwood tree.
We contacted Burl and Grain in Portland and they took the bulk of her trunk to turn into furniture. We also had four local woodworker artists that gathered some of her trunk to turn into beautiful art. The city will also be creating a bench and placing it in a local park.
I thought it would be wonderful to have an art show someday to showcase what was created from her wood and share her legacy. We will be planting more trees in our yard this fall to help with restoration from the loss of the redwood tree.
I got involved with the Oswego Lake Watershed Council while being on the annual Tree Summit planning committee a couple years ago and have continued to serve on this committee. I sure appreciate the excellent work the OLWC does.