@dannyboy that's a great idea! You give them another life, far away from your house and they will be strong enough to survive that bit of ground! ❤️
Yes, ask an arborist to identify it. No no, Don't help Tree of Heaven. Something to know about Tree of heaven: if you cut it down without pulling every single root, it will come right back. It can grow back from even a tiny piece of its root. It sends shoots out more than 50 feet. It is nearly impossible to irradicate. It does not need your help.
@dannyboy Identifying if it is the Tree of Heaven is probably the best thing to do. If it is, and it really is this invasive (which our wise group says it is ? ), there is nothing else for it: it has to go. You cannot have your house at stake for a tree, no matter how much we love them. However, you can still make something from its branches. Basket weaving even!
Also, free seeds for new trees that are native to the US here https://www.arborday.org/
@jeanne-mayell , i wasn't sure where to post this, but i loved reading this article, and i thought you may enjoy it too. It is about a Punk rocker in Oakland who discovers that she can communicate with animals, especially birds. From Harper's Magazine, here is "The Crow Whisperer":
@unk-p I loved that story. I could read stories like that all day.
I need to start using my own whisperer abilities. I can read them but it's a whole other gift to be able to work with them.
A few weeks ago, grackles found my bird feeder. They are so greedy. They emptied the feeder in three days whereas before they came, it would take three weeks. They are gangsters. They loiter in the yard, yakking and keeping the other birds away. I want to reason with them. Give them their own feeder if only they would leave the little birds alone. Forget it. They want everything. Is there a grackle whisperer out there?
@jeanne-mayell grackles may be rude dinner guests, but they won't stay in your yard forever. They have to eat a lot, to prepare for their migration, and they will probably be out of there by the end of the month. I just read that the number of grackles is down to 73 million. It was 190 million in the '70s. Grackles will eat almost anything, but they really love to eat grubworms from lawns. Unfortunately, many homeowners use poison to control the grubs- and then the grackles die from eating the poisoned grubs. And then there are farmers who don't want to share their crops with the birds, so they hire companies to spray entire flocks of grackles in the winter, at night, with a chemical that strips the protective oils from their feathers. This ghastly human trick causes the birds to freeze to death in agony.
My advice would be to love and feed them as much as you can, and wish them well on their journey.
@unk-p Oh that is awful! I don't use any sprays on my yard so maybe that's why they like it here. I will fill up the feeder now, happily! Interestingly, I just on impulse bought a big bag of bird seed yesterday.
@unk-p. Regarding the grackles, I bought more seed and filled up a large feeder yesterday morning. The grackles came and wolfed it all down in a day. Also I read that they aren't leaving by the end of the month. In fact they just got here and are staying through the fall. They are probably leaving where you live in the south by the end of the month to come up north where I live. I need to rethink my plan.
@jeanne-mayell I found this article suggesting kinds of bird feeders you could try to make it harder for the grackles to hog all the food: