On the Stump: Fall 2019

Friends are special gifts that life bestows. All these gifts are precious, and all are packaged differently. They are unique and individual coming in varying ages, genders ethnicities and personalities. Friendships take different paths. Some friends become like family...

On the Stump: Summer 2019

Thirteen years ago, when Woody came to us from the animal shelter, he took the back yard as his own. A fenced half acre became his great wide open and he became a whirling dervish, racing the perimeter, weaving into shrubbery, under lawn chairs and jumping onto, off...

On the Stump: Spring 2019

If you are a regular reader of this column, you know that I am guilty of the occasional rant about how trees contribute to our society; environmentally, medically, psychologically and monetarily. Shoot, in the last edition of The Acorn, I even pontificated that trees...

On the Stump: Winter 2018

As I began to think of Arbor Day this year, I remembered (with just a slight twinge), the seemingly countless times I listened to mayors, teachers and garden club ladies recite Joyce Kilmer’s famous poem, “Trees”. Simplistic in style and direct in purpose, it is a...

On the Stump: Spring 2018

I thank my lucky stars each time I remember August 23, 1983. That was my first day as the City of Charleston Urban Forester.  I had never heard that term before and didn’t have the faintest idea what it really meant; much less, how to be one. Snappy and intellectually...