24 April 2008

Dear Friends of Spring Hill Cemetery,

I am relieved to say that Spring Hill's 15 dead trees were cut down on April 24th, as planned.   Not only does this open up the cemetery to more light, but also the disruptive and potentially destructive process of tree removal is largely behind us.  Sanborn Tree Removal Service sent out a crew that included three tree climbers who actually climbed the dead trees, cut, and then lowered sections.   Regional Parks' crew worked alongside the tree service with chain saws and a chipper to cut the sections into managable pieces. Jeremy Nichols and Mel Davis were there as well, representing the "Friends" interest in protecting our monuments.  I want to thank Sanborn and Regional Parks - as well as Jeremy and Mel, for a difficult job well done.  Only one stone was newly damaged in the process, and that stone was already on the list to be taken to Gary Galeazzi of North Bay Monument for repair.

Following Thursday's tree cutting, the focus of Friday's work day centered on removing the newly cut debris from the cemetery and raking the main paths to remove obstacles.  Luckily, the sun was glorious filtering through the trees for our work day, just as it has been for all the work days we have had so far.  Wild turkeys strolled away as we drove up to the cemetery.  Conditions were perfect for our labors.

As you can see from the pictures, 15 downed large trees left the cemetery in major disarray.  Friday was the most physically demanding work day we have had yet, with our 12 volunteers dragging, cutting, and using any means possible to transport the downed wood to Regional Parks' chipper machine.  Regional Parks sent a crew of 3 to work with us -- two of them operating the chipper, and one of them using a chain saw to cut logs into manageable pieces.  We managed to fill the large dump truck with the "chips"  produced.  We will continue (and hopefully finish) this process on May 30th.  

If you visit the cemetery this month, don't be alarmed by the missing Ogan,  Darius Martin, James Parmeter,  and Mary Ford's stones.  Darius, James, and Mary's stones have been taken to North Bay Monument where Gary Galeazzi has very generously offered to repair them for us.  Glen of Regional Parks moved the 3 Ogan stones to a safer location within the cemetery to protect them from damage during  tree removal.  The Ogan stones will be back in place at the end of May, and the other stones will return to Spring Hill once Gary has a chance to repair them.

Thank you to those volunteers who joined us on Friday. The next work day is set for Friday, May 30th. As always, the workday will begin around 9am, and finish when the dump truck is filled - usually around 12:30. If any of you are interested in becoming "official" Sonoma County Regional Parks volunteers, contact John Ryan at ryan1@sonoma-county.org - he would be happy to send the information and forms to you.

I look forward to joining those of you who can make it to the cemetery on May 30th!