Not long ago, I noticed that a tall pine tree in a neighboring yard was dead all the way up. It had long been one of those pines whose lower branches died off, but whose top branches were still green year-round. No longer.

Our neighbor must have noticed this too, because one fine morning recently at about 8, the noise of tree removal started. I heard that, of course, but what really got me out of bed was our dog, who took a loud interest in the goings-on. I was thus up, so I figured I might as well take a few pictures.

By the time I got around to that, the crew has stripped off the lower branches of the tree and feed them to a chipper. That was the real source of the noise, not the cutting of the branches.Rather than remove the top limps, the pro tree-climber got into position —— to cut off the whole top. Repeat until the whole tree was gone. But I didn’t stick around for that, breakfast was calling.