11/02/11 LATE TO THE PARTY, A FAKE RUSSIAN, AND READY TO GO BACK TO WORK

SILVER MAPLE, LATE TO THE PARTY

NEITHER RUSSIAN NOR OLIVE

Wednesday, 7:30 AM.  39 degrees, wind  WSW, calm.  It is overcast but the barometer is up.
    Lucky is walking around pretty  well but is still sick, exhausted and has incontinence issues, and we are trying to get his stomach back to normal.  We’ll all do o ur best to “hang in there.”
    Even the silver maples are joining the color brigade this year, the one on Rittenhouse Ave. that is pictured being quite pretty in yellow, even if late to the party.  The leaves often just dry up without much color.
    The Russian olive, Eleagnus angustifolia in the family Eleagnaceae, is neither Russian nor olive.  It is listed as invasive in Wisconsin and should not be planted.  Its only real landscape value is silvery gray leaves, which make it rather an oddity in the landscape.  It bears olive-like, silvery-yellow fruits, thus its common name.  I have not personally found it to be that invasive, but I will defer to the experts.  It is salt tolerant, and has become a problem in the American Southwest.  It is best to avoid it.
    Last Thursday there was a meeting in Hurley, which is in the Iron Range country, regarding the proposed open pit iron mine.  Its purpose was to gain public input for a legislative committee.  I had intended to go as an observer but Lucky’s disappearance interfered. The Bad River Tribe spoke in opposition for fear of pollution of their wild rice beds, and there were others who spoke in general opposition, but according to the Ashland Daily Press most in attendance favored the mine, citing the region’s mining heritage and history, and the desire to once again have the good jobs and economic opportunities that mining would bring.  Many remember the mining days, which only ended in the 1960’s.  The industry brought nearly a century of prosperity to Hurley and nearby Ironwood, MI and other communities.  One old timer showed up in his mining gear; headlamp, shovel, lunch box and all, and declared he was ready to go back to work.   
    It appears to me that the proponents of mining are largely working people who want decent jobs to raise their families, and the opponents second home owners and those residents who see themselves as “environmentalists,” and above the economic fray, for whatever reason (and there are many).
  Surely there can be a sensible meeting of the minds here, with compromise on both sides, while ensuring that environmental laws and standards are upheld.  Truth be told, the economic, social and environmental health of the region and the state demands it.