tree gone!

As I sit at my computer at the moment, there is a great racket of chomping, grinding and buzzing outside. When we moved to this place, I particularly noticed a lovely Scots pine gracing the house across the road, giving it an air of dignity and history with its elegant twisting branches, brushy clusters of needles and confident sturdy trunk. Something to notice, to look out for as I came round the bend in the road. This is an area that I suspect was once heathland, there are a lot of pines, birch and heather in the gardens round about and the soil is acid. Sadly, this particular pine is no more, reduced in a few short hours to a pile of sawdust and logs after long years of quiet existence. I can only hope it had some disease or rot - it seems a sacrilege to destroy something of such age and beauty. I suspect however that some health and safety geek suggested it might be a danger to the house, or perhaps they just thought it was getting too big, as if this wasn't what tree were for! I shall mourn its passing, a landmark no longer.