151/366: Half an Oak

When Kate and I were looking for a house back in late 2002, one of the things that sold us on this place was the back yard. The lot is very deep, unusually so for this part of Niskayuna, so there's a lot of space in the back yard, and it was pleasantly shaded by trees. We've since taken down the maples that were on the south side, but there's an enormous oak in the northeast corner that we've left in place, which is a really nice tree.

Our neighbor to the north, however, was not as fond of this tree, as she was really into gardening, and the oak casts much of that yard in shade. When we were having the maples taken out, she hinted a bunch that she wouldn't mind having the oak disappear as well, but we like it. I did, however, tell her that it would be OK to have the tree service trim back the branches that extended over the fence, so long as it didn't hurt the tree.

This is the result:

The giant oak tree in our back yard, showing the aggressive pruning of branches that stick over the fence.

(That's at sunset yesterday, but there wasn't much color thanks to the cloud cover, so I made this a greyscale image.)

From our yard, it's not really that noticeable-- I had to stand in a slightly inconvenient spot to get this-- especially in summer when it's fully leafed out. It's pretty striking from the back angle, though, especially in the fall and winter. I've been meaning to get a photo of this for a while, and yesterday was the first good opportunity.