I was out at a construction site the other day and snapped a picture of a tree that had been repaired with duct tape. I'll get into why that's a bad idea in a minute, but that duct taped tree reminded me of The Red Green Show, a weekly TV comedy that ran for 15 seasons and 300 glorious episodes of handyman-filled drama at the Possum Lodge in Ontario. Lodge President Red drove a Dodge Ram cargo Possum Van. The Possum Lodge had its own prayers and philosophies, things like "I am a man, I can change, if I have to, I guess, Amen," "Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati" (fake Latin for "when all else fails, play dead," just like a possum), and "If women don't find you handsome, they should at least find you handy."
If It Ain't Broke, You're Not Trying
I believe (don't quote me) I was watching an episode about 25 years ago that featured lodge member Dalton Humphrey in a segment called "If It Ain't Broke, You're Not Trying!" Dalton was self-proclaimed as not handsome or handy, and he was married to a controlling wife. Dalton brings Red his wife's broken tree. Red doesn't consider himself handsome either, but he is a Possum Lodge Handy Man with a secret weapon. Red fixes everything with duct tape. Could it be the tree in my picture?
Duct tape is great for ripped up screen doors and taping up cardboard boxes. It's not so good at fixing trees.
Red was right about a lot of things, and I'm no expert on the ladies, but it seems that if you want to impress them, you can be ugly, but they know that fixing stuff is more than just tape. Duct tape is stylish in a very manly way, and yes, I personally love the stuff. But it's bad for fixing trees, because it suffocates trees, girdles trees, and rots trees.
Trees Have to Breathe
Duct tape suffocates. Bark isn't a plastic candy bar wrapper. It's a living, protective, porous layer that needs to breathe. Tape up your lips and smash down your nose with some gray duct tape. Can't breathe? Not cool, not handy, and very unimpressive to the ladies.
Trees Have to Grow
Duct tape girdles. I went to Walmart last night to get shoes for one of my growing grandkids. The kid loves his size 5 croc shoes, but now he needs a size 6. Get it? A tree trunk gets fatter every year. The pipes that carry food and water up and down the tree get choked off with tape. Same goes for tags, wire, staking strap, paint, and blackjack roof tar (don't laugh, I've seen it). Too bad, though, Red is wrong. Trees don't like duct tape.
Trees Need to Stay Dry
Duct tape creates rot. A landscape worker I knew kept adding duct tape to his work pants, and then one day, voila, he had stylish duct tape pants. Handsome and handy. He loved how easily they washed off with a garden hose, and holes got fixed with more tape. Those pants made a statement, until one summer day when they got too hot, too heavy. It didn't go well for him. The chafing, the rash, the rot, it was too much. Nothing ever dries out. He never said anything about insects and critters, but I often wonder.
A tree wrapped in duct tape gets the same deal. Under all that tape is a warm, wet pocket that never dries out. The tree isn't mending, it's suffering.
Bottom line
Remember, a tree isn't a screen door or a cardboard box going back to Amazon. If you've got a tree wearing duct tape, or a new landscape around Spokane, Coeur d'Alene, or Post Falls is tanking, it's worth having somebody take a look.
