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Our Arrowhead Electric Co-op deserves credit for restoring our electrical service promptly after windstorms blow trees down onto power lines, often in the dark, during the nastiest weather our north woods have to offer. I have no problem with regular maintenance necessary to remove trees and limbs from right-of-ways in the aftermath of storm or pre-emptively where potential hazards exist.
I love it when I see the county, MnDOT, and Arrowhead Electric “Coop” contractors working the ditches and right-of-ways with brush-cutting machinery. It usually means they won’t be broadcasting and dumping carcinogenic chemicals on our lands and into our waters, poisoning everything that tries to live here.
Apparently, as we have been advised, not consulted, in April’s suddenly slick-coated paper “Highline By Line” our Electric Company and their favorite mega-contractor Lake States Tree Service are not satisfied with mechanical and manual methods of vegetation control. Either that or they have a cozy arrangement with the petrochemical industry, whose profits depend on the outrageous overkill of these toxins on our wilderness lands.
Herbicides have been proven over the last fifty years to be a devastating cause of cancer and other disease wherever they have been used, from Agent Orange defoliant wreaking havoc on the animal, plant, and human populations of Indochina and on our own soldiers, to the ubiquitous use of Glyphosate (Roundup) everywhere in agriculture and forestry, in spite of the World Health Organizations declaration that it is a “probable human carcinogen.” Quite simply put, their cumulative and repeated application causes, among other toxic effects, uncontrolled cell growth (especially in broadleaf plants) in the organism to which these compounds are applied, resulting in the sudden death of the organism.
My heart sinks and my rage rises as I travel along roads in August and I see everything green turn deathly grey where I know this chemical warfare has been deployed to keep alder, hazel, and dogwood brush that will NEVER grow as tall as a power line, or suddenly stop an errant vehicle. Low growing brush, however, will control erosion, provide shade, and change CO2 to Oxygen.
So how about we cut and even shred tree species that WILL grow 30 feet high on our power lines, and let the brush and berries, deer, rabbits, woodchucks, bees and birds and berries live.
We HAVE to stop using these chemicals, especially on our forest lands. As a co-op member, I, for one (and there are MANY other members who agree) insist that their unnecessary use on our power lines should cease and desist.
Sincerely and
unequivocally,
Marco Good,
Grand Marais
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