Tree spiking

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Nail in the tree trunk

Tree spiking or tree pinning (Engl.) Is a type of sabotage , when the rods of metal of the root tree are hammered to a precipitation to be prevented. A chainsaw blade that hits such a stick will tear, making it difficult and uneconomical to felling the tree. The staffs can injure forest workers , so the practice is also associated with eco-terrorism . In addition, the value of the timber is greatly reduced by discoloration of the wood as a reaction of the tree to metallic foreign bodies. The viability of the tree, however, is not affected by such nailing.

In the USA

Tree spiking has a long history, individual incidents of this type can be traced back to the late 1800s, although it was not widely known until the 1980s. Dave Forman , co-founder of Earth First! , publicized the practice in his book Ecodefense , and suggested it should be part of the arsenal of every committed environmentalist.

In 1987, the sawmill employee George Alexander was seriously injured in California when the band saw he operated was destroyed by a tree nailed in this way.

Tree spiking was declared a criminal offense under US federal law in 1988. ( United States Code 1864)

In 1990, then Earth First! Leader Judi Bari called on activists in Northern California and Southern Oregon to abandon tree spiking as a tactic in Redwood Summer, a non-violent campaign against the felling of the Redwood Empire in 1990.

Tree spiking in literature and film

In the 1998 novel Die Blockade by the author Derek Hansen, the protagonist, an employee of a forestry company, has tree nailing carried out in order to discredit anti-clearing activists.

In the film Severed - Forest of the Dead , the woodcutter Eric tries to saw a tree trunk that was previously manipulated by an anti-clearing activist. He injures himself with his chainsaw, a growth accelerator preparation from secret researchers gets into his blood through the wound and he turns into a zombie.

In the X-Files - The scary cases of the FBI episode The Cocoon (English. Darkness Falls , Episode 1X19) two environmentalists are accused of tree spiking in the state forest of Washington.

See also

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ What is Tree Spiking?
  2. ↑ United States Code, Title 18, Part I, Chapter 91, § 1864 (d) (3), "Hazardous or injurious devices on Federal lands"
  3. ↑ Tree-spiking renunciation & Mississippi summer in the California redwoods ( Memento from May 9, 2008 in the Internet Archive )

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