Who Chopped Down the Apple Trees?

Their great-grandfather planted the first apple trees. The Farris family had migrated from North Dakota in the early 1900s, settling on a farm near the banks of the Pajaro River. The apple orchard ran alongside the river, more than a couple hundred trees planted in three straight rows.

The orchard became a family heirloom, passed down across four generations. Mark and Harold Farris inherited stewardship of the trees a decade ago, after their father died. The orchard, Mark Farris recalled, had been his “dad’s little pride and joy.” Mark himself, now 27 years old, practically grew up under the trees, helping with harvests almost as soon as he learned to walk, camping in the orchard with friends on warm summer nights.

“I used to strap a walkie-talkie on him,” his mother recalled the other day, “so I could call him back for dinner.”

This was last Thursday. Six days had passed since the crew with the chain saws came and laid waste to the orchard--for reasons that the Farrises still could not quite fathom. “What happened,” said Harold Farris, “did not have to happen.” That it did says something about the folly of our times, although the whole thing is so strange that a moral is not easily extracted. Maybe it simply is this: When politicians, bureaucrats and Mother Nature collide--duck.

*

It began with the flood. Two weeks ago the Pajaro River jumped its banks, broke through a levee and swamped farmlands and a farm town across the river from the Farris place. Farmers were furious. They were led to believe that routine maintenance of the riverbed had long been suspended in order to protect an endangered species--the Santa Cruz long-toed salamander. Thus, when the rains came, overgrown vegetation clogged the river and created the flood. Good crops were sacrificed, as one strawberry grower put it, “for the tree-huggers and environmentalists.”

The complaint received national notice--making handy fodder for the enemies of environmental protections. Of course, like so many anecdotes that now shape national debate, this one simply was not true. Studies had demonstrated long ago that no long-toed salamanders lived by the river. The vegetation had flourished only because local bureaucracies could not come up with money or a workable maintenance program. Moreover, federal engineers doubted the vegetation triggered the flood: The rains simply brought too much water too fast.

None of this resonated nearly so well as the original story line: Farms lost to appease lizards. Enter Pete Wilson, the governor who would be President. Wilson now begins each day looking for ways to demonstrate his conservative bona fides. He choppered down, stood before cameras and declared enough was enough. He was suspending the state Endangered Species Act for five years. Let the clear-cutting of riverbanks begin! It made a swell photo op, but left officials better versed in the situation perplexed.

“Because there are no endangered species in these areas,” said a state Fish and Game biologist, “suspending the act . . . will have no bearing.”

Well, unfortunately, this was not quite so. Taking a cue from Wilson, Santa Cruz County officials promptly ordered an emergency clear-cutting of vegetation in the river, along its banks, and across the so-called benchlands--the property that runs from the riverside to the levee--where the Farris apple orchard had stood since 1914, long before any levee.

*

When he heard chain saws, Mark Farris assumed a crew had come to knock down the benchland cottonwoods and willows. He went to make sure. The crew said it had orders to cut everything. Period. “You can’t touch that orchard,” Farris exclaimed. “That’s on private property. That’s my business, my income. That’s our family orchard.”

The crew was not impressed: “One of them,” Farris recalled, “said they had a letter from Pete Wilson that gave them the go-ahead to clear-cut the Pajaro River.” Chain saws roared to life, and apple trees began to fall.

Frantic, Farris started making calls. He called the governor and reached a tape recorder. He called county officials and learned they were at lunch. He called the sheriff and was told nothing could be done. Finally, a Farm Bureau representative rushed out and convinced the crew to stop long enough for a clarification. It was a little late. More than 150 trees already were mowed down.

Later, the responsible parties would run for cover. It was all a mistake. One of those things. Oops. The Farrises, however, have yet to hear an apology from the Presidential Aspirant or anyone on down the line. “We aren’t broken financially,” the mother said, “but there are some hearts here that have been broken.” The brothers plan to go down soon and chop up the apple trees for firewood. They’re told it burns real good.