# College football rivalry gone insane: scummy bastard poisons trees at Toomer's Corner **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [February 16, 2011, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639 "2011-02-16T22:41:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![armedmonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@armedmonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/armedmonkey)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/41 "2011-02-18T20:17:18Z")
[This](http://www.treemover.com/ourcompany_history.cfm) is who I worked for. ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/42 "2011-02-18T20:33:20Z")
I’ll be darned, I talked to them this winter, **MWA Gun** , when I was having some trees brought in to my place. They do excellent work. I hope Auburn chooses them for the service. There’s none better. So… how often did you get to say “I’d tap that”? ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/43 "2011-02-18T21:09:32Z")
> [@lieu](#): > > So… how often did you get to say “I’d tap that”? On a college campus: pretty damned frequently. The OPPORTUNITY to tap is another thing entirely of course. ---
**Author:** ![armedmonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@armedmonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/armedmonkey)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/44 "2011-02-18T21:17:29Z")
The more I think about it, the more I think my on the fly max. estimate of 15 ft is probably too conservative. 25 ft maybe? But the higher you go, the trickier it gets, and the more likely to have root damage. Bigger than that is doable, just not good for the tree because of all the loss to the root system\* Anyway, I mainly just drove the dozer - I’m not the foremost tree expert. \*There _might_ be a way though. Tree farms exist that specialize in this stuff. My experience is with wild trees and wild root systems, but tree farms prune the roots of the oaks while they are growing in order to produce a smaller but still viable root ball. I don’t know the sizes on those, though. ---
**Author:** ![Ogre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ecb155/32.png) [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2011, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/45 "2011-02-18T22:09:23Z")
I must point out the Facebook group, “Tide For Toomer’s”. Over 20,000 members, and $8,000 raised. Not all Bama fans are asshats. ---
**Author:** ![Ogre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ecb155/32.png) [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2011, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/46 "2011-02-19T16:18:27Z")
> [@Ogre](#): > > I must point out the Facebook group, “Tide For Toomer’s”. Over 20,000 members, and $8,000 raised. Not all Bama fans are asshats. Tide for Toomer’s is up to almost $30,000 as of this morning. ---
**Author:** ![shellofmyformerself](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5f8ce5/32.png) [@shellofmyformerself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shellofmyformerself)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2011, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/47 "2011-02-19T21:51:30Z")
I read/heard somewhere (can’t remember where, as I live in Montgomery and this is the talk of the town so there are stories everywhere) that Auburn has actually been growing replacement trees for years in case something (man-made or natural) ever happened to the trees. Anyone know if this is true? ---
**Author:** ![Ogre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ecb155/32.png) [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2011, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/48 "2011-02-19T22:33:36Z")
> [@shellofmyformerself](#): > > I read/heard somewhere (can’t remember where, as I live in Montgomery and this is the talk of the town so there are stories everywhere) that Auburn has actually been growing replacement trees for years in case something (man-made or natural) ever happened to the trees. Anyone know if this is true? I’ve heard the rumor as well, but I have no idea if it’s true. ---
**Author:** ![Mince](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecd19e/32.png) [@Mince](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mince)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2011, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/49 "2011-02-20T02:27:18Z")
From the OP (emphasis added): > **[Auburn University](https://auburn.edu/404msg.php)** > > Auburn University, one of the South’s largest universities, is a leader in arts and applied science education, and it brings a tradition of spirit to the responsive career preparation it offers. > [@](#): > > Auburn University has formed a task force to help save its famed Toomer’s Corner oak trees, **bringing together experts in horticulture, agronomy, civil engineering, forestry, chemistry and landscape services**. > [@](#): > > The Auburn Police Division is receiving assistance in the investigation from the **Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Marshals Service, State of Alabama Department of Agriculture and Industries (Pesticide Management Section), Tallapoosa County Sheriff’s Office, Dadeville Police Department and Auburn University**. My God, is the universe going to explode if these trees die? ---
**Author:** ![Ogre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ecb155/32.png) [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2011, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/50 "2011-02-20T04:24:17Z")
> [@Mince](#): > > My God, is the universe going to explode if these trees die? More than likely, yes. ---
**Author:** ![Mince](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecd19e/32.png) [@Mince](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mince)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2011, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/51 "2011-02-20T04:33:37Z")
> [@Ogre](#): > > More than likely, yes. Well then, I guess the ridiculous expenditure of resources is justified. ---
**Author:** ![Mince](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecd19e/32.png) [@Mince](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mince)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2011, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/52 "2011-02-20T04:48:44Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > Not that I think this is a post that’s even halfway meant to be anything other than blatant threadshitting, but “killing a couple of trees” is like saying that if somebody burned down Monticello the Abraham Lincoln House they’d “burned an old house”, or that the guy who defaced the Pieta back in the 1970s “broke an old statue in a city that’s got a billion of 'em already”. Mention Toomer’s Corner to however many hundreds of thousands of Auburn graduates and former students there are around the world and regardless of how little they cared about football it would instantly form a nostalgic image. Jimmy Wales probably said “Oh shit!” today before the wiki entry for the destruction was added. > > I only attended Auburn for a quarter and I LOATHE college football culture and even I have nostalgic memories of it. I have pics of my siblings at Toomer’s Corner with those two massive oaks in view from the late 1970s/early 1980s and of my parents there in the 1950s. My brother has a picture of my grandmother at Toomer’s Corner when she was a student in the 1920s. [Here’s a pic of one of the oaks from 1910](http://deniseb.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/2007/11/26/toomerscorner1900s480.jpg). There’s a picture in almost ever edition of the _Glomerata_ (the AU yearbook) since the 1910s. > > I’m neither a football fan, a proud alumnus, a tree hugger, or even particularly devoted to that campus (though my siblings, parents and grandmother were all fanatical on the football and the school loyalty and my brother has attempted to buy Toomers Drugs a couple of times), but just thinking of the conversations and gatherings under those trees have seen student gatherings for two world wars, the Civil Rights era, integration (Auburn U.'s integration was amazingly low key), Vietnam, the Shug v. Bear years, Desert Storm and into the present era makes me gutsick over how needless and senseless this act of vandalism was. It’s like knocking Washington’s nose off of Mt. Rushmore or collapsing Natural Bridge (except neither of those things are living). > > Personally I don’t see this as the act of a classless Bama fan but as the act of a crazy old piece of shit who I hope spends every minute of the maximum sentence allowable in prison because he’s proven he can’t be trusted outside of a cage. Now, I think the man should suffer the penalties outlined by law. However, I don’t think any such punishment should be defined by the trees’ legacy. Breaching nostalgia should not be a crime. [QUOTE=Giles] Perhaps one week each year for 130 years doing community service as a gardener at Auburn U. [/QUOTE] What an interesting sentencing model. Next, we can order convicted pedophiles to burn off their community service at daycare centers. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2011, 6:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/53 "2011-02-20T06:32:22Z")
> [@Mince](#): > > Now, I think the man should suffer the penalties outlined by law. However, I don’t think any such punishment should be defined by the trees’ legacy. Breaching nostalgia should not be a crime. So if somebody were to torch Martin Luther King’s church in Montgomery and brag on a radio show about choosing the church specifically due to its history and significance, should they be tried the same as somebody who torched any other Baptist Church in any city? (Assume nobody is hurt in the church burnings.) ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2011, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/54 "2011-02-20T15:52:11Z")
> [@Mince](#): > > My God, is the universe going to explode if these trees die? > [@Ogre](#): > > More than likely, yes. :eek: :mad: Somebody should let those Auburn folks know that the whole point of a Doomsday device is lost if you don’t tell anybody about it… ---
**Author:** ![Ogre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ecb155/32.png) [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639/55 "2011-02-21T02:02:35Z")
> [@Mince](#): > > Well then, I guess the ridiculous expenditure of resources is justified. Yes indeed. > [@](#): > > What an interesting sentencing model. Next, we can order convicted pedophiles to burn off their community service at daycare centers. Good thing he didn’t try to fuck the trees (except, you know, in a manner of speaking). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/college-football-rivalry-gone-insane-scummy-bastard-poisons-trees-at-toomers-corner/571639.md?page=2)