Damage from Typhoon Glenda - Part 3

Seeing all the damage as discussed in part 2 of this article made me realize how lucky we were that the neighbor's santol (cottonfruit) tree near our backyard had been cut. That santol tree had grown so big that the trailing storm winds of typhoon Glenda would've knocked off the tree branches and trashed our house. The timely cutting of the santol tree saved us so much of grief.

Another project that proved worthwhile for us was the garden gate arch that we had constructed. That arch now has a very robust Rangoon Creeper on it. It is so lush and thick that I'm quite sure it has become heavy. But because of how solidly built that arch was, I had no apprehensions whatsoever with super typhoons knocking it down.


Lack of Typhoon Disaster Preparedness

With now super typhoons becoming the norm, there ought to be a standard practice of cutting trees to a maximum height during the month before the monsoon rains come in the rainy season. Typhoons are an annual occurrence anyway.

Some neighbors would cut their trees though after the storm has passed. It's like they've awaken from some deep slumber of negligence and suddenly realized they needed to do something in case another storm comes.

Needless to say, the streets were strewn with felled branches, both from typhoon Glenda's winds, as well as the branches that neighbors decided to cut post haste.

This however, posed so much inconvenience as well as danger to motorists. The photo below shows how one street became a slalom course with all the cut and felled tree branches in several piles. Were these people thinking that with all the extensive and severe damage done that the garbage haulers would come pronto to pick up their trash?

Quite frankly, I thought the situation was a state of emergency already that homeowners would just have take the initiative to clear debris and trash as much as they can - by themselves.

Don't wait for national government for goodness sake, to pick up your piles of yard trash on the streets! Cut the branches up. Remove the leaves and burn or bag them. There's so much that can be done.


Finding Treasure in Trash

In the midst of the trash brought about by the typhoon, we found items that I never thought I'd find - but was looking for. Window blinds, or Venetian blinds as others call it, are not very common in homes with owners preferring the more practical window curtains.

Well in one of our morning walks, I saw a set of window blinds thrown out by the owner after the typhoon. That old set of window blinds provided raw materials (the blinds slats) that I used for homemade plant labels or markers.

The pinion rod or tie rod in the set was used as an accessory for two DIY projects: a heavy-duty fruit picker and a lightweight apple fruit picking tool. Truly, one man's trash is another man's treasure.

See part 4 for the continuation of this article.