Tenets of collecting

[Cruiser]

You two should combine your abilities and collect in a montane swamp.

Let’s meet halfway. Somewhere in Nebraska.

 

[Cruiser]

I think giving up is something worth to be mentioned.
When digging a lot of people suffer from the sunk cost fallacy. "I worked so hard, it's late in the day, I'm hungry, I'm thirsty, I dug for three hours already, this plant MUST come home with me."
Yet sometimes, while digging, we find out that there's not enough roots to have this plant survive. Or we find out it's actually a branch from a tree a couple meters downhill.
Yanking it out at all costs, knowing that's it's a senseless destruction of nature and nothing more, because the plant will never or barely live.. That's something that requires attention.

We are humans, we don't give up. We're programmed to keep going. But we have a brain that can flip that switch, and we should convince ourselves to be realistic. Take a step back.
We're also programmed to hoard. When it's money and nursery plants, or food and water, go ahead. When it's plants from nature, yeah, tap the break every now and then.

Keep in mind that nobody anywhere in the world will look down on you for leaving a plant where it is.

This one is pretty good. I’m adding it to my list as Acceptance. Accept when a tree is unobtainable and move on. HAMPA.

 

[rockm]

Here’s some context for what I meant by weird/odd.

This is a weird form to find in a true fir, a very apically dominant tree. Yet this is how it was growing in the wild. (Minus the light wiring on the bottom branch of course).
View attachment 585090

Another fir. Very unbalanced. A large triangle. Odd. It grew this way for a reason, and that story has value to me. Its form may change over time, but the initial weirdness is what drew me in.
View attachment 585092

Yeah. No. These trees are not what I’m talking about as weird. Wouldn’t have collected the first BTW Pretty non descript. Anyway, The second isn’t weird. It’s a common natural form of the tree. I’m talking about “one off” oddities that draw attention because they stick out visually at the expense of the rest of the tree. Can’t count the number of new collectors who dig a tree with some kind of oddity -inverse taper, bulbous roots, out of scale burls etc.-BECAUSE of that singular oddity. The vast vast majority of those kinds of trees aren’t worth the trouble