Every morning, a group of youth start off with a plyer in hand and they go about removing nails from trees in Theni. They walk street by street, looking for trees bearing advertisement boards nailed on to the trunk and they remove the boards and nails from the trees. “So far, we have removed over 25 kilos of iron nails from about 300 trees in the past couple of months. Sometimes, around 20 to 30 nails are found on a single tree,” says Pasumai Senthil, running a small business in Uthamapalayam. There are about 40 young volunteers like him, across Theni district, who engage in removing nails from trees.
The youth have been doing the work in Theni, Uthamapalayam, Cumbum and Andipatti towns. “Majority of the trees affected by the problem are the ones along the highway. Advertisers find it convenient to put up boards on a tree by the roadside. We have also been creating awareness among the public against drilling nails into tree trunks,” he adds.
“Seeing us, few walkers and passers-by have also joined in the work. Roping in few such walkers, we recently removed nails and boards from trees inside a public park and termed it as ‘aani pidungum tiruvizha’ ,” says Vignesh Babu, a volunteer. “After removing the nails, we also apply a paste of turmeric and neem oil on the affected portion of the trunk.”
“Hammering nails into the trunk of a tree can harm the tree in many ways. The tissues around the nail will die and the growth and lifespan of the tree can get affected. The free flow of nutrients will be blocked due to nails being drilled into the cambium tissue in the trunk,” says S. Baburaj, retired Professor of Botany, Thiagarajar College, Madurai.
A forestry official said that hammering nails into trees belonging to the forest department, will be taken as damage caused to the tree and can attract penalty. “However, not many trees along the highways belong to the forest department and the rule may not apply in such cases,” he said.
