Red, I thought your post was sarcasm, but couldn't quite tell which way the weapon was pointed or if it was all intended as sarcasm - my bad!

We are way past doing whatever we want, whenever we want, anywhere on the planet, public or private. Is this good or bad? Depends on my mood. Was it ever different, probably not except in degree.

Zoning laws, pollution laws, local laws, state laws, and federal laws all tell us what we can do or not do on "our" land because the effects of what we do does not stay on our land. Peer pressure, church pressure, nosey neighbor pressure, etcetera all succeed in keeping what we do on "our" land limited on a less formal - but just as powerful - basis.

But I am not advocating any of that in this thread. My point is that kids learn fast from our examples and we should try to teach them the best we can: cutting live branches from trees -wherever the tree happens to be located - should be part of a larger lesson about treating the environment we share.

So I have had my say; I think I am going to let this thread go where it wishes. I am going on to something else.