Actons announce second dragon – a third on the way

by Trina Kleist, The Union Newspaper

Arborist Aero Acton sees dragons in his Banner Mountain front yard – two now.

The latest one emerged at the end of October from the stump left when a tree fell during a storm last winter.

Labor took six and a half hours at the hands – and chainsaw and torch – of Foresthill resident and wood carver Jeff Turpin of Owl Creek Lumber Co.

Acton and his wife, Kara Acton, operate Leaf it to Me tree service.

“After having our booth at The Union’s Spring Home and Garden Show for years with Jeff of Owl Creek Lumber, we hoped we would have the chance to use him in our own yard,” wrote Kara Acton. “Who knew the tree would fall last November and open up that opportunity?”

Turpin birthed the dragon on a recent Friday, delivering a head bursting out of the ground. He “used one of the exposed roots to create a wing emerging on one side of the dragon head,” Kara Acton wrote. “The carving turned out better than we ever could have imagined!”

The Actons’ first dragon appeared eight years ago, Kara Acton continued.

“Shortly after moving to our home, we received a tree order containing some twisted, weeping blue Atlas cedar,” she wrote. “After looking at the trees leaning this way and that in our yard, Aero said he saw a dragon topiary in the shape they made and had to plant them out front.

Read full article at TheUnion.com