>>1343376>how do you do this without feeling depressed and guilty for betraying them when you have to cut them down bc *you* failed to take care of them properly? Or thinking that you could've done more, and so you're a failure and should give up gardening so you don't cause more suffering through your incompetency?M8 it's even worse when you're selectively breeding them. Most of the condemned will be healthy or relatively healthy, but won't have some trait or other you want. So in order to make room for the next generation of potentials, you have to kill them. It's especially bad for my apples as I look after them for years and then they exhibit some trait I don't want and have to be killed.
Sometimes I feel like it is cruel, that I cross the parents and cause these trees to be born, and most are only put on this earth to live a few seasons before the hand that started them has to end them too.
In the first generation I had favourites, one had a very unusual lobed type leaf and was immune to scab where most others were afflicted. For two seasons I killed trees suffering any sign of scab or canker but my favourite was not only untouched but also outgrew its fellow survivors. The better it did the more fond of it I was, until year three when it got powdery mildew and cut it down and returned it to the earth. I still feel pretty bad about that.
