City goes back to basics, using draft horses to pull infected trees out of Mount Royal park

The City of Montreal has been testing out a new method of hauling trees infected by the emerald ash borer out of Mount Royal park one that harkens back to days of old.

Until the end of the week, two Belgian draft horses from Brisco stables in Prvost, Que., will be pulling infected trees out of the woods.

The city opted to try using horses instead of heavy equipment to hack down and removeinfectedtrees in hard-to-access wetlands and marshyareas, where the impact of bringing in machinery would be significant.

"The horse is an additional tool that we can use to operate in certainareas, for example the wetlands. If we want to have zero risk of spillingoil or gas, then the horse can replace the machine," explainedLuc St-Hilaire, a forestry engineer with the city's large park service.

There are more than 10,000 ash trees in Mount Royal park, two-thirds of which have been treated against the invasive bug.The rest will be axedby March 2019.

• Mount Royal to lose 4,000 trees in Montreal's emerald ash borer cull

The city announced thatplan in January, saying that it wouldremove the dead treesand plant 40,000 saplings in their place.

Emerald ash borers arebeetles that infest ash trees and eat them from the inside. They have been causing havoc on the island for several years, from BeaconsfieldtoPointe-Claire, RosemontandNotre-Dame-de-Grce.

In the case of Mount Royal, it's the larvae that are causing the most trouble, said arboristDaniel Pilote.

"It's crazy how such a small beast, that measures around three-fourths of an inch long, can kill a tree," he said.

The horses work alternately every hour and have a shelter on site where they can rest, eat and drink water.

When they aren't working hauling logs, the horses earn their keep giving sleigh rides at local sugar shacks on the weekend.

During the first half of the two-week pilot project, atotal of 200 ash trees were carted away. The work has to be done by March 31because of the beginning of the bird nesting period.