Unique house gate made from 2 ancient elm trees in Nghe An

Huy Thu• May 22, 2019 19:58

(Baonghean.vn) - Thanks to meticulous care and pruning, a family in Nam Linh commune, Nam Dan district has turned a bonsai tree (also known as a gioi tree) into a unique gate.

From the beginning of the village, you can see the unique green gate of Mr. Nguyen Xuan Ngoc's house (31 years old) in hamlet 6, Nam Linh commune.

The gate is made from two ancient elm trees, tied together and pruned over decades.

The green gate is 5.5m high (from the ground to the top), looks like a box-shaped roof with a base length of 7m, a width of 2.5m, and a height of 3m. Ms. Nguyen Thi An (68 years old), Ngoc's mother, said that these two elm trees were from Ngoc's grandfather's time. In the past, there were many elm trees in her garden, but later they were all cut down, leaving only two trees to make the gate. According to Ms. An, the green gate has been trimmed for nearly 30 years. When her husband passed away, Ngoc, the second son, took over his father's job of trimming the trees.

It is known that Ngoc's father used to work as a barber under this green gate.

The two elm tree stumps are not of equal size. The larger stump has a circumference of about 1.2m, many knobs and holes through the trunk.

The underside of the green gate is covered with interwoven elm trees spreading out like umbrellas.

To trim this gate, Mr. Ngoc bought a 5m long ladder and a specialized sickle. According to Mr. Ngoc, because it is difficult to cut while standing on a ladder, using a sickle is easier. On average, he has to trim the gate once a month, more often in the summer than in the winter, especially in early spring, he has to trim 2-3 times a month. The green gate is a box, the total area that Mr. Ngoc has to trim at one time is about 70 m.²"If it's sunny, it might take me all day to finish by myself," Ngoc said.