‘‘I'm furious about this. There must be a lot of people that are anti-tree in Alexandra,'' Mr Manning said.
‘‘They don't seem to realise their worth but this is one of the places in New Zealand we should be celebrating trees.''
Mr and Mrs Manning had been driving along their familiar route when they saw the tree that grew on the school grounds alongside the footpath on Bringans St had been cut down.
‘‘We passed that tree every day and every time we've gone past we've admired it.
‘‘What a shocking example for primary school kids.''
The tree would have been about 50 years old, he said.
‘‘There's a walnut tree [also on school grounds] we've registered our concern over because they're going to build a kindergarten in the Alexandra Primary School,'' he said.
Mr Manning is a former member of the New Zealand Forestry Council and is a former national vice-president of the NZ Institute of Forestry.
He proudly admits to being ‘‘a tree man''.
On his woollen jersey, he wore a Men of the Trees New Zealand pin - an organisation of which he was a past president.
A bone carving around his neck had been given to him for tree care by the New Zealand Arboricultural Association.
Alexandra Primary School board chairman Shane Crawford said parents of children at the school, in conjunction with an arborist from Asplundh, had recently chopped down the tree.
The board rang the council before cutting down the tree, Mr Crawford said.
‘‘It [the tree] doesn't have a heritage protection order or anything placed upon it by the council.
‘‘The board made the decision to take it out for for health and safety reasons.
‘‘It was chopped down because of the damage it was doing to our plumbing and pavement and things.
‘‘The roots were damaging the drains we had to work on,'' he said.
Some of the children at the school had tripped over the roots which were raising the pavement and forcing it up, he said.
There were no intentions to plant anything in its place.
Mr Manning disagreed that there was any damage to the footpath caused by the tree's roots, as only a small crack was visible on the pavement.
Council community facility manager Grahame Smail said legislation was ‘‘pretty loose'' on trees in Central Otago.
‘‘If somebody's got a tree on their private property they're pretty much within their own rights unless it's a protected tree by the district plan,'' he said.
Central Otago District Council planning team leader Ann Rodgers said trees could be protected if they were considered to have significant value.
Some had been listed for protection on the district plan, one of which was on the Alexandra School grounds on the Dunorling St frontage, she said.
Anyone could write to the council and make an application to have a tree protected, she said.
Mr Manning and his wife Enny own a 6ha property called Jolendale Park. The park was officially handed over to the QEII National Trust in 2003, giving the land and the trees, which the couple have gathered from throughout the world, protection. In two years' time, the park, which would then have been cared for by the Mannings for about 50 years, will be given to the community.
