Trees are due for special thanks this Thanksgiving.

We tend to take trees for granted while, day in and day out,  they are helping to save us as the climate warms and  sea level rises

While we humans spend our time dickering over the turkey and the pumpkin pie about how high the temperatures and the sea will rise, who or what is to blame and what to do about it, trees are quietly coming to our rescue.

It’s time to say thank you to those big trees out there that are quietly cleaning our air by absorbing carbon dioxide –up to 48 pounds a year– storing the carbon and returning the oxygen to Earth.

Let’s give thanks to the trees that work behind the scenes to slow flooding by taking up water from the ground—up to several hundred gallons of water a day!

Thank goodness for trees that, every day of the year,  offer food and homes to hundreds of insects, birds and other animals that help make our world go round.

And let’s give a round of applause for the simple pleasures that trees give us humans. They shade us, cool us and looking at them,  makes us happy.

All this and more,  yet trees ask for nothing,  except a pass from the logger and room to grow.

Add some thank-yous to the folks who save trees, rather than cut them down, to those who add trees to their yards and to  those in high places who believe that protecting and planting trees will make this Earth a safer and better place.

Better yet, make every day a day to give thanks for trees.