Cedar fever
Ashe juniper—at this time of year, the “mountain cedar” is on many Austinites’ Most Wanted lists.
An editorial in the Austin American-Statesman today sums up the agony of cedar fever sufferers. I joined their ranks in 1999, five years after moving to Austin. It took a second post-Christmas season of runny nose, intensely itchy eyes and cheeks (yes, my whole face itches from this allergen), and general run-down feeling before I realized the culprit. So what if I’d never had allergies before? So what if for five years in Austin I’d never been bothered by cedar? None of that matters. If cedar wants you, it’s gonna get you.
I love the evergreen, ancient-looking beauty and Christmasy fragrance of our cedars, but only in solo trees. As I posted recently, if you have more than one cedar—or, God forbid, an entire cedar brake—you’re going to hate it.
An ugly, dead-looking cedar brake along the Barton Creek greenbelt. These cedars are green on top and look great when you’re zipping over a greenbelt full of them from a highway overpass, but underneath their dense canopy it’s dismal.
Aside from the bleak woods formed by a group of cedars, male cedars produce a prodigious amount of pollen each winter from around Christmastime until the end of February. Click here and scroll to the bottom for a photo of a cedar tree releasing a cloud of pollen; this is from the group People Against Cedars!
As cedar season approached this year, I dosed up on Flonase and prescription eye drops. Thus armed for battle, I waited for the first shot. It was fired last week, during a warm, sunny, breezy day. The pollen blew in from the hills, and I was knocked down for two days with sneezing attacks and eyes that itched so badly I just wanted to claw them. Stupidly, I’d held out on adding Claritin to my arsenal, but after buying a big packet of it and taking my first pill, I rallied. Hurrah! I can still feel the cedar in the air (a vague itching in the back of my throat and in my eyes occurs within minutes of being outside), but I think allergy shots can be delayed for another year.
What I find most disheartening about cedar fever is that it strikes hardest during our most beautiful winter days, just when I want to be outside in the garden or hiking the greenbelts. Why couldn’t it hit during August, when I rarely leave the air-conditioned house?
I am a sufferer too. I like the gnarled old trunks. I wish we had some of the old cedars on our place. Somebody cut them down and planted a bunch of arizona cypress instead. We still have lots of cedar seedlings popping up in the woods. I dig some of them up and move them out to the treeless field that separates us from a neighbor who makes a lot of noise with machines. I am hoping they will grow into a sight and sound barrier.
I’ve always lived in this area, but didn’t develope an allergy to “cedar” until my freshman year of college. The last week has been miserable, as my choices have been to either suffer or go through my days in an antihistamine-induced fog. On a side note, someone told me that cedars are notorious water hogs that choke out other plant species.
We don’t have cedar fever in Indiana, but in May when I want to be out in the garden, we have Cottonwood Fever. Claritin works great for that, too!