Tumbleweed Tree rises in Chandler

Not many people have to worry about snakes during the process of putting up a Christmas tree. William W. Williams, a Chandler parks worker, does.

SLIDESHOW: See photos from the construction of the tumbleweed tree

Williams, known by his co-workers as Winston, carried a shovel Nov. 5 toward a clump of Russian thistle, otherwise known as tumbleweed, and narrowed his eyes toward the bottom of the plant.

He slid the head of the shovel underneath and pushed down on the handle, snapping the stem and turning over the globular weed to reveal the bare, dusty ground.

"Snakes like to get out here where they aren't disturbed very much," Williams said.

For 17 years, Williams has repeated this routine for a couple of weeks before Christmas.

Williams, who usually maintains the city's parks, is the one who begins the process of building the city's traditional Tumbleweed Tree, which this year will be lit in a ceremony today.

He and a helper, Manuel Cordova, drove their city truck and trailer on their first day of tumbleweed scavenging to an empty 9-acre lot in the middle of the Valencia II subdivision near Lindsay and Chandler Heights roads.

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The lot will someday be a city park, but today it is the growing field for the Tumbleweed Tree.

Williams is looking for green tumbleweeds about 3 feet in circumference.

He and Cordova will "pop" them loose, leaving enough of a stem so workers down the line can tie wire to it.

They gather them into piles in the field and return with a pitchfork to fill their trailer with 100 to 130 of the plants before hauling them slowly to Tumbleweed Park to dry. They have to drive no more than 20 mph to keep the tumbleweeds from blowing away or disintegrating inside the 6-foot net enclosure.

They'll repeat this for a few weeks until they have the 1,000 to 1,200 needed to build the tree, which, when completed, will stand almost 40 feet high in the city's historic downtown.

The Russian thistle is not native to Arizona, even though it is a symbol of the Wild West.

It's from Russia. The plant spreads its seed by breaking loose and tumbling in the wind.

The Tumbleweed Tree became a Chandler tradition in 1957, when resident Earl Barnum came up with the idea after seeing a similar one in Indiana built out of chicken wire and pine boughs.

"I didn't think much of it when I started," Barnum said in a 1986 interview in the Chandler Arizonan when he was 83. "I just figured it was something for Chandler. I didn't think it would gain the popularity that it has."

The frame of the tree is a 35-foot pole in the center with guide wires connected at the top and strung to the iron base that is 18 feet in circumference. Chicken wire wraps around the guide wires.

Billy Valenzuela usually maintains the city's ballfields, but on Nov. 19, he was in downtown as part of a five-man crew that builds the tree.

This is Valenzuela's third year of helping. The Chandler native's grandfather also worked on the tree years ago.

On this day, Valenzuela is wearing a white chemical-resistant suit and wearing an industrial dust mask.

He and Gorge Cazares work inside the chicken wire frame and stand two rungs from the top of a 12-foot ladder tying the plants to the chicken wire.

Lupe Mejia, an eight-year city employee, stands in the bucket of a cherry picker outside the frame, using a stick to give the plants to Valenzuela and Cazares.

The tree's interior is shaded, dusty and littered with broken prickly sticks of the tumbleweed.

"Sometimes the dirtiest job is the easiest," Valenzuela said.

The tree isn't taking shape yet, however.

The silver chicken wire, guide wires and pole extend to a point above clumps of brown tumbleweeds surrounding the bottom 10 feet.

"This is kind of the long drudgery part of it," said parks worker Russell Lassuy, who controls the cherry picker while standing atop a flatbed truck and wearing a Milwaukee Brewers batting helmet as his hard hat.

"It's not rocket science, it's just real tedious."

By Nov. 24, they were using a homemade sculpting tool - a stop sign attached to a metal pole - to put the finishing touches on the conical shape.

The sculpting consisted of smashing the tumbleweeds into place with the face of the stop sign, causing a puff of dust with each strike.

The workers sprayed fire retardant on it and painted it the next day, but Thanksgiving rain left it looking a little brown still.

On Monday, the crew had to give it another coat of paint and then tossed handfuls of glitter at it.

"We throw as much silver glitter at it as we can make stick to make it shimmer a little bit," Lassuy said.

Stringing the lights takes another visit with the cherry picker to the top, and they have to work their way around and down.

By Tuesday, the tree was done and the workers were back at their regular jobs.

"For us, it's a unique thing," Lassuy said. "It's a fun time of year for us."

See it for yourself

What: Tumbleweed Tree lighting ceremony

When: 4:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. today; Parade of Lights begins at 7 p.m. with tree lighting immediately afterward

Where: Dr. A.J. Chandler Park, 3 S. Arizona Ave., one block south of Chandler Boulevard