Chips Off Many an Old Block

A Paris lumberman uses a probe which monitors a newly-imbeded computer chip in the trunk of a tree as he enters data in a hand-held computer. Tree surgeons are bugging each of the 90,000 trees which line the streets of Paris in a monitoring operation of unprecedented scale. "It takes less than 15 minutes to embed a three-cm long computer chip in the trunk and enter the data in a computer," said Christian Mantaux, a tree surgeon for 20 years who assures nature lovers that the chips do not harm trees. On the contrary, when they are all installed by the end of 1999, it will be much easier to take care of them. The chips contain an identification number and a mobile computer gives a read-out on each tree_s location, age and condition. "With the new system we will be able to know almost instantaneously how trees are doing and therefore treat them rapidly when necessary. Before, when a lumberman noticed something was wrong with a tree he might not have located it perfectly because there are often many trees next to the same street number," said Jean-Pol Neme of the city council.