It’s hard to resist the temptation to ask Basil Camu ’06 that infamous Barbara Walters interview question: If you were a tree, what tree would you be?
That’s because trees are a big part of Camu’s life. He is co-founder, with his father, Colin, of the tree-care service Leaf & Limb in Raleigh, North Carolina. In 2017, he led the creation of Project Pando, a nonprofit that collects seeds from wild native trees, raises them into saplings, then gives them to anyone who needs them.
A certified master arborist, Camu gained a degree of fame in environmental circles for his decision, in 2017, to stop cutting down trees because leaving them to die and decompose naturally provides habitats for birds, insects and animals. The standing dead or dying trees, called snags, are also good for the soil.
Margaret Roach, who wrote about Camu in her gardening column for The New York Times, was at first startled by the idea that Camu’s company didn’t do “take-downs,” as that’s where most of the money is usually made. But his mission got her attention.
“What really struck me,” she says, “was how Basil goes beyond his impressive ecological business practices and is also committed to the greater ecology through his nonprofit, Project Pando.”
Those business practices – getting creative with new services such as structural pruning, and growing native meadows and densely planted pocket forests – helped Leaf & Limb replace the revenue from tree removals.
Creativity comes naturally for this Raleigh native, the eldest of five children. His father grew up in South Africa dreaming of owning a small business in America. His mother, Robin, from North Carolina, was a counselor who also homeschooled the kids. Camu says those years of home school before he went to a public high school made him an unconventional thinker and gave him a love of learning that would set the course of his adult life.
“I sort of began to understand that I really love trees – but not so much cutting down trees.”
He hadn’t thought much about college when he sat in on visits from college admissions officers, including Carrie Williams ’96 from Duke. Her encouragement to apply was important, he says, “because I’m not sure I would have felt qualified.”
Physics was his first major, but he switched to economics and history. After graduation, he spent a year working in finance in Washington, D.C. That path was potentially lucrative, but Camu was coming to a realization.
“I knew that wasn’t what I wanted to do,” he says.
What he wanted to do was start a business, so with his dad, he launched an adventure travel company and grew it over almost five years. Camu found he enjoyed the partnership with his father, whose Raleigh tree service was being hit hard by the recession, so he made the decision in 2017 to join Leaf & Limb.
Fast-forward to 2016: The business was thriving, and Camu had fallen in love with trees and their complex ecosystems. The more he learned, the more he felt he was on the wrong path.
“That led me down a deeper journey of trying to figure out the things that were important to me,” he says. “I sort of began to understand that I really love trees – but not so much cutting down trees.”
So he put together a business case for repositioning the company to one that cared for trees instead of removing them. In business lingo, Leaf & Limb pivoted.
The father of two sons, Hugo and Jasper, with his wife, Morgan '06, Camu is doing his part to ensure a better world for his kids. He gets them outdoors as much as possible, teaching them about their surroundings in ways they don’t notice.
To share his message more broadly, he published “From Wasteland to Wonder: Easy Ways We Can Help Heal Earth in the Sub/Urban Landscape” earlier this year. He gives the digital version of the 200-page guide away on the Leaf & Limb website, and sells the hardcover at the cost of printing and shipping it.
Johnny Randall, the former director of conservation programs at the North Carolina Botanical Garden in Chapel Hill, says Camu has made an essential contribution to the conservation of natural resources.
“As the human-nature connection becomes increasingly severed, a voice of encouragement is really needed,” Randall says. “He is one of those.”
Camu wants everyone to understand the value of trees and love them as he does. He’s asked to name a tree that is good for the ecosystem, resilient, likable and strong, and comes back quickly with the white oak (Quercus alba).
Surely, that’s the kind of tree he would be.