As much as killing trees is pure evil... I did read once that you can kill a tree by driving copper nails into the trunk... just curious if theres any truth to this..
Possibly if you drive in enough nails to cut off an adequate supply of water and nutrients to the tree ... but otherwise, no.
I live in a lake, well to be technical it's a reservoir built for flood control and hydroelectric generation. It's rather large, 50,000 acres, and because the level will rise and fall the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers owns the land around the lake up to the top of the dam, the number of feet above sea level that is the top of the dam.
Depending on where someone's property is their property might run right to the lake and there isn't a tree between their house and the lake. Others might have a quarter mile of woods between their house and the lake and have no view at all. Since the Corps only allows dead trees to be cut down, and even then you need someone from the Corps to come out and see it and mark it to be OK to be cut, people have tried over the years to find ways to kill trees so they could then get the Corps to let them cut them. Copper nails is one of the commonly claimed to work ways of killing trees, but as I said, unless you drive in enough to damage the flow of water and nutrients up the tree, it will survive. Some people will dig holes and pour gallons of various things into the hole and then cover it up. Others have dug deep holes and poured many bags of fertilizer in and covered it up hoping the 'burn' the tree to kill it. Some had dug holes and poured in many bags of salt or used salt licks and covered it up hoping that would kill trees. One thing that works, but is slow, is some people will walk around a tree several times shooting .22 rounds all around the base of the tree. Insects get in and over some years the tree usually dies. If someone from the Corps notices the holes they just assume it is from insects and they don't dig around to see if they can find .22 rounds just a little way into the tree. Instead of shooting a tree some people will instead drill a number of holes in a way that doesn't look like a pattern someone would make and again insects do the rest. For pine trees all someone needs to do is take something like a razor knife and cut just deep enough to get a little way past the bark, because that is where the water and nutrients rise up the tree, in the outer fibers just under the bark, so it cuts the flow ... basically like black turpentine beetles did to a number of my pine trees I lost.
In my case I was lucky to find a home with little Corps land between my property and the lake and only a handful of trees that were blocking the view. When a new home was built up the road and a tree crew was there I asked them if they would stop by and grind some stumps for me later that day. While they were finishing up clearing the lot my neighbor and I dropped the trees that were blocking my view the most, the tree crew came and ground the stumps and the Corps was never the wiser since there were no stumps to be found from trees that were not OK'd to be cut.
While I do love trees it made my view much better and it increased my property values and with less shade grass grew and it stopped the erosion problem that had been going on causing the lake to silt in around my dock.
Not that little trees would be able to take the place of adult trees for many years I planted 20 new trees on my property, in areas that would not block my view of the lake.
Sadly that was more than outweighed when a few years later I lost 27 large pine trees, the bases were all between 15 to 32 inches across, not around, across. Black turpentine beetles did them in. The trees were so thick with them that when it was quiet outside, no sounds from boats or jet skies, you could hear the beetles chewing. By the time I discovered there was a problem and then identified it, it was too late and I had to have a tree service come in a fell them all.
In the case of cutting trees on Corps land, if caught you can be fined and you can lose you clearing and dock permit. One neighbor risked it and dropped four large oaks blocking his view and he was fined $750.00 and he said it's the best $750.00 he ever spent since it gave him a great view and his property value shot way up.
The case of the person with the most 'balls' that I know of was back some years ago when the government was shut down for a handful of days or so. He knew that no one from the Corps would be around so he got a friend with a dozer to come in and had every single tree between his property and the lake knocked down ... and there were a lot of them.
The first day the government was back at work he called the Corp's area office and bitched and pissed and moaned and asked why they cleared in front of his house or gave the OK for someone else to clear in front of his house. He claimed he loved the privacy and the woodsy look. Someone from the Corps came out and decided that someone else in the area must have paid someone to clear in front of their land and the person doing the clearing went to the wrong home.
They guy ended up with a fantastic view when before he could hardly see the water. He wasn't fined a penny and the Corps even came in and planted some type of grass they use around the lake that can remain submerged under water for long periods of time and not die, so he ended up with a great looking lawn all the way from his house to the lake and a million dollar view.