Despite Phrakhru Pitak's preaching, the destruction continued.
The villagers came to him to make religious merit and listen to his sermons, then returned home to clear the land. The logging companies cut the forest and the villagers were either too afraid of retribution or too unorganized to oppose them.
If they saw a connection between their actions, their increasing poverty, and the environmental crisis, they did nothing about it.
In early 1990 Phrakhru Pitak visited Phrakhru Manas of Phayao Province, the monk credited with performing the first symbolic ordination of a tree to make people aware of environmental responsibility.
In June 1990, Phrakhru Pitak moved beyond preaching an ecological message and sponsored a tree ordination in the community forest of his home villag€ (see Darlington n.d.), and in July 1991 he performed a second to sanctify the forest surrounding ten neighboring villages.