Nikola Smolenski comments on The bonds of family and community: Poverty and cruelty among Russian peasants in the late 19th century

[Nikola Smolenski]

it seems hard to imagine that [...] jealous neighbors uprooting the trees of their slightly more well-off neighbors, would have been particularly adaptive in the long run

This is easy to imagine if you recall another bit of the text:

Semyonova notes that “the very same elder” who turned in the flour thief, “when he is guarding the landlord’s apple trees against raids by the boys hired on temporarily as shepherds, fills his pockets with apples every time he makes the rounds.”

So, if you plant apple trees, and don’t invite your neighbors to help, you are an arrogant “big shot” who deserves his apples destroyed. But if you ask your neighbors to guard your trees, in exchange for a share of the apples, then your trees will stand. This is no different than taxation really, only way more informal.