It is quite natural. Death, I mean. Every living thing does it at one time or another. Even the oldest bristlecone pines that live for thousands of years eventually do it. The Monterey pine in this picture did it quite efficiently. The three crows perched on top make it look extra dead. You know, not merely dead, but very dead. If this tree were in my own garden, I would be totally saddened by its death, but there is nothing that I could do about it.
The smaller dark objects suspended in the now dead limbs are pine cones. Monterey pine starts to produce pine cones at a young age, and of course, produces more with age and increasing size. As mature trees begin to deteriorate, they produce even more cones as they concentrate their resources into seed production for the next generation. This elderly tree knew that death was imminent. After all, death is natural.
Compared to other trees that are native to the neighborhood, such as valley oaks that live for centuries, and coastal redwoods that live for thousands of years, Monterey pines are ‘short-lived’. They live only a century or so, and may not live half that long in urban situations, particularly in more arid climates. They are endemic to the Monterey Peninsula, where they live within an ecosystem that, prior to urban development, naturally burned at least every century or so, before they got to be too old. In fact, their natural life cycle was directly relevant to how combustible the forests were, and how efficiently fires spread through them; but that is another topic.
The main concern here is that death is natural. The tree in this picture died a natural death. It can not be blamed on global warming, climate change, big industry, the President that we all seem to hate even though enough of us voted for him to become president, or my old car that, after almost half a century, is still not a hybrid. We can complain about death all we want, but we can never stop it.