Enable the SQL log. I'm 99% sure that you simply execute hundreds of SQL queries when the tree is rendered. Read up on explode()/CONNECT BY operators in SQL, and workarounds with "nested set" and "materialized path" (use Google). In Hibernate, you can also think about batch fetching. Do not optimize or even think about any method call stacks before you optimize the interaction with the database system. If you want to know more about this, specific to Hibernate, read http://www.manning.com/bauer2 View the original post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&p=4008130#... Reply to the post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=posting&mode=reply&a...