The 50′, 30 year old Maple was overhanging the neighbors’ yards and decks and blocking the sun in that corner of the yard. I did this all by myself.
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- You start with a ladder
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- Then you climb the ladder
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- Add four or so levels of cross members for climbing and footing.
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- Drag up ropes, webbing, harnesses, carabiners, pouches, saws, etc.
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- Hoist gear
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- Attach gear. The purple strap was attached first. It kept me from falling. The bright red strap was attached to the chain saw so I could drop it in a crisis and save my legs from being trimmed.
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- Strap yourself in Laddie. Make cuts in between breezes. I had 20-25 mph gusts this day.
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- Don’t look down. I was above the ridge line of the roof when I started.
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- Well, you get use to it after a while.
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- Most upper limbs had to be attached to a repelling rope and lowered slowly.
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- Start making piles
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- … and more piles
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- Dad’s old and frayed come along still had enough strands remaining to pull down the limbs and trunk sections. I’m pulling from the Kanzan Cherry trees in the back in this pic.
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- The more you top, the lower you get to the ground but weight starts adding up quickly.
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- Light, 3/8″ cord was attached to the heavier line. I would throw the light line over the limb, thread it through the carabiner and cinch the heavier line to the limb.
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- At this point, your think you have done most of the work.
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- Work gets harder to handle as you work you way down the trunk.
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- Different sections had to be pulled down from different angles.
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- There’s a lot of eyeballing involved with each cut. You have to determine how much mass is hanging in which direction. Otherwise, things begin to twist and fall elsewhere.
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- Back cut angles and depth become real important
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- I would have to cut a bit, climb down, add more tension to the come along, climb back up and cut some more. Quite a quad workout.
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- You have to listen very carefully to the trunk noises as you make progressive cuts. Otherwise, you will come down with it.
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- Ratcheting from the Weeping Cherry tree in the front yard
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- Getting close… Not
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- Time to clean up the debris on the ground
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- Clean up on the ground takes a lot of time and energy.
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- But wait… there’s more… time to section and split. Set the axe blade firmly, use the sledge on the axe to set it deeper, insert the wedge, sledge the wedge, repeat.
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- The high chair.
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- Worked the daylights out of the 14″ McCulloch.
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- Where there are trees, there is dew.
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- Almost halfway done on the ground.
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- Geeze, this never ends!
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- The big stuff is always left for the end.
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- I had to lever these suckers over smaller logs to make the section cuts.
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- The “bendy” ladder came in handy as a scaffold.
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- It’s amazing how much wood you have to remove before a section can be pulled down.
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- And to think I grew this from a sapling.
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- That’s enough for today.
