The rains have moved back in for the last several days, heavy storms that drops 3 1/2 inches (9 cm) of rain in 45 minutes. Rivers are flooding, roadways under water, shops flooded; not good at all. Small town to the south of me got hit pretty hard. Last night around 1:00 am as the third storm moved over me dropping heavy rains, I heard the loud crash of a tree hitting the ground. This morning I did inspection and found that a large chestnut oak had went over, taking part of a maple with it. The night before saw a storm with some high winds; it could be that storm weaken the roots and with the heavy rains saturating the soil the poor chestnut oak gave it up. I do have plans on dropping trees but I would rather it be my choice. There will be a lot of wood in this tree. I did not have anything to show the size of the tree when I took the photos; however, let me say that it is nice the Beast has a 20 inch bar because I am going to need it. This is rather sad, this tree had been growing for a long time. It was up on the top of the ridge beside the upper road. Down, it reaches to the bottom of the hill; it opened up a good size hole in the canopy. As I finish writing this I hear more rain outside. Monday is suppose to be a really bad day as the storm front moves through this area.
Yes, not looking forward to tackling this mess. I am guessing that I should start at the crown and carefully remove limbs.
It kinda depends. You need to look things over to see whats holding what. Don't want to cut off limbs that are holding everything up unless you have to. Gotta be really careful of anything with potential energy in it though...and be ready to boogy if the tree starts to roll when you make a cut...it happens, often.
Looks like fun times! If you could get a helper that would be great. Use judgement on every cut you make, there is sure to be a couple surprises in that mess.
You can't seem to catch a break with the weather, Kimberly . Be careful with the cleanup. It looks a little tricky.
Wouldn't you start at the base? If you started to take weight off the top, would the tree stand up on the root? Or is the whole tree laying down hill?
The tree is on a steep hill (which adds to being careful as you are not on level ground). The tree fell tight to the ground so I think the root ball got ripped out rather well; so I don't think the mass of the root ball will do much; plus the ground was so wet.
Kimberly when cutting near Tha root ball be extra extra careful! I have had them stand the tree back up because of the torsion once you remove weight.. just donthe assume tree is down and therefore safe!
x2. Great advice HDRock , brenndatomu, tamarack, Flatlander Pete, Woodwidow & Canadian border VT Be careful Ms. Kimberly.
Yes, but this is not a tree that I was thinking of taking down. If I could get it out of the woods and to the sawmill I might could sell it. As it is, I guess it will become firewood for future use; get it cut, split and stacked and it may be ready in three years.
