BEECH! Went for a little tractor ride yesterday to groom and check a trail I haven't been on much this summer. Found this mess. With tractor for scale. I didn't closely examine, but it appears there are four to five trees involved in this. A whole lot of stored energy and PITA. As 3 of the trees are Beech, 1 rotten I may not even touch this mess. Beech burns really well for me, but processing can be rough, even with a splitter. I just "can't even" when looking at that pile. Now, that said, further down the trail I came across this. Another downed Beech. This one I have no choice whether to deal with it not. It looks to be pretty straight grained, Good handling size, low danger factor and will not be a challenge to get pulled out of there. I retreated as it was late afternoon and I was plumb wore out from some previous chores of the day. Will get this one out hopefully next weekend.
The ones that fall across the trails never seem to move until I intervene for some reason? Indeed. That's why I may not even try to get anything from that first mess. It's a fairly steep hillside, no way to get tractor close to and trees tangled and lying on on other trees. The one across the trail looks to have a little spring in it, but shouldn't be bad once pressure/weight is taken off. Humidity did me in yesterday. Was only about 80*, but was working out in the sun and sweating like blind lesbian in a fish market with the 65% humidity we had.
Let gravity help with the ones on the hill. Cut limbs free, then rig a block/tackle to your 4x4 and drag them down the hill
If you don't feel comfortable let it be. No sense putting yourself in danger. You just gave the wildlife a little more cover is all.
I would be all over that mess on the hillside. Can't turn down beech. It's like eating a whole elephant - one small bite at a time. Cut a piece off, drag it down the hill, cut it up, repeat until done.
For sure I don't think it would be too tough of a task to get that down off the hillside. Gravity is your friend then and yes, a little at a time will work nicely. I wish I had that problem with beech!
Most of the time these situations look worse then they are, but I agree, never work when you are tired. I have found I actually get more down working in the woods a little at a time. I'll cut from 8AM to noon and call it a day. Yeah it is only 4-5 cord, but adds up over the course of the week. I actually get more wood out rather then slogging out 10 cord in a single day because I seem to find excuses not to get in the woods.
It was between that and "like a nun in a cucumber field". If you can see in the picture, there is already a couple of dead beeches on that same hillside that were left to rot previously. It's all relative I guess. Being spoiled and awash in BTUs to be had, I'll only go after these if not able to find easier stuff to get after. Right now, I have some small ash, red elm, white oak, and that other beech that fell across the trail to keep me busy. It would also be great if I had help on the tougher stuff such as that mess. I'm a one man band about 95% of the time, so when I see the potential dangers associated with a tangled mess, I tend to look for other options. I typically will put in 3.5-5 hours in the woods in a day. If I go much longer than that, it starts to become more of a chore and much less enjoyable. Not to mention the aches getting out of bed the next day being multiplied.
Went back for the tree across the path. Turned out to be somewhat interesting. The pictures do not show it well, but this is a blowdown where the whole root ball lulled out of the ground. It had significant spring pressure on the trunk from how it settled across this little slope, with the root ball hanging over a ditch edge. Limbed and ready to be cut into sections. First cut. Here we start to see some stored energy. I undercut 1/4, then finished from the top. First log out. Now for that butt log. Though it looks like I'm leaving a very high stump, this is as far to left left as I can position myself to cut. You will see why. Glad I took time to look this over thoroughly before tacking. At 9/10ths through the log it let go. The stump and root ball flipped up and fell down into the ditch, also, the newly freed log decided to go for a walk.
Second log out Had to use 3 chains to reach initially, but the top came out with little drama. And the money shot after this two hour project. Stay safe out there when cutting!
