Here’s another excerpt from a book about a big tree now that you’ve rattled my brain The great oak tree had stood on a hill over the Hudson, in a lonely spot of the Taggart estate. Eddie Willers, aged seven, liked to come and look at that tree. It had stood there for hundreds of years, and he thought it would always stand there. Its roots clutched the hill like a fist with fingers sunk into the soil, and he thought that if a giant were to seize it by the top, he would not be able to uproot it, but would swing the hill and the whole of the earth with it, like a ball at the end of a string. He felt safe in the oak tree’s presence; it was a thing that nothing could change or threaten; it was his greatest symbol of strength. One night, lightning struck the oak tree. Eddie saw it the next morning. It lay broken in half, and he looked into its trunk as into the mouth of a black tunnel. The trunk was only an empty shell; its heart had rotted away long ago; there was nothing inside – just a thing gray dust that was being dispersed by the whim of the faintest wind. The living power had gone, and the shape it left had not be able to stand without it. “It was an immense betrayal – the more terrible because he could not grasp what it was that had been betrayed. It was not himself, he knew, nor his trust; it was something else. He stood there for a while, making no sound, then he walked back to the house. He never spoke about it to anyone, then or since.”
Dang that’s some nice clear wood in that tree, no rot, no knot. That’s gonna make some purty firewood. Is big John available as a day worker? Looks like he’s handy to have around. Now when you commence noodling those rounds don’t be afraid to noodle horizontal too, no shame in it and a lot less work.
John drives truck and isn't around mostly during the week (I know where the loader key is). We do a lot of stuff together on the weekends. That tree was very solid. The one we're supposed to drop next weekend has a lot of lower limb knots from the past and may have some hollow and rot in the main stem down low so I'll do some bore cuts with the small saw to get a feel for the area of where the felling cuts will be. I hate opening up a tree and discovering it's way more dangerous than anticipated. Back in the woods I don't worry bout it as much but this one has 3 buildings within the "crush zone" so I'll do everything I can to ensure a nice solid hinge and safe felling. We'll have a bull rope rigged to tip it after the hinge is set cuz there's a serious widow maker way up high in it. I'm not a fan of standing under a widow maker banging on a wedge...
Stop by and we'll load it on your truck to take over to Walt's... Unfortunately John's loader would only pick up about a 3' section of that stem. We had to roll a 5' section that had insulators and wire in it into the woods. No candles out of this tree. That reminds me, I need to get some made to make sure they're dry for the GTG at walt 's this fall. You're welcome to swing by and CSS any of this White Oak in your spare time...
LOL... Don't be silly, of course I have beer and steak... cold PBR and a freezer full of steaks, roasts, briskets, burgers... Now I'm thirsty and hungry!!! Wife and I had filet mignon last night and we're taking 64 burgers to grill at my sisters 4th bash Friday night. I'll save out a brisket and 5lb. rump roast to make Jerky for Walt's this fall too.
This year's steak seeds back in early April They've grown a little and should be delicious by Oct when they get put in the freezer... Here's some of them a few weeks ago. 4 of the 7 are already at or over 1,000 pounds, they do know how to eat, but other than that, they aren't the smartest animals... Not brilliant, but tasty...
Weekend 2... I went over Thursday and rigged the 2nd big Oak to tip with the loader just in case. It had a slight lean into the woods where they wanted it dropped but being a belt and suspender kinda guy, put a bull rope up just 'cause... Tweaking the notch to ensure nice matching cuts aimed where we want it. And yes, that is poison ivy around the stump. Neither John or I get it. Got it down safely right where we planned it. The top half landed in gully and the trunk bounced an rolled when it hit. Not the prettiest hinge and stump, but it got the job done. Some rot getting started inside this stump. I could tell it was a little punky the other day when a make few bore cuts to make sure this wasn't a hollow shell. some video: My 288 clone with a 32" fully buried. https://youtube.com/shorts/B_bvsn0-a4M John with the 660 42" bar fully buried https://youtube.com/shorts/94taCBqOxwQ We got started at 7:30 and finished up at 3:00 I'm wooped!!!
I noticed what looked like where the large trunk y’all were cutting had what appeared to be wire running in it. That must have been the one that got pushed into the woods. Nice work gentlemen!!
We've used maybe a gallon and a half to two gallons, but we haven't cut it all up and split it yet. Most of the wood is still 8 to10' logs and HUGE rounds that we hauled away in the dump trailer to a couple of our processing areas. I'm sure we'll use a bunch more mix by the time it's all CSS'ed. The big saws drink it! The square filed chain sure makes a difference in this big wood.
Yes, there was a 5' chunk we cut off the blown down tree that had a bunch of insulators and wire in it. We ran the metal detector wand over it and cut where we thought we would be ok. The top end of that section had 3 dark spots like we were just an inch or three from metal. When we cut that section off the main trunk, that's when the root ball pulled it back up to about 60 degrees. Overall we were lucky so far cutting these as they could be considered "yard trees". We dulled two 42" chains from normal cutting and bounced another one off of the loader bucket but those are sharpened back up and in the rotation again converted over to square filed. The 288 32" only dulled one chain and that was from normal cutting, no hits on metal or dirt that I know of. We have lots of spare chains when we attack something like this. They want us to come back in the fall after all their parties and events and drop 4 more monster oaks similar in size to these. Both clone saws oil the chains OK when cleaned up but the oiler holes clog up quickly with the long bars buried so some time gets wasted in pulling bars off and cleaning them every other tank of gas. I'll pull these apart and see what I can do to get the bars to seal better on the cases and clutch covers. I may have to flatten the mounting surfaces to get them to seal better (easy on the clutch cover but a little more to it on the crankcase half). But on the other hand, big bars like that have a lot of chips to clear. I may have to be less aggressive when cutting with the big bars, but that is hard to do...
On some of our old farm trees it’s hard to know whether there was field fencing or barbed wire through the tree so when bucking them up it usually only takes one cut to find out! Since the original fencing is mostly long gone it’s a crapshoot. Glad that you found it first!
Our farm is mostly woods now, but back in the 40's and 50's it was a large cattle operation with fences all through the place. Many fence lines I know where they are and can be careful around them, but there are some that surprise me on occasion. I don't worry bout it too much. I can sharpen chain pretty quickly by hand these days and it usually only dulls a just a few cutters. I normally touch up my chains about every other tank of fuel anyway and keep them sharp all the time. I'm not gonna waste time, fuel, and energy cutting with a dull chain for very much time. As soon as I notice a slowdown in cutting speed, I'm off to the truck to sharpen. I've got the square filing figured out pretty well now and I'm spoiled on how it cuts. The only way I'll go back to round filing is if my eyes get to where I can't keep the corner of the file in the corner of the cutter... Even that 42" chain that I hit the loader bucket with only took a 15 to 20 minutes to get back to life. Only about 10 or 12 cutters had their tips curled on it. I can usually feel when I've gotten into something bad and can get back out of it quickly... In fairness though that chain was a full skip so there were a few less cutters to sharpen on it compared to the other two full comp chains.
I do both, but mostly sharpen on the saw. I like to keep a chain or two with me when I'm not here at the farm, but most of the time I can sharpen the chain on the saw as fast as I can change the chain. But I also like taking the bar off and cleaning it to ensure everything is getting oiled well. I try to keep an eye on things and play it as it's needed. The bigger bars need more attention on the oiling side of the equation.
