Monday, March 16, 2020

Timber!


Weather: Rain Friday. Bare ground had begun to crack in places when dry air was drawing out moisture. The cracks remained after the rain. They’re ideal places for wild seeds to germinate.

Last rain: 3/13. Week’s low: 28 degrees F. Week’s high: 70 degrees F in the shade.

What’s emerging: Austrian Copper roses, bearded iris, Daylilies, chinodoxa, Dutch clover, alfalfa, western stickseed, golden spur columbine, Jupiter’s beard, winterfat, Queen Anne’s lace, coreopsis, goldenrod, tansy

What’s green: Junipers and other evergreens, cliff rose, fern bush, yuccas, grape hyacinths, garlic chives, garlic, vinca, coral bells, blue flax, hollyhocks, alfilerillo, coral beards tongues, pink evening primroses, Mexican hats, anthemis, yarrow, purple asters, dandelions, cheat and June grasses

What’s gray: Bath pinks, snow-in-summer

Tasks: I took advantage of the cloudy days before the rain to rake out sticks and grasses that had accumulated in the gravel. It’s not something I do in the sun, and so there was more than I expected. I only got a fraction done.

Animal sightings: Chickadees, house wrens, and other small birds. Tulips are being eaten as they emerge.


Weekly update: The methods used to cut down trees probably haven’t changed much since men invented axes. In the late nineteenth century, all the innovations were applied after the tree was felled. Steam-powered saws were used to cut the tree into transportable lengths, and steam cranes were used to lift them onto railcars. Before that, axles connecting big wheels were used to move logs out of forests. Then, of course, steam was used in the saw mills.

Loggers changed from axes to two-man saws. However, they still used the same methods. An area was cleared large enough for a tree to fall, then a notch was made in the trunk on the side facing that area. Next, a smaller cut was made on the other side, and the weakened tree forced to fall forward.

Once the tree was on the ground, men lopped off the branches, and sawed the trunk into appropriate lengths for loading onto a sled, big wheel, or rail car.

A website that explained how to do this with a modern chainsaw suggested placing wedges in the felling cut to prevent the saw from getting pinched by the tree. They also would guide the direction of the fall. This is the sort of technique that probably was used in the past, but didn’t get included in descriptions of the work.

The biggest change in logging didn’t come from the saws, but from the invention of cranes with buckets, better known as cherry pickers.

The man I hired to cut my trees used a chain saw to fell an 8' cherry at the base with a notch cut last winter. This year, with the much taller cottonwood, he utilized his crane.


The owner began by cutting all the low branches with a chainsaw mounted on a pole. This shrank the area where limbs could drop.

Then, his assistant took the crane aloft. He steered it into smaller branches, and cut manageable sized pieces that he dropped into the cleared area. Once the outer wood was removed, he moved the crane nearer the trunk, and repeated the process, until he was at the center.

One reason so little has changed is logging ultimately depends on an intuitive sense of the laws of gravity and geometry. These have been known, in one form or another, since Euclid. The Family Handyman website said the way to calculate the space needed for a tree’s fall was to hold an axe handle vertically at arm’s length, and walk back until the handle blocked sight of the tree. That was the place were the top would land. I know I learned something like that in tenth grade, but have long since forgotten the details.


Notes on photographs: Taken 5 March 2020 with the permission of the crew.
1. 10:31 am. The assistant began at the outer edge of the tree.
2. 10:36 am. He cut manageable sized pieces from the tree, and let them drop to the ground.
3. 10:44 am. He was able to move toward the top of tree, because he had cleared a drop area.
4. 11:12 am. Once one area was completed, he moved to another.

End notes: "Cut Down a Tree Safely." Family Handyman website.

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