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Tim-ber!

#1

R

Rocky

I'm going to have to take down about five large fir trees to make room for an outbuilding I am planning to build in the spring. Is taking down large trees feasible as a DIY project, or am I better off to pay someone?


#2

K

KennyV

Plan carefully and don't get into a rush...
Bringing them down will not be so bad, Imagine what you would have to do to stand them up :biggrin:...

You should not have too much trouble. :smile:KennyV


#3

JDgreen

JDgreen

Rocky said:
I'm going to have to take down about five large fir trees to make room for an outbuilding I am planning to build in the spring. Is taking down large trees feasible as a DIY project, or am I better off to pay someone?
Click to expand...

Oh brother...so many variables to consider...how big are these trees, how close together, how near to anything else, buildings, power lines, whatever? Are they standing straight, leaning, touching each other, etc? I have taken down a LOT of trees here, some as large as three feet across at the base, and close enough to buildings they could hit while falling, but I ALWAYS took my time, put tension on them in the direction I wanted them to fall using several tow straps and a 2 ton tractor, as well as notching the base properly...for one that was close to the road I used TWO separate vehicles to be sure the tree would go the way I wanted it to. If you have any doubts whatsover about your ability to fell them, hire the felling out, then cut them up on the ground yourself.


#4

adan

adan

In my country, cutting a tree requires an Environmental Clearance Certificate. Since we are basing a lot of our laws from the USA, I suggest you check this out.

Secondly, I suggest you get professionals to do it. I'm not sure if DIY would work well with the number of trunks you think of cutting. At some point, you'll still pay someone to do things for you. Why not delegate the whole headache to experts?


#5

A

AndyMan

Wow, talk about a loaded question! I guess I would say that if you have to ask, don't try to do it yourself. Better safe than sorry, you know? With experience, care and the right equipment it's not a problem. If you leave things to chance, then look out.

If the trees are big enough for you to be worried, then at least get a friend to either (1) advise, (2) help, (3) call 911, or (4) video tape it so they can send it in to one of those you'll-never-guess-what-this-dude-tried-to-do shows.


#6

D

Driller

How big are said trees? You do need to plan and consider their size. Where will they fall? Are there fences, power lines, etc. in the path? Be cautious.


#7

RobertBrown

RobertBrown

At least thier fir trees.... as far as dropping trees goes, I can't think of an easier species to drop. Why don't you spare us the suspense and tell us the the largest and the smallest trunk diameter at the ground?
Are they big enough to rent a portable saw mill? Could you make a mantle out of one?


#8

C

cubby

Rocky , If you just happen to knock down a power line during your tree chopping event don't tell the
the girl at the power company that YOU cut the tree, only say a tree fell on the line. When they come
to fix the line It will only cost a couple of cases of their favorite beverage and a small tip of course!
Versus a HUGE bill by the power company, I learned this the hard way!

But all kidding aside if you don't have any experience get some help or hire a profesional. I have been
in the crane business for over 20 years and I've seen trees falling on just about everything you can
think of. Mostly by natural disasters , alot by people like you and me and oh yeah profesionals too!

Be careful.......cubby


#9

JDgreen

JDgreen

cubby said:
Rocky , If you just happen to knock down a power line during your tree chopping event don't tell the
the girl at the power company that YOU cut the tree, only say a tree fell on the line. When they come
to fix the line It will only cost a couple of cases of their favorite beverage and a small tip of course!
Versus a HUGE bill by the power company, I learned this the hard way!

But all kidding aside if you don't have any experience get some help or hire a profesional. I have been
in the crane business for over 20 years and I've seen trees falling on just about everything you can
think of. Mostly by natural disasters , alot by people like you and me and oh yeah profesionals too!

Be careful.......cubby
Click to expand...

"if you JUST HAPPEN...." :laughing::laughing::laughing: sorry cubby, I don't buy that type of reasoning, there is NO WAY anybody can cut down a tree and make it look accidential, maybe if you are strong enough to push it over and break it off at the base...:laughing::laughing:

Power company employees are a lot smarter than that...30 years ago a classmate of mine got an entry level job as a tree trimmer with a huge power company, he had a number of people try to bribe him to testify the tree they cut down on a line was the fault of the weather, didn't work. I have had a number of very large box elder and cedar trees here storm damaged by ice and wind, the trees never broke off at the base, always higher up. Believe me, there is NO WAY to get out of liability if you fell a tree on something expensive.


#10

C

cubby

JDgreen said:
"if you JUST HAPPEN...." :laughing::laughing::laughing: sorry cubby, I don't buy that type of reasoning, there is NO WAY anybody can cut down a tree and make it look accidential, maybe if you are strong enough to push it over and break it off at the base...:laughing::laughing:

Power company employees are a lot smarter than that...30 years ago a classmate of mine got an entry level job as a tree trimmer with a huge power company, he had a number of people try to bribe him to testify the tree they cut down on a line was the fault of the weather, didn't work. I have had a number of very large box elder and cedar trees here storm damaged by ice and wind, the trees never broke off at the base, always higher up. Believe me, there is NO WAY to get out of liability if you fell a tree on something expensive.
Click to expand...

WOW jd you're way too serious! I guess you didn't see the kidding part? Let me be perfectly clear I'm not saying to bribe anyone or to get away with anything just a little humor thats all.

So let me tell you about that day 25 yrs ago, My wife and I bought are 1st house and it was heavly
wooded all the way up to a few feet from the house. The house was really damp because of all the
shade. One of the guys I work with had this huge chain saw and was dying to show it off. He offers
to come over and knock a few of them down for me. I got a few more friends together and made a
day of it. Well after cutting down around 27 trees without any problems we came to the last tree.
It was an oak about 90ft tall we figured. The only place to fell the tree was towards the driveway.
There was a power line running through my property to a neighbors property, but at the very edge
of this driveway. We measured from the tree to the line and had just over 100ft. We all felt comfortable this would work. So you know what happens next, as it fell the very last branches and only the leaves just brushed the wires and they came down like they weren't connected! Lucky nobody got hurt and no real damage. My wife called the power co. and told them I cut a tree down on top of the wire and knocked it down. Two hours later two power and light trucks show up and crew of guys.
After a few good minutes of laughter only because of all the trees we cut down and it was the last one
that did me in these really great guys put the lines back up in about 15 mins. if that. When they finished they had to come over for one more laugh and told me the lines weren't even hot because
the property next to mine was off. Just before they left they told me next time just say a tree fell on the line and we'll take care of the rest. I'm sure they laughed all the way back to their shop. These guys were really nice and would not accept anything I offered, but I was able to sneak a couple of cases of beer in their trucks anyway!

Now the next month when our light bill came we were real nervous to open it but were really surprised to see not a word or charge was mentioned, we are very grateful. Well thats it and I hope you didn't take it the wrong way , take care.......cubby


#11

adan

adan

Hi Cubby! Thanks for your story. I thought things like that don't happen in the USA. I have this impression sometimes that rules are rules in that part of the globe :) But the way you have described it is the way it goes oftentimes in my part of the globe, sometimes to a fault.

The moral of the story is, just be a person of good cheer and that usually resonates.


#12

JDgreen

JDgreen

cubby said:
WOW jd you're way too serious! I guess you didn't see the kidding part? Let me be perfectly clear I'm not saying to bribe anyone or to get away with anything just a little humor thats all.

So let me tell you about that day 25 yrs ago, My wife and I bought are 1st house and it was heavly
wooded all the way up to a few feet from the house. The house was really damp because of all the
shade. One of the guys I work with had this huge chain saw and was dying to show it off. He offers
to come over and knock a few of them down for me. I got a few more friends together and made a
day of it. Well after cutting down around 27 trees without any problems we came to the last tree.
It was an oak about 90ft tall we figured. The only place to fell the tree was towards the driveway.
There was a power line running through my property to a neighbors property, but at the very edge
of this driveway. We measured from the tree to the line and had just over 100ft. We all felt comfortable this would work. So you know what happens next, as it fell the very last branches and only the leaves just brushed the wires and they came down like they weren't connected! Lucky nobody got hurt and no real damage. My wife called the power co. and told them I cut a tree down on top of the wire and knocked it down. Two hours later two power and light trucks show up and crew of guys.
After a few good minutes of laughter only because of all the trees we cut down and it was the last one
that did me in these really great guys put the lines back up in about 15 mins. if that. When they finished they had to come over for one more laugh and told me the lines weren't even hot because
the property next to mine was off. Just before they left they told me next time just say a tree fell on the line and we'll take care of the rest. I'm sure they laughed all the way back to their shop. These guys were really nice and would not accept anything I offered, but I was able to sneak a couple of cases of beer in their trucks anyway!

Now the next month when our light bill came we were real nervous to open it but were really surprised to see not a word or charge was mentioned, we are very grateful. Well thats it and I hope you didn't take it the wrong way , take care.......cubby
Click to expand...

Thanks for sharing your story...apologize for sounding doubtful but if it really did happen that way I am glad for you and even gladder there wasn't a charge...it's pretty easy to misjudge the heigt of a tree, I have used both the sunshine-and-shadow method and using a marker stick to calculate the height...usually got within a few feet that way. I wonder if those optical distance finders used by hunters and golfers would be really accurate to measure tree height? Wow 27 trees? Seems like a shame to cut down a beautiful old oak, most of the trees here I have removed were either box elder or cedar, not worth much but they were storm damaged otherwise I would have let them stand. If I had something like an oak or maple I would do everything I could to keep it standing. Almost lost our best tree in the front yard 20 years ago, it's a huge black walnut, beautifully shaped, it got hit by a big lightning strike early one evening and the charge blew bark off it 35 feet away. We called the local agricultural college and they told us the best way to make sure it lived was to just flood the roots with water as often the charge boiled the moisture out of a tree, we followed their advice and it lived.


#13

Two-Stroke

Two-Stroke

I had a tree struck by lightning in May, 2009. I wasn't around at the time but my neighbors (about 1/3 mile away with lots of trees and hills in between) said it was so loud that it startled them out of a deep sleep.

It was an oak which provided a lot of firewood for the winter of 2009-2010.

tree-1.JPG


I've always been very careful about the possibility of hitting anything of value when I cut down a tree. I'm in the process of thinning out lots of very dense forest so I've cut down hundreds of trees (mostly small ones) in the last couple years. The idea is to allow the remaining trees to thrive.


#14

JDgreen

JDgreen

Two-Stroke said:
I had a tree struck by lightning in May, 2009. I wasn't around at the time but my neighbors (about 1/3 mile away with lots of trees and hills in between) said it was so loud that it startled them out of a deep sleep.

It was an oak which provided a lot of firewood for the winter of 2009-2010.

tree-1.JPG


I've always been very careful about the possibility of hitting anything of value when I cut down a tree. I'm in the process of thinning out lots of very dense forest so I've cut down hundreds of trees (mostly small ones) in the last couple years. The idea is to allow the remaining trees to thrive.
Click to expand...

I was out mowing the back yard on my smaller John Deere when the storm began that night, it was almost dark, when the rain began I parked the tractor in the north barn and ran thru the back yard into the house, could see lots of lightning flashes nearby so ran into the living room to tell my wife to get off the phone, the tree was maybe thirty yes THIRTY FEET from the inside of the living room, it felt like a bomb going off inside....and we had a hardwood floor !!!! If the strike had happened a minute earlier I would have seen it hit the tree while I was running through the back yard...odds are my wife would have been sure it hit me on my tractor.

Every since that incident, if I see any lightning out side, no matter how far away, I get my tractor indoors as fast as I can and skedaddle for the house. Stay on it when I see lightning? NEVER AGAIN. :eek:


#15

C

CurbAppeal

If they are very large I would have someone else do it unless you are experienced in the field. They can be very large trees which you will have to cut up after etc. If you do it yourself plan a lot of time for it and make sure you know what you're doing.
__________
Large Rocks, Wooden Furniture and Beautiful Grass. A Picture of Beauty.:thumbsup:


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