Hollow trees

[DitchDr]

Kind of new to this, and wanted to get some felling work done. So i got out to some land I own near the lake to clear out a place for the house will will some day build..

I took someone with me just incase something goes wrong. Anyhow I climbed 4 trees limbed them and took them out following info in the Jeff Jepson book. Everything went as planned.. Come up oon the last tree, a 80ft gum tree. From the out side it looks healthy, and no matter where it fell it would not hit anyhting other then a few pines that are coming out anyhow.

I make my mind up to spike climb it as i have used ropes all day it would be a good change. I get up take out a few good size limbs and come back down to drop the rest of the tree. The stump is about 90inches around so I make my face cut about 15 inches from top to bottom. As i am making the cut I notice the tree is hollow in the middle and has maybe 4 inches of solid wood holding it. I have my buddy stand far away as I am not sure as to where is will fall. I make my back cut and the tree falls to the left. I mean straight left. There was no big wood up there causing it to go that way, nor was there any wind. Is it common for hollow trees to pretty much do what ever they want? Other then roping it off and hooking it to my truck I dont know of anything I can do different

 

[MillerTreeMN]

common problem.

after you make you wedge / notch cut, youre able to control the direction of the tree with your back cut / angle and depth of your saw.

but not with a rotted tree.

i had one yesterday that i made my notch, only got an inch into it with the back cut, and she started to go. i was lucky i was able to push it and make it land where i wanted.

when you have all that rot in there and no solid material, you are lacking the core of the tree that is suppose to work with you.

 

[shootingarts]

new here too

New here too. I was fighting some hollow gum trees a few years back. One was full of some kind of fungus growth, found out that chainsaws hate cutting that stuff when there is a foot or two of it hidden in a tree!

I had fourteen of the big gums to take down by myself. Not being a trusting soul with those hollow trees I used 120 feet of transport chain I had in multiple pieces tied about 12-14 feet up the tree and about 8000 pounds of John Deere farm tractor to be sure the trees fell where I wanted them to.

My sad story was a pine tree by a highway. Watching the wind I had laid three of them exactly where I wanted them. I was down on the saw cutting the fourth and final one when the wind changed. The tree twisted and I laid it across a two lane highway. By luck and the grace of God there weren't any wrecks but I was stepping and fetching for a few minutes clearing the traffic lanes!

Hu

 

[gwiley]

A hollow tree is officially a hazard tree, they will do whatever they care to. Particularly if the tree is a large diameter there is no way to tell where the balance is. If the hollow is asymmetric (almost always are) and extends significantly up the tree then it will complicate the fall. When you add the fact that the "ring" of sound wood provides a small surface for hinge you get unpredictability.

My rule is, as soon as I realize a tree hollow I stop and get a pull line on it and double check my escape paths.

 

[DitchDr]

I was going to rope it off, but all i had was my 1999 Ford Ranger, I am sure the tree far out weighed it, by more hten 2 to 1. I can just see me being stuck out at the lake with my truck smashed by a giant gum.


I have had 2 more hollow trees since. I knew these were hollow first by sounding them, and next was by doing a plung cut into the trunk with my MS200.

I took some 3/4 arborplex went to a pully block in the direction I wanted to fell the tree in, then took the rope from the pully to the back of my tractor and keep some tension on it. Tree still did some dancing as it came down, but fell with in 2 feet of my marker.

Next one was way to close to a house for me to take any chances so I threw on the spurrs and took it down in 2 foot sections.

 

[BC WetCoast]

A hollow tree is officially a hazard tree, they will do whatever they care to. Particularly if the tree is a large diameter there is no way to tell where the balance is. If the hollow is asymmetric (almost always are) and extends significantly up the tree then it will complicate the fall. When you add the fact that the "ring" of sound wood provides a small surface for hinge you get unpredictability.

My rule is, as soon as I realize a tree hollow I stop and get a pull line on it and double check my escape paths.

No, you're wrong. Being hollow does not automatically make a tree hazardous. There are distinct criteria which make a tree hazardous and a thin shell would be one of them. This tree, with a 4" shell on a 28" diameter would be borderline.

You also need to remember that the heartwood, being dead, contributes significantly little to the effectiveness of the hinge, to the point where many cutters will bore out the centre of the hinge. The outside sapwood provides the strength in the hinge.

It sounds to me like he cut off his holding wood. It would be interesting to have a picture of the stump.

 

[shootingarts]

gotta agree

I did make sure I had more chain than tree height! I thought that last chain was for sure extra but better safe than sorry, I liked my tractor and it did a lot of work for me.

If a tree isn't badly lopsided or leaning I haven't found it to take much to guide it, once it starts wrong you are had though. I tied off to my tractor and just tightened up enough to get the chain off the ground and out the way for me to make my face cut. After I made my face cut I put a little more tension on the tree but still not a massive amount. I'd try to tie high and get a little bit of flex in the tree with the second pull. Not a lot, just enough you are confident you are controlling the tree. With the tractor and field tires I put a pretty heavy bend in a couple and then backed off to just a light flex to cut them. Way too much energy in that tree with thousands of pounds of side force on it if I really put maximum load on it with the tractor for me to want to be beside it if it decided to snap.

I have used a half or three-quarter ton truck as a dead man many times to tie off to guiding trees that weighed far more than they did, I usually just wanted a guiding force. A chuckle, I helped a friend take down several big pines wedged between a double wide mobile home, cyclone fence, and power lines. We had a rubber tired backhoe that weighed close to twice what my tractor did guiding at 30 degrees to one side of the line of fall, my tractor at 30 degrees on the other side, and a four wheel drive truck in the middle that actually pulled as the trees started over. Overkill but we took the trees down without a scratch on anything and that is what it is all about.

Pays to bear in mind that I am far from a professional, this is how I found things to work but I run a saw for days or weeks at most and then put it up until the next time I need it either on my land or land I am buying and selling.

Hu

I was going to rope it off, but all i had was my 1999 Ford Ranger, I am sure the tree far out weighed it, by more hten 2 to 1. I can just see me being stuck out at the lake with my truck smashed by a giant gum.


I have had 2 more hollow trees since. I knew these were hollow first by sounding them, and next was by doing a plung cut into the trunk with my MS200.

I took some 3/4 arborplex went to a pully block in the direction I wanted to fell the tree in, then took the rope from the pully to the back of my tractor and keep some tension on it. Tree still did some dancing as it came down, but fell with in 2 feet of my marker.

Next one was way to close to a house for me to take any chances so I threw on the spurrs and took it down in 2 foot sections.

 

[BC WetCoast]

I did make sure I had more chain than tree height! I thought that last chain was for sure extra but better safe than sorry, I liked my tractor and it did a lot of work for me.

If a tree isn't badly lopsided or leaning I haven't found it to take much to guide it, once it starts wrong you are had though. I tied off to my tractor and just tightened up enough to get the chain off the ground and out the way for me to make my face cut. After I made my face cut I put a little more tension on the tree but still not a massive amount. I'd try to tie high and get a little bit of flex in the tree with the second pull. Not a lot, just enough you are confident you are controlling the tree. With the tractor and field tires I put a pretty heavy bend in a couple and then backed off to just a light flex to cut them. Way too much energy in that tree with thousands of pounds of side force on it if I really put maximum load on it with the tractor for me to want to be beside it if it decided to snap.

I have used a half or three-quarter ton truck as a dead man many times to tie off to guiding trees that weighed far more than they did, I usually just wanted a guiding force. A chuckle, I helped a friend take down several big pines wedged between a double wide mobile home, cyclone fence, and power lines. We had a rubber tired backhoe that weighed close to twice what my tractor did guiding at 30 degrees to one side of the line of fall, my tractor at 30 degrees on the other side, and a four wheel drive truck in the middle that actually pulled as the trees started over. Overkill but we took the trees down without a scratch on anything and that is what it is all about.

Pays to bear in mind that I am far from a professional, this is how I found things to work but I run a saw for days or weeks at most and then put it up until the next time I need it either on my land or land I am buying and selling.

Hu

Careful when you are pulling with that tractor or you will introduce yourself to a very nice barberchair.

If you have your notch cut properly without a dutchman, and leave lots of holding wood, the tree is going to follow the notch. Pulling a tree sideways against quality holding wood is almost impossible.