Never let your guard down!

[tree md]

Sometimes it's unavoidable. Say your removing a larger tree that a deck is built around, you have to block wood down. There is always the risk that there is an unseen flaw in the tree where it can fail. That's just part of the risk of the job, Anytime you leave the ground your taking a risk whether you are lowering big wood or not. Hopefully climbers are learning from someone who has the experience to know the little things like the dangers of Hickory and whatnot. When I was first starting out I remember hearing about a guy who bought some climbing gear and jumped in with both feet with virtually no experience. He topped a hardwood without a notch or any kind of face cut and the tree split and tore him in half. It's often a wonder to me that we don't hear a lot more of these stories when I read some of the posts on here.

 

[Blakesmaster]

Sometimes it's unavoidable.

Exactly. Sometimes I wonder how some of the guys on this site get anything done. If the spar I'm on can safely take the weight I cut my notch and flop her over. I'll take a little ride for the sake of production. It's a little nerve-racking the first time or two but after a few you learn how to brace for it and float with the spar instead of fighting 'er. Seeing that I come from a no-block, natural crotch rigging background you can be quite certain I've taken a few good whippings on that butt-hitched top and I'm still here. S'all part of the game.

 

[pdqdl]

...

I was roping out tops on Thursday, a big casuarina, 70' multiple vertical leads.

...

I got curious, 'cause I never heard of this tree. Wikipedia says they are a nuisance tree down there:

"It is also an introduced, invasive plant in Bermuda. It was introduced to replace the Juniperus bermudiana windbreaks killed by juniper blight in the 1940s. Now they are growing on cliffs and sandy slopes strangling all surrounding plants, or covering them in needles, they also erode the cliffs by digging their roots deep into them and splitting them apart. The plants are strongly suspected of having allelopathic properties, as evidenced by the near absence of understory once a mat of litter develops around the plants."

It also says they are nitrogen fixing trees?

Bermie! do you remember the nitrogen fertilization thread? http://www.arboristsite.com/showthread.php?p=1469465&highlight=nitrogen#post1469465

I posted that there were only 3 groups of trees that fixed nitrogen; after some digging I find that this is in one of those groups! http://www.arboristsite.com/showpost.php?p=1459731&postcount=11

This is a fascinating tree. If you didn't know any better, you would think they were a conifer, especially since they have evergreen growth and what looks like pine cones. Instead, they are in the Beech family, and are related to walnuts, beeches, birches, and some others. Alders come to mind, since they were also nitrogen fixing.

Does anyone know if walnut trees fix nitrogen? I never heard of it, if they do.

Go figure.

 

[ozzy42]

I got curious, 'cause I never heard of this tree. Wikipedia says they are a nuisance tree down there:

"It is also an introduced, invasive plant in Bermuda. It was introduced to replace the Juniperus bermudiana windbreaks killed by juniper blight in the 1940s. Now they are growing on cliffs and sandy slopes strangling all surrounding plants, or covering them in needles, they also erode the cliffs by digging their roots deep into them and splitting them apart. The plants are strongly suspected of having allelopathic properties, as evidenced by the near absence of understory once a mat of litter develops around the plants."

It also says they are nitrogen fixing trees?

Bermie! do you remember the nitrogen fertilization thread? http://www.arboristsite.com/showthread.php?p=1469465&highlight=nitrogen#post1469465

I posted that there were only 3 groups of trees that fixed nitrogen; after some digging I find that this is in one of those groups! http://www.arboristsite.com/showpost.php?p=1459731&postcount=11

This is a fascinating tree. If you didn't know any better, you would think they were a conifer, especially since they have evergreen growth and what looks like pine cones. Instead, they are in the Beech family, and are related to walnuts, beeches, birches, and some others. Alders come to mind, since they were also nitrogen fixing.

Does anyone know if walnut trees fix nitrogen? I never heard of it, if they do.

Go figure.

Yes,they are invasive ,and considered a nuisence here as well.
A lot of the snowbirds started freaking out a few years when they started removing them from the beaches here.
They were introduced here so long ago,people thought they were native.
They grow to 100 ft or so on the barrier islands ,and have a wide ,but shallow root system.They tend to uproot easily during tropical storm winds.

They don't really bother me much,except I am tender footed and hate stepping on those little cones while at the beach.My kids however will run,stomp and play tackle football barefooted with no shirts on underneath them and they don't seem to be bothered at all by them.
Ahhh ,to be young again.

 

[Rickytree]

did you buck it up where she stood? lol.


edit: glad the OP is alright after the ride he took. thanks for sharing.

Your right, I did buck it up when it was off the ground. As for the OP, that would be me. Alittle bloody nose but that's it. Would have been a homicide if I would have lost teeth. I scared the poop out of him and the ground idiot with the next tree. Thanks for listening!

 

[Bermie]

Casuarinas ahh yes,.they just call them austrailian pines here.
Yeah,they can be a handfull too.
I know they are a REALLY REALLY Hard wood ,hard to gaff.Have to stomp like hell every step . I heard somewhere they are like the 8th or 9th hardest wood in the world.Don't know if it's true or not,but they are the hardest wood i've ever cut,especially when near salt water.

Yo, sorry for the derail but....

Yup...mmmhhmmmm, that's the one!
They are REAL hard, and along with that goes HEAVY! Spike stomping mandatory, I was riding some of those drops with only like a quarter inch of spike stuck in! At least the wood fibres are strong and flexible, good control on the hinges. This one was hanging over the salt water...

Yes pdql, they are a big problem here for all the reasons you discovered on wikipedia! The tree I took down, if were to have fallen in a storm would have probably taken 20' of waterfront with it. The area of Harrington Sound is unique for a formation called a bioerosional notch just under low tide level, where the rock is eroded by clams and sponges sometimes up to a metre deep. It then forms an overhang and the casuarinas can get in between the rock layers and cause the notch to collapse...all that expensive waterfron in de wata!

I do a lot of felling and removals of casuarina in nature reserves to allow the native vegetation to flourish and open up areas for replanting. Some of the fun removals are bombing tops and logs onto the other invasive...mexican pepper the dreaded Schinus...!

Mind you, today was thinning and reducing three old casuarinas(all hand saw stuff) that had been planted as a windbreak for a house right on the ocean side... managed and maintained they do serve a useful purpose, as indeed they did when they were first introduced, just not those wild ones!

Sorry for the major derail...

 

[pdqdl]

Despite looking like conifers, they aren't. That suggests that they grow right back from the stump after you cut them down, doesn't it?

If eradication is desired, don't you have to stump treat?

 

[Bermie]

Despite looking like conifers, they aren't. That suggests that they grow right back from the stump after you cut them down, doesn't it?

If eradication is desired, don't you have to stump treat?

Yes, we use Tordon or Garlon.
They are considered by some to be a 'link' tree between angiosperms and gymnosperms.
Sometimes if it was a real big tree the stump will die on its own. So many of them here are really badly topped and hacked about, the 'sad' thing is that because they spring back so vigourously that people think that is the right way to treat them when they get too big...drives me nuts!
Other than that, they make excellent firewood, burns clean and hot and makes good chipped and composted mulch! If you try to use the wood for cabinetry it has to be cured very carefully or it will split and check. No-one bothers here, but it can be attractive.