This Year's Trees

Here, for my records, are the trees that I cut for firewood this past fall. Small trees = less than 6" in diameter. Medium = 6" to 1'. Large = over 1 foot in diameter at the butt. All were living unless otherwise said.

The first tree I got, a large one, was not on my property. I helped neighbor H. to cut it down, as it was growing right up against the back of his workshop. H. thinks it was an Ash. That's one of the rarest species around here, and I don't know of having any on my own property..

Next, because they were right next to one of my horseshoe pits, I cut a Hickory and a Water Maple, both small. Then, in the same area I felled a medium Virginia Pine that ever since Hurricane Fran over 10 years ago had been leaning heavily. Then I cut a medium White Oak that I hoped wouldn't be missed by the large Tulip or Yellow Poplar growing just a few feet away on the slope in front of the house.

Then I cut two that were leaning out over the "S" curve of the creek -- a medium Maple and a large White Oak. The latter took several weeks to cut up and haul as it fell across the whole S-curve, and many of the logs and most of the brush fell into the creek.

Next, far up the slope across the creek, I cut and sectioned a Eastern White Pine snag that was nearly 3' through at the butt and about 20' tall. Along with several others like it, this tree had been hit by ligntning at some unknown time, and the top two-thirds had broken off. That tree had stood over 80 feet tall and it must've been quite a sight and sound when that big top part fell and hit the ground.. I wonder where I was when that happened, and how long ago it was?

A few yards farther up that steep slope from the pine snag was another long dead and broken-off White Pine that had left a smaller snag, plus there was a really imposing sight -- a huge Hickory, also quite dead but with all its trunk still standing straight as a pillar in a gigantic temple..

Hickory is probably the most desirable firewood of all, green or dead, but I had already been merely studying this tree for well over a year, as I do with all large trees and most smaller ones,too, before I finally decided I had to bite the bullet and get this thing down. It's not good to have a dead tree that large standing in your woods. The probabilities are still highly in your favor, but still you never know what will happen or when.

For various reasons it is easier and safer to cut live trees than dead ones, but hickories are the trickiest of all even when green, because of the enormous strength of its heartwood, plus, more than most trees around here, they tend to grow straight up with hardly any lean to help calculations. And even when it is properly notched a hickory thus so well-balanced all around will keep standing perfectly upright even when you've cut through to nearly its last intact inch of heartwood -- a dangerous situation unless you have some reliable external way of influencing its fall.

Except for the very smallest trees, I always attach one and sometimes even two comealongs to the trees I cut, so I can generally make even huge ones fall where I want, but it is still tricky, because I'm pulling the tree in my direction. I counter that by extending the length of the comealong cable with a lot of chains and a stout 30-foot cable, hopefully putting me out of range of the top of the falling tree even if I didn't manage to move aside quickly enough, though so far that's been easy to do. Also I try to pull with the comealong only enough to give the tree "the right idea," and then I stop the ratcheting and rely on the sawing instead.

In the case of this towering, dead hickory I did all the necessary preparatory comealong stuff, but to my surprise my pulling alone started that massive tree leaning sharply in my direction then and there. It had rotted away at the base much more than I had thought. So I only had to keep carefully pulling while paying maximum attention and without even having to fire up my saw, and I was intensely relieved when that monster hit the ground.


Meanwhile a few yards behind this Hickory was another dead and almost large tree, a While Oak, I didn't notice this till I used it as an anchor for the comealong while pulling down the hickory. So, while thanking the always benevolent spirits of the woods, I collected that tree, too, plus a few rounds from the second already downed White Pine.

Finally, just a few weeks ago, I cut a small White Oak and a smallish medium Red Oak at the edge of the state road that runs behind our house, both dead and with the potential to fall across the road..

That makes a total of 11 of my own trees that I cut for this past winter's firewood, five dead and six green, plus the Ash that I didn't cut but whose wood I got. With the frost-free period starting only eight days from now, unless things get really out of hand we still have enough firewood cut and stacked under cover to last as long as two weeks