Trees

Stories about trees falling on our property and structures here in WI have appeared here before. Since those incidents, I have tried to be prudent about the removal of trees that might threaten the house, the garage, parked vehicles, or guests. Yesterday, I had a crew over to remove several dead trees and a couple of additional popples that were aimed squarely at the house and the parking area. The company I use is a very professional one. I watched the entire process and marveled at their professional, careful approach with each tree. They have amazing skill with riggings to pull trees, with sawing so as to drop trees exactly where desired, and with cutting trees down to size once dropped. They also do an excellent job with cleanup. As you might imagine, a dead tree makes something like a small explosion when it hits the ground, since its dry branches shatter and fly everywhere.

Here are a few shots of the men at work. There were two trees that had fallen in a storm in 2005. In fact, they had only almost fallen. They were leaning at a 45 degree angle against two other trees, and they spanned a pathway that we use regularly. Walking under these two trees was always a little spooky, and with them down so far, I was sure they would fall sometime in the near future. To remove these trees from the woods when unable to take much equipment into the woods, the crew rigged up lines from a tree near our house and then used a skid loader to pull cut sections onto the drive where they could be cut and hauled away.





Here are a before and an after shot of the space previously occupied by those two leaning trees.



I also got one shot of another tree just as it began to fall.


Finally, lest anyone believe we are eradicating the trees near us, here are some shots of two of the nine trees we have planted so far. The first is a mountain ash. The second is a red pine that I relocated from a very crowded spot in the woods. I am finding lots of red pine seedlings that are in places where they will struggle. My goal is to relocate as many of these as I can find to create a grove of new trees in the area between our house and the garage. The one in the shot below is hardly a seedling. This particular red pine was uncovered when the "leaning trees" were removed. It had been growing adjacent to the stumps of these trees and was crowded together with a number of balsams and other growth. When the leaning trees fell, it was pushed over. I have high hopes for its survival. When we have planted, we mix a batch of new soil, based on recommendations from a local nursery, to included lots of peat moss, composted cow manure, local soil, and root stimulators. With some judicious watering and attention, I hope we can get all of these trees to thrive. As you can tell, the mountain ash is already leafing out.