Me in My Guise as a Farmer, with the Tree that Tried to Kill Me
Just below the dam that held my pond was a giant, old oak, at
least four feet in diameter at the base. Sometime around 2010 a strong wind
blew the top off the tree and left a broken stump about 20 feet high.
Over a period of time, I hooked a log chain to the great,
broken-off limbs, pulled them out with my tractor, and cut them up for
firewood. The smaller limbs went on the burning pile
where we burned dead limbs
that had fallen from our trees, and also dead trees that were no good for
firewood; mostly pines killed by pine borers.
In April, 2020 as we were preparing to sell the property I decided it was time to get rid of the ugly, old stump. It sat beside a small ravine just below the ponds overflow drain. I cut all around its base with my chainsaw -- the stump was hollow, by the way -- and very unwisely, made my final cut on the low side of the stump.
(I say unwisely because I knew better. I 've been working in the woods all my life, beginning when I was nine years old, when my Dad paid me a nickel apiece to cut down small trees for fence posts.)
As I made the cut the stump began to slide on its base, rotating as it fell across the ravine, hitting me and knocking me down. I fell across a root and cracked a few ribs, but the tree bridged the ravine and did not actually fall on me. If it had, I would not be writing this. Don't blame the tree. It tried!
Sawing Up a Big Limb of the Tree for Firewood
Burning Brush at Deer Run Farm
Photographs and text copyright 2022, David B.Jenkins.
I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday each week unless life gets in the way.
Soli Gloria Deo
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