HeyBub wrote:
Robert Allison wrote:

HeyBub wrote:

I have no idea but I can tell you a palm tree can easily be pushed
over with a tractor.



The roots on palm trees are about six inches long. In LA, people
STEAL palm trees with a wrecker - just pluck-n-go.

On a pine, there is more tree BELOW ground than above.



That is not true. Pine trees have a small root ball, and are
very prone to being blown over. They are very easy to knock
down as I know from experience. I owned a logging company in
East Texas (unfortunately during the Carter administration).


Well, that doesn't speak too well for your business acumen, does it?

I had no control over the politics of the decade. I did,
however, have control over my costs. While others were
purchasing their equipment, I was leasing. When the bottom
fell out of the construction industry and it became
increasingly difficult to find mills to buy logs, I was able
to get out of the business. Others had huge notes to pay and
many went bankrupt. I don't really get to count that as
tremendous business acumen as much as it was just plain dumb luck.

Our skidder could easily push over a 10-12" pine. No way with
an oak or a hickory. Part of my side work was to remove pines
blown over by high winds. Oaks would snap in half. Oaks ARE
larger underground than above, but this is not true of pines.


Okay. You caught me. I exaggerated. Let me restate.

"Almost ALL trees have MORE organic matter below ground than they do above.
Not just pines."

It should be: Except for pines and a few other species.


--
Robert Allison
Rimshot, Inc.
Georgetown, TX

A strong wind that would create an equally loaded force can uproot
a pine. Pines do have a weaker root system than most trees but putting
a winch at one point on the tree will not uproot the pine. It will
only snap the trunk and cause your winch to fly back at you.

Don't pines typically snap, rather than uproot in strong winds?
I hope so. I have some big muthas too damn close to the house. G

No. If they are in the open and see the full brunt of the wind they
will actually partially pull out of the ground because of the weak
root system. I have had two pines on different occasions pull down
to a 45 degree angle. I had to remove them. My neighbor has three
pines right now that have a 20 degree tilt at the base but have grown
to re-righted the top half of the trunk through the years.


It depends in where they're growing, how long it's been
raining, and whether you've recently changed their wind
exposure. A pine tree that's grown in the middle
of a pine forest and has spend all it's energy lunging
for the sky in order to beat it's brethren to the sunlight
will blow over in the next big storm if you cut down
all the trees around it. A pine tree that's
grown up in the middle of a field because it's too
close to the pigsty to mow isn't going anywhere.

Bob F wrote:
I have a columnar white pine tree, about 40 feet tall and maybe
8" in daimeter at the base, I need to remove. I am considering
trying to use an old climbing rope and a come-along to winch
it out of the ground. I figure that if I attach the rope to the tree
about 30 feet from the ground, it shouldn't be too hard to winch
it over. I would used prussiks to allow me to pull it multiple winch-
fulls to move it far enough to break roots (with a little axe help maybe).
Does anyone have any idea how much force this should take?
Will it work?

Bob

Wow, lively topic, eh? I like the idea, it's creative, and anything
that avoids having to dig out the damn stump by hand is worth
considering. I would advise against it though. Winching it over will
create a situation with a lot of potential energy in your system. It
is inherently dangerous. The tree could snap, rope snap, whatever you
have the rope tied to move, etc. As someone said, if it was practical
and safe the pros would do it that way. Many trees blow over in storms
taking the roots up, but the wind force is distributed over the whole
tree, whereas you would be applying the force in only one spot, making
breakage more likely, I think.

I have cut down several trees in the yard (mostly dead elms) of this
size or bigger and never had any trouble dropping them in the direction
I wanted. A combination of how you do the cut (notch on the side you
want it to fall toward, and felling cut from other side) and having a
helper pull on a rope attached way up in the tree seems to do it. Yes
once the rope is slack your guidance is over but once you get it
started in the right direction, my experience has been it keeps going
that way. When felling leave a hinge of uncut wood and try to pull it
over with the rope. If the tree is leaning or lopsided though you
might have more trouble getting it to go where you want.

The stump can be removed by digging around it, chopping exposed roots
with an axe, more digging, more chopping, etc. Not fun but it will
work eventually.

OK, you want a more fun way. Here is my suggestion - don't use any
tools. Push on the trunk, the tree will sway a little and come back.
Push rythmically in time with the sway to make it sway more and more
until it falls over.

I think lots of great opinions here! Roots will always be an issue,
depends on how old they are, how far they travelled, how much water
they got over the life to determine which direction they travelled,
etc. Yes, Pine have larger root systems than Palms, but each tree will
be different. There is no magic answer. Key is: SAFETY! A tree this
size is DANGEROUS and can cause REAL damage to surrounding stuff (like
humans).

Suggestion: Tie a rope/chain to the top section and connect it to a
known SAFE area. Lop the tree at 25 feet or so (which will fall towards
the rope/chain), then again at 10 feet (again with the rope/chain
guiding it's descent). Dispose of those two sections. Now, dig around
the tree trunk a bit and see if you can saw the stump below grade. If
so, and if you do not plan to build anything on top of it, simply cover
it with soil and enjoy your new yard. Alternatively, get a stump
grinder to level what sticks up. They can be found for under $100 and
their machine takes 20 minutes or less to unload, grind and load.


Joseph Meehan wrote:
Bob F wrote:
wrote in message
...
On Sun, 22 Oct 2006 21:19:10 -0700, "Bob F"
wrote:

I have a columnar white pine tree, about 40 feet tall and maybe
8" in daimeter at the base, I need to remove. I am considering
trying to use an old climbing rope and a come-along to winch
it out of the ground. I figure that if I attach the rope to the tree
about 30 feet from the ground, it shouldn't be too hard to winch
it over. I would used prussiks to allow me to pull it multiple
winch- fulls to move it far enough to break roots (with a little
axe help maybe). Does anyone have any idea how much force this
should take?
Will it work?

Bob


You gotta be kidding !!!!!

Have you ever heard of a chainsaw?
I can guarantee that if your winch, cable, whatever you use does not
fail first, the tree will snap off somewhere along the trunk, and the
snapback will likely hurt someone and/or damage property. Cut it
down, then use the winch to help remove the stump while you dig and
chop roots.


Once it's cut, the winch is going to be a whole lot less effective.
No leverage.

Bob

Bob, I really think you are going to be a lot safer following the
advice. It may be a little more work, but think of this: If it were easier
and safe, don't you think the professional loggers would have been doing it
for years?

--
Joseph Meehan

Dia duit

"Heathcliff" wrote in message
oups.com...

Bob F wrote:
I have a columnar white pine tree, about 40 feet tall and maybe
8" in daimeter at the base, I need to remove. I am considering
trying to use an old climbing rope and a come-along to winch
it out of the ground. I figure that if I attach the rope to the tree
about 30 feet from the ground, it shouldn't be too hard to winch
it over. I would used prussiks to allow me to pull it multiple winch-
fulls to move it far enough to break roots (with a little axe help
maybe).
Does anyone have any idea how much force this should take?
Will it work?

Bob

Wow, lively topic, eh? I like the idea, it's creative, and anything
that avoids having to dig out the damn stump by hand is worth
considering. I would advise against it though. Winching it over will
create a situation with a lot of potential energy in your system. It
is inherently dangerous. The tree could snap, rope snap, whatever you
have the rope tied to move, etc. As someone said, if it was practical
and safe the pros would do it that way. Many trees blow over in storms
taking the roots up, but the wind force is distributed over the whole
tree, whereas you would be applying the force in only one spot, making
breakage more likely, I think.

I have cut down several trees in the yard (mostly dead elms) of this
size or bigger and never had any trouble dropping them in the direction
I wanted. A combination of how you do the cut (notch on the side you
want it to fall toward, and felling cut from other side) and having a
helper pull on a rope attached way up in the tree seems to do it. Yes
once the rope is slack your guidance is over but once you get it
started in the right direction, my experience has been it keeps going
that way. When felling leave a hinge of uncut wood and try to pull it
over with the rope. If the tree is leaning or lopsided though you
might have more trouble getting it to go where you want.

The stump can be removed by digging around it, chopping exposed roots
with an axe, more digging, more chopping, etc. Not fun but it will
work eventually.

OK, you want a more fun way. Here is my suggestion - don't use any
tools. Push on the trunk, the tree will sway a little and come back.
Push rythmically in time with the sway to make it sway more and more
until it falls over.

LOL. I think the tree is a little big for that to work.


Bob

"Bob F" wrote in message
. ..
I have a columnar white pine tree, about 40 feet tall and maybe
8" in daimeter at the base, I need to remove. I am considering
trying to use an old climbing rope and a come-along to winch
it out of the ground. I figure that if I attach the rope to the tree
about 30 feet from the ground, it shouldn't be too hard to winch
it over. I would used prussiks to allow me to pull it multiple winch-
fulls to move it far enough to break roots (with a little axe help maybe).
Does anyone have any idea how much force this should take?
Will it work?

Incidentally, I found this on a Warn winch site.

Pull out shrubs or pull down trees.Use

the choker chain low around the shrub,

then start pulling with the winch.The

choker chain will tighten. Small shrubs can

be pulled out by the roots.

On a larger tree, you can attach the

choker chain high up on the trunk for

leverage, then start pulling.The winch will

pull the tree over and expose roots that

could take hours to dig out. Slack the

tension on the wire rope and cut the tree

roots so the tree can be pulled loose.Use of

a snatch block to change the angle of the

pull to you to position the vehicle out of

the way should the tree fall.

Heathcliff wrote:

The stump can be removed by digging around it, chopping exposed
roots with an axe, more digging, more chopping, etc. Not fun but
it will work eventually.

They can also be burned out too. Especially pines. For that matter,
the roots will burn out underground too...I burned out an old dead
pine stump a few years ago and the roots burned underground for close
to a week (a heavy rain put them out).

--

dadiOH
____________________________

dadiOH's dandies v3.06...
....a help file of info about MP3s, recording from
LP/cassette and tips & tricks on this and that.
Get it at http://mysite.verizon.net/xico

Robert Allison wrote:
HeyBub wrote:

On a pine, there is more tree BELOW ground than above.

That is not true. Pine trees have a small root ball, and are
very prone to being blown over. They are very easy to knock
down as I know from experience. I owned a logging company in
East Texas (unfortunately during the Carter administration).
Our skidder could easily push over a 10-12" pine. No way with
an oak or a hickory. Part of my side work was to remove pines
blown over by high winds. Oaks would snap in half. Oaks ARE
larger underground than above, but this is not true of pines.


Depends on the type pine. Here in the south the majority of pines
(Loblolly & SYP) have a tap root that anchors the tree really deep into
the ground. Not a dense root system, but a deep one. A hurricane or
tornado will break them off, but will *not* blow them over. Oaks on
the other hand have a massive root system but it is shallow with no tap
root. A saturated ground and a strong wind will blow over 100 year old
oaks fairly often.

Bob S.

In article %rv%g.2365$GJ.1385@trnddc07, dadiOH wrote:
Heathcliff wrote:

The stump can be removed by digging around it, chopping exposed
roots with an axe, more digging, more chopping, etc. Not fun but
it will work eventually.

They can also be burned out too. Especially pines. For that matter,
the roots will burn out underground too...I burned out an old dead
pine stump a few years ago and the roots burned underground for close
to a week (a heavy rain put them out).


Don't do this near any coal veins that are close to the the surface.

http://www.easternpa.com/pottsville/hist.html

http://www.dep.state.pa.us/dep/DEPUT...MR/CENTBRF.htm



--
No dumb questions, just dumb answers.

Larry Wasserman - Baltimore, Maryland -

On Wed, 25 Oct 2006 00:55:11 -0500, ()
wrote:

In article %rv%g.2365$GJ.1385@trnddc07, dadiOH wrote:
Heathcliff wrote:

The stump can be removed by digging around it, chopping exposed
roots with an axe, more digging, more chopping, etc. Not fun but
it will work eventually.

They can also be burned out too. Especially pines. For that matter,
the roots will burn out underground too...I burned out an old dead
pine stump a few years ago and the roots burned underground for close
to a week (a heavy rain put them out).


Don't do this near any coal veins that are close to the the surface.

http://www.easternpa.com/pottsville/hist.html

http://www.dep.state.pa.us/dep/DEPUT...MR/CENTBRF.htm

It doesn't have to be coal seams. Deep loam can be
nearly as bad. Although easier to get at, once you
figure out that you've set the planet on fire.