Trimming the Elm

I’ve been looking at a large, mostly dead branch in the American Elm in front of The Homestead for more than a year now. I’ve wanted to remove it, but have hesitated because of the difficulty. I did not, however, want to let any of the remaining live twigs form buds, so I knew I had to do it before any warm spring weather. It was almost spring-like today, so I decided that it was time.

The limb I wanted to cut was about 25 feet off the ground. It was also about 15 inches in diameter—so I wasn’t going to be cutting it by hand. I hate to run the chain saw one handed and wasn’t sure that would work anyway, so I needed to use both hands. Using both hands means that the only way to hang on is to wrap your arms around the tree. The problem with that is it puts your face very close to the chain. If the saw kicks back, you’re going to lose a nose before you can stop it. I didn’t want to cut my face and I didn’t want to fall out of the tree, so I pulled out an old climbing rope and tied it to the bumper of the Chev. I then ran the rope through a crotch several feet above where I needed to be and tied it off to a waist harness. There. I wasn’t going to hit the ground if I lost my balance and I could use both hands without putting my face in the chain.

I’m good at some things, but trimming trees isn’t one of them. I once removed a middle sized maple from a friend’s back yard. I volunteered to do it because they didn’t feel they had the skill and couldn’t afford a professional. I didn’t have the skill, either. I bounced one limb off the roof, set another on the picnic table, and crushed their kid’s slide. Sure, I did the job for free, but all the repairs to the infrastructure were costly.

I didn’t hit anything this time, and I didn’t hurt myself, so I guess the day was a success, at least for me. The tree, however, fared less well. The best way to cut a heavy branch like that is to reach out from the crotch and score it on the bottom a couple of times. Then, when you start the cut from the top, the bottom can collapse until the whole thing snaps off cleanly. Finally, you can move back to the crotch and finish the cut flush against the trunk without all the weight of the branch pulling against you. My position today was so bad, however, that I couldn’t reach out and score it. I did my best right against the trunk, but it wasn’t enough. When the branch let loose, it tore part of the bottom of the branch, pealing the bark back like skin, and leaving an ugly wound on the trunk. I got the limb on the ground; I just hope I didn’t do permanent damage to the tree.

Burning Pine; Burning Eyes

The other day a friend of mine sent a picture of me that he had found on his computer hard drive. He had taken it a couple of years ago when we were under-burning some ponderosa pine at a place called Stump Springs on the Dixie National Forest. I had a job as a “lighter,” which meant that I spent the day using a drip-torch and enjoying a walk in the woods. Unfortunately, the day would soon become less than enjoyable.

A prescribed fire is planned in such a way that the flames are always traveling away from the lighters. This is frequently accomplished by way of topography. That is, you start lighting at the top of the hill and burn your way to the bottom. That way, the fire, which travels uphill, is always moving away from you. The people who plan prescribed fires, the Burn Bosses, also keep careful track of the potential weather and the prevailing winds. A strong wind can, of course, push a fire downhill—straight at the lighters. The perfect situation is to burn from the top down with a slight uphill breeze to help push the fire (and the smoke) away.

On this day, there were probably eight or ten of us burning about 100 or 120 acres. It was a lot of work and, as the day grew long, the wind started to turn against us. By the late afternoon, our smoke was not going, but coming. After a while, it became so dense that I couldn't keep my eyes open. The wind was not strong enough, or low enough, to push the flames downhill, but it was enough to hold up the smoke and put us in the middle of it. It isn’t easy to walk through the woods wielding a drip torch while keeping your eyes closed.

When we finished the unit, the Burn Boss told a bunch of us to jump in his truck and drive around to the top to see if we could get out of the smoke. Some of the younger guys had been using some goggle-type eye protection and they were still able to see. I got into the passenger side of the six-pack with my hands over my face while one of the young guys drove. For probably 15 or 20 minutes, the tears streamed down as I ground my fists into my burning eyes. I wasn’t sure how long it would take to see again.

After a while, resting in the clear air and setting sun at the top of the unit my vision slowly returned. We were in a meadow just below Powell Point, the place from which John Wesley Powell supposedly scanned the entire Grand Staircase—from central Utah to the Arizona Strip. It was a place for clear vision and long views. Finally, everybody cracked the Gatorade and snacks and we drove back down. There was laughter in the truck then, and a sense of accomplishment. Of course . . . you know what they say . . . any day in the woods is better than a day in the office.

Chinese Tree of Heaven

I was in the southern Sierra Nevada mountains during November and I went for a hike along the Kern River. It was a beautiful fall day and many of the trees were displaying colorful foliage. I was surprised, however, when I noticed a Chinese Tree of Heaven (Ailanthus altissima) growing there by the river. Soon I recognized that it was growing everywhere and that there were thickets of it springing up throughout the riparian area.

The Chinese Tree of Heaven, as the name implies, comes from central China. It is a root sprouter and prolific seeder with a foul smell, and it can quickly take over any disturbed area. According to the Plant Conservation Alliance’s Alien Plant Working Group, the Tree of Heaven was first introduced in North America by a Philadelphia gardener in 1784. It has now spread to at least 30 states and has become an obnoxious pest.

This is something I know well, because in Salt Lake City we once bought a house with an established Tree of Heaven population. I was unfamiliar with the species at the time, but I soon determined that it was an unwelcome part of the landscape. It sprouted everywhere, pushing up into the garden, cracking the foundation, and leaning against the wall of the garage. I couldn’t stop it. I cut it, I dug it up, I sprayed it. After a while, my vigilance allowed me to stay even with it, but I hardly dared go away for a weekend vacation. After that experience, I will not consider buying any property where it has an established presence. It is that bad.

Because Ailanthus altissima is a stump and root sprouter, it will not go away when you cut it. That is, you can cut down the clump of trees, but the clump will immediately re-sprout from the cut stumps and lateral roots. According to The Nature Conservancy, there is not much information regarding the use of herbicides to control the pest, though it may be effective in some circumstances. In Salt Lake, the only thing that worked was heavy cutting, followed by persistent pulling of small sprouts and seedlings, but this level of maintenance is clearly impractical for an area a large as the Kern River Valley. In that case, it is likely that the locals will simply have to learn to live with the tree.

The Chinese Tree of Heaven is an alien plant in North America that is quickly becoming an invasive pest across the continent. It is a prolific seeder and sprouter and can quickly colonize an area. It is an ugly tree with a foul odor and poor form. The best way to remove it may be simply to persist in cutting it and weeding it over the long term. In my own experience, moreover, the tree is improperly named. I mean, if they've got these things in heaven, I'd rather go to the other place.