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.