The Lumberjack Bill Show: Axin' Hemlock

Hi, I'm Lumberjack Bill.

On today's segment, I'll show you what to do about a tree that falls across your path.

Amblin' along a Deerwood trail yesterday, I happened to lean against a tree trunk and it moved. "That tree's gonna fall soon", I said to myself, "better get it down now".

So, after pushing the trunk this way and that, I realized the only way the maze of hemlock branches from surrounding trees would let the dead hemlock fall is right across the trail. Well, that's the way it's gonna go then, I figured.

With a big push and a "TIMBER!" the dead tree dropped to the ground.

The next challenge was to get it off the trail. I'd just stowed the ATV away and didn't feel like lugging the chainsaw all the way to that spot in the forest, so I decided to break out the ol' axe and do this job the old-fashioned way.

I went to the far side of the trail and started to chop angled cuts on one side of the log while standing on the opposite side for safety.

With one side chopped, I switched to the other side. and chopped that. I didn't take more than five minutes to chop through the soft, decaying wood.

You can see in this close up how the log end was half cut and half smashed through with the axe owing to the partially decayed state of the wood.

The last thing to do was lift the cut tree section to one side of the trail and job done.

REMEMBER gang, an axe is a dangerous tool. Never touch, carry, or use an axe unless you have received expert instruction in its use and understand all of the life threatening accidents an axe can cause.

Until next time, this is Lumberjack Bill saying, "Good luck and be ready".