Marling a pine

[pantheraba]

Or is it "mauling" a pine?

I got a referral call late Friday afternoon to go look at a "small pine tree broke off at about ten feet that is leaning in another pine tree and might fall on the shed we built last year."

I loaded a bunch of gear Sat. afternoon and took the 45 min. drive to check it. Ends up it was a pretty good description. The tree was still attached where it broke...it had been dead quite awhile, the owners just didn't realize it until it broke.

I secured the base to a largish poplar about a foot away and went topside to secure the top, too. I took a large CMI block, tenex sling and 9/16 stable brain up. First I used a piece of 11 mm static line to secure to top to the big pine that was supporting the broken tree. There was not much pressure on the bug pine..apparently there was still a lot of weight on the stump. I was concerned the stump might break and let the tree get loose.

Picts 4 and 5 are how the tree was supported topside.

 

[treesandsurf]

That shed is nicer than a LOT of places I've lived. Nicely done Gary!

jp

 

[klimbinfool]

Cool! looks like you at least had some good rigging points to work from.

 

[stehansen]

Looking good. It's been a couple of years since I had a suitable neighbor tree to rig from.

 

[pantheraba]

The leaner was pretty small and rotten at the top so I dropped down about 15 feet and attached the bull rope there. I was concerned that whenever the tree let go (either as planned by me or before I could get back to finish it) that I might end up with a comminuted fracture in the top section (with bone that is when you get a pulverized, many fractured sections of the bone).

Thus, the marl. I cloved several sections for about a 10 foot span of the top to try to contain some of the pieces if it did comminute.

Today I went back in between thunder storms and finished taking it down. I used a portawrap to hold the tree up, used a belay at the butt, about 3 feet above the fracture point to secure and then belay the butt once I cut the but free below the fracture point...I had a block on the nearby poplar to redirect the butt and contain it from swinging toward the shed. I also put a pull rope about half way up to keep tension on the trunk away from the "shed" (really a very nice storage shed that the owner's wife had designed as a school project and had him build).

I made a face cut towards the supporting pine, slowly made a back cut until the tree moved just a little then got away from it. I used the pull rope to ease some pressure on the trunk and was able to trip the cut into breaking slowly (kinda ).

The butt dropped down to where it was barely resting on the ground as it took the stretch out of the bull rope. I then made butt cuts, lowered the trunk down 4-5 feet to the ground again, repeated as necessary until I had a piece about 20 feet long that I could pull out horizontal away from the target and lay it down.

Luckily it all worked as planned (which is NOT the norm for me...Murphy was around some but not like normal)...my question is about the marl (I am calling it that...I know that a marl is often a type of hitch [maybe half a clove?]).

Since I was concerned about the top busting up on me I was kind of "making it up as you go" to try to contain a possible mess.

Is there something else I could have done?

Have any of you rigged pieces like that to contain dead wood (I remember the trick from Jepson's book) and did it actually work?

It seemed to me that a standard marl would have turned pieces loose if things went south...any experience with using clove hitches like this?

Zoom in on the first picture below to see the cloved sections.

 

[pantheraba]

Cool! looks like you at least had some good rigging points to work from.

Yah, JP, to me a shed is 4 poles and a tin roof...or scrap plywood...this guy's definition of "shed" is pretty upscale.

10-4, Greg on rigging points. The big pine it fell into was wonderful...I got a line up and was able to climb the back side where I felt sheltered in case the tree cut loose as I climbed. It was real stout topside with big, strong limbs to work with. I took down 2 biggish dead limbs (maybe 15 feet long, 5-6 inch diameter that the owner hadn't realized were directly over the "shed".

They have a lot of nice trees..almost too many. I had trouble finding a hole to shoot my throweight through to get a line set.

 

[pantheraba]

Looking good. It's been a couple of years since I had a suitable neighbor tree to rig from.

Hahaha, that's no fun...you need to get out more, bro.

 

[Old Monkey]

Remember that if you have good enough branches you can set a retrievable rigging point to save yourself some climbing when you are done.

 

[pantheraba]

Remember that if you have good enough branches you can set a retrievable rigging point to save yourself some climbing when you are done.

Yep, I wanted to do that but didn't have another long/strong rope to dedicate to that...could've used another bull rope.

 

[gf beranek]

Nice style, Gary. Right on job.

 

[MasterBlaster]

Never enough ropes, ha.

Excellent handling of a tough situation!

 

[lumberjack]

Nice work, Gary.

Regarding the marl is an overhand knot tied around the stem. If it busts apart the knot is still there and can hold onto the pieces. A half hitch is quicker to unti, but it'll drop the pieces as you mentioned since it's only a turn in the rope*.


*With weight lower on the rope and if the piece is long enough not to flip over, the half hitch can hold a piece. Like when rigging down pine limbs, for example.

 

[Blinky]

Well done. I hang a lot of trees.

 

[CurSedVoyce]

Well done Gary...

 

[klimbinfool]

Looks like you took the necessary precaution. Is the blue rope attached to the bull line and pine incase the upper portion detached ?

 

[No_Bivy]

next youll be buying a GRCS....good one Gary....

hows the fam?

 

[Blinky]

I want a GRCS!

 

[pantheraba]

Looks like you took the necessary precaution. Is the blue rope attached to the bull line and pine incase the upper portion detached ?

Precisely, Mr. Sharpeyed Discerner...trying to cover the bases I could think of.

Roger on the GRCS...I would have liked to pretension the rope so that gravity wouldn't have to do it for me. It looked like a perfect spot for the GRCS.

Family is good, John...thanks. Hayden is still our main focus, keeps us hopping.

He was helping Alex today dig out a big sweetgum stump...used a backhoe and chainsaw to loosen it and a firetruck to dump the stump. I'll post video later.