Worked on some land clearing today for my friends' cat kitten rescue. A new facility, owned by the non-profit, rather than rented, as it has been for a long, long time, will be built for her, compliments of donors, and a rich woman with a lot of money to spend. She gave it to her, 7 nice acres, earning a tax write-off. One big pacific yew, one medium yet, and a few small yew. Very slow growing understory trees that produce that anti-cancer compound that is now synthetically produced...taxol, IIRC.
The Ogre was awesome. Hardwood cleanup with an Ogre is fast. Our conifers seem to demand more stacking, but still way, way less work. I moved the chipping piles to where the shade was, rather than what was close. Moving the chipper around with the Ogre was sweet, as we chipped back around a big cedar. A low tray feed height was wicked nice.
This western redcedar was around 44" dbh and 80', with four main leads. The inclusion was split from 20' to the ground, open a foot or more.. I did a vertical reduction of about 50%, cut up the tops to look like break outs at various heights, with some big branches to develop into new leaders, a couple nice reiterant tops preserved down low in the canopy. Popped each lead in one shot. Used a different technique for a boring back-cut. I couldn't get my 16" bar all the way across the 20" trunk, nor could I access the far side due to the next leader. I bored one side of the backcut, plunged through the facecut, then used that gutted-hinge kerf to plunge through the facecut to the far-side backcut to set my hinge. Then, finished boring the backcut, leaving a back strap. A final check of how the branches crossed each other, and being clear of my rope, released the backstrap. An odd situation, but it works. It could work for ground felling, as well, if due to slope drop off, another tree being in the way, or whatever. Odd.