How'd it go today?

Wokeup this morning, and when I get into the kitchen, I hear a crunching noise, and see the cats into something. They(the girl I'm sure) caught a frog, and the crunching was probably the leg that was missing :shudders: It was still twitching a little. I took it from them, and threw it outside.

Hotter than yesterday, so of course it was a good time to make grass shorter. Actually, it was an awful time to make grass shorter, but rain's coming later this week, and it was already longish. Mostly timothy poking up looking all hillbillyish. Sucked. Hopefully I get a break for a couple weeks. Should be going dormant soon.
 
Got lucky, as my son posted my job listing to his Instagram group. Got 2 landed so far, and potentially 2 more soon down the road. One is expressing an interest in climbing, driving my stick chip truck, and giving the middle finger to college to do this full time. Hoping he at least works out. The other will work through summer b4 heading back to Rutgers indoctrination. Both seem to be good kids, and we spent today doing driving F550 w/trailer, saw usage and knot training (too f'ing hot for me to climb anyway).. Hope they last longer than the last 2.
 
lxskllr said:
Wedges are cheap insurance.
Click to expand...
If my work in the same sort of conditions Austin is describing are anything like similar, there is simply too much cutting required in the day to waste unnecessary time with wedges on otherwise simple bucking scenarios...if you can read binds well :).

Smart saw work is far more efficient...in other words, in this situation, wedges are not cheap insurance :).
 
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The small diameters can bind as hard as the big ones and there isn't enougth room to place the wedge. Access to pound it can be a problem too, as in a bottom bind, a stack of trunks and the crushed crowns of the deciduous trees. A twisting fork is tricky too, even with a wedge already set.
Then, after the saw, you have to free the wedge. Not so evident, the tree can get you again with an axial bind for example.
 
I sold a crane job, good sized hollow oak over nine sets of wires and a 1800's cottage/hotel/condo building.

Short ish story:
So I got a call about a year and half ago to trim out this nice big cottonwood. About seven months ago the same tree was struck by lightning so we went out and cut out the damage traced the bark and made it look good and the tree seemed fine. So last week I get a call saying the tree doesn't look so good. The tree was cooked 90% of the trunk is loosing its bark and about a 6" wide strip is the only thing keeping one limb healthy. So now it's a removal, no stump, as the stump is growing abound three utility boxes but may come down to air spading out the entire thing, a massive area.
 
Burnham said:
Smart saw work is far more efficient...in other words, in this situation, wedges are not cheap insurance :)
Click to expand...
My boss has a farm drive that gets washed out every time it rains. When I get on his ass about fixing it, I get told it washes out cause the house next to built a swale that directs water to the drive. The swale's still there cause it's on someone else's property, and the drive still washes out. Identifying the problem is only the first step, and it sounds like Austin's gonna take care of it, assuming his man "gets" it(some people never do regardless of what task we're talking about), but in the meantime, wedging a cut is *much* quicker than freeing a trapped bar.
 
Burnham said:
If my work in the same sort of conditions Austin is describing are anything like similar, there is simply too much cutting required in the day to waste unnecessary time with wedges on otherwise simple bucking scenarios...if you can read binds well :).

Smart saw work is far more efficient...in other words, in this situation, wedges are not cheap insurance :).
Click to expand...
I'm lust curious how often you expert loggers get pinched in a day, week, or month. In my opinion residential workers are at a disadvantage in the sense they don't cut as many trees per day to stay on top of their bind reading skills. Then again, loggers have many more opportunities to get pinched. Where I work, most of the tree is already in relatively small pieces before anyone on the ground has to do some cutting. 2 days ago we were working on a huge fallen tree. The boss got started as I was sharpening a saw, and I finished just in time to find his saw in a bind and cut it free. I then cut the rest (90%) of the tree, and got pinched 3 times, freed by a machine since a wedge wasn't handy.

I thought I was doing pretty good, but I knew that there probably are methods I am not familiar with or fluent using that could decrease the chance of a pinch, especially if the bind is particularly hard to read.
 
If you're not sure, just slow down a bit and pay attention to your kerf. Most times, it will warn you before getting to the point of no return. I rarely use wedges, but I will stick a twig or two into the kerf if I know it's going to pinch.
 
Residential tree workers bind are way different than logger binds.

Most residential tree workers don't seem very proficient at using wedges for falling or bucking.
 
Mellow said:
If you're not sure, just slow down a bit and pay attention to your kerf. Most times, it will warn you before getting to the point of no return. I rarely use wedges, but I will stick a twig or two into the kerf if I know it's going to pinch.
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Key word: "most times"
 
I think I get a saw trapped a couple of times a week (where I need to cut it out) - depends on what I am cutting though, as when I was cutting young beech trees last year it seemed like every 10 minutes 😆
 
Got in an argument with the boss this morning. He wanted to go on his job, and I wanted to go to the new one in PA. They're calling for rain tomorrow, but typically, you can't say how often, or how much. Aside from me typically looking out for my client, it's stupid to drive to the other side of the world, and possibly get rained out. The job he wanted to go on is 10 minutes from the office. I won.

Hot as shit today. Heat's making me angry, and work's piling up. Got stuff to do around the house too, but it's too hot to do it. Only 13 weeks to go...
 
Nutball said:
I'm lust curious how often you expert loggers get pinched in a day, week, or month. In my opinion residential workers are at a disadvantage in the sense they don't cut as many trees per day to stay on top of their bind reading skills. Then again, loggers have many more opportunities to get pinched. Where I work, most of the tree is already in relatively small pieces before anyone on the ground has to do some cutting. 2 days ago we were working on a huge fallen tree. The boss got started as I was sharpening a saw, and I finished just in time to find his saw in a bind and cut it free. I then cut the rest (90%) of the tree, and got pinched 3 times, freed by a machine since a wedge wasn't handy.

I thought I was doing pretty good, but I knew that there probably are methods I am not familiar with or fluent using that could decrease the chance of a pinch, especially if the bind is particularly hard to read.
Click to expand...

Pinched in a bind that requires another saw or a machine to retrieve your bound saw? Well under half a dozen times a year...and most years, never.

And do not take my earlier post in this thread to mean I eschew use of wedges to protect against getting pinched...far from it. I never go into clearing fallen trees without a wedge in my pocket, and a falling axe at hand...I just don't need to use them very often.

Pinched so I had to yank on the saw a bit, or sometimes pound in a wedge to generate clearance? A whole lot more often than 6 times a year :D.

But I was never a day in and out production logger. My experience is more based on hazard tree felling and bucking, and storm damage clearance.
 
I could have freed my saw with a wedge or two, but the machine was working right beside me. They were "minor" binds between 500lb chunks that occurred when tripping the buck.
 
Burnham said:
Pinched in a bind that requires another saw or a machine to retrieve your bound saw? Well under half a dozen times a year...and most years, never.

And do not take my earlier post in this thread to mean I eschew use of wedges to protect against getting pinched...far from it. I never go into clearing fallen trees without a wedge in my pocket, and a falling axe at hand...I just don't need to use them very often.

Pinched so I had to yank on the saw a bit, or sometimes pound in a wedge to generate clearance? A whole lot more often than 6 times a year :D.

But I was never a day in and out production logger. My experience is more based on hazard tree felling and bucking, and storm damage clearance.
Click to expand...
Yup, most of the time you don't have the convenience of heavy equipment so you better plan accordingly.
 
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