Althouse: The Arborist.

March 14, 2011

The Arborist.

Video'd this morning, from inside Meadehouse. You can hear a bit of me and Meade talking.

19 comments:

Harry said...: At first I thought that was Meade up there. I know he's manly, but not that crazy.

We used to have a great tree guy who did a lot of work for us--a very fit guy in his fifties. Eventually he fell 40 feet out of a tree and decided to retire. All his parts still work, fortunately, but not as smoothly and confidently as they did earlier.; 3/14/11, 3:58 PM
TML said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 3/14/11, 4:01 PM
TML said...: That's one big-ass tree. How does it fill out in the Spring and Summer? Dense? And, of course, what kind of tree is it?; 3/14/11, 4:03 PM
Ann Althouse said...: Oak tree. Many pictures of it over the years on this blog.; 3/14/11, 4:08 PM
Meade said...: White Oak.; 3/14/11, 4:12 PM
TML said...: It's as curvy as a lot of the Central Coast scrub oaks near my moms house in Los Alamos. Though much larger, obviously.; 3/14/11, 4:21 PM
PaulV said...: White oak makes good furniture. After carpenter invaded I have to have mine cut down. Fortunate as Isabel hit that Fall and it would have fallen on house. Big tree and a lot was still good enough to use in a timber framed house.; 3/14/11, 4:23 PM
PaulV said...: White oak makes good furniture. After carpenter invaded I have to have mine cut down. Fortunate as Isabel hit that Fall and it would have fallen on house. Big tree and a lot was still good enough to use in a timber framed house.; 3/14/11, 4:23 PM
Carol_Herman said...: Meade is still a boy who loves to climb trees.; 3/14/11, 4:33 PM
Michelle Dulak Thomson said...: Prof. Althouse,

What have you got there? A maple of some kind? I ask because we have two trees that look very like that (apart from the fact that they have the ubiquitous layers of moss you get in Oregon) out back of our house in Salem, and we've just been wondering if they need trimming and, if so, how the hell you'd do it. I never dreamed they'd be climbable (for that matter, what with the moss, maybe they aren't.)

Ours, at least, are stronger than they look, even with all those skinny, wide-flung branches. We've had a combination of saturated ground and high winds for a few days, and we got home from a Trader Joe's run Saturday to find that a neighbor's massive tree had pulled right out of the ground and across the street, though it was passable by then (someone was rendering it into manageable lengths with a chainsaw).

But that was a pine, and you could see that the root ball didn't provide much leverage at all, it was so small relative to the tree. Our maples have roots almost as wide as the crowns, and I don't think they're going anywhere. At least, they'd better not, because they're damn big.; 3/14/11, 5:00 PM
Michelle Dulak Thomson said...: Oh, sorry. You and Meade said oak twice. My bad.

Some other neighbors had arborists butcher the absolute hell out of a tall pair of birches right across the street from us. I suppose they know what they're doing, but to the naked eye they didn't really leave anything that looks likely to generate, well, leaves. I grew up in gypsy-moth-infested country; bad things happen when trees don't have anything to photosynthesize with.; 3/14/11, 5:05 PM
rhhardin said...: Arbor macht frei.; 3/14/11, 5:07 PM
Unknown said...: He may know what he's doing, Ann, but say a little prayer anyhow.

One place where I worked, the guy who trimmed the little trees in the mezzanine missed his grip, fell, and broke his pelvis.

PS Arrgghhhh, rh; 3/14/11, 5:46 PM
ken in tx said...: You can eat white oak acorns. Boil them like chestnuts, to get the bitterness out. Peel them. Then roast them with butter and salt. Most acorns are too bitter for this to work. White oaks are different.; 3/14/11, 5:50 PM
michaele said...: Mature oak trees are living works of art when they have been well groomed. That one looks like it has been on the receiving end of excellent care. But, yowsa, it gives me the heebie jeebies to watch that video. That guy is so high up.; 3/14/11, 5:56 PM
Wally Kalbacken said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 3/14/11, 6:50 PM
Wally Kalbacken said...: When I last lived in Madison, we had a tree that split in a storm. A huge tree. I faced the choice of buying an industrial grade chainsaw and getting some exercise or hiring an arborist/tree surgeon/extirpator. I call some fellow and he comes over, entirely presentable and seemingly very confident. I point out the next door neighbor who has just spent $000's to create an elaborate Japanese garden on the opposite side of the fence (well within the falling radius of the tree.) Main instruction: do not let anything land in the neighbor's yard.

Appointed day arrives, I leave for work before the tree folks show up, when I get home I see that the three stooges of tree removal (none of whom was the guy who sold us on the work) are there - rough hewn fellows wearing flannel shirts, cursing up a storm. They have pared back the tree to a 35 foot central trunk and have a rope tied about 20 feet up which is being balanced by a guy on the ground pulling on it, as if to influence it to fall in the opposite direction of the neighbor's yard. Another of the team's experts uses a chainsaw on the base.

Of course it ends up in the neighbor's yard and crushes the garden and the fence. The salesman for the tree service comes back, apologetic as hell and gives us a blank check to be completed when the damages are calculated. I give the check to the neighbor, he calculates the damages about a week later, completes the check, and it bounces. Doh!; 3/14/11, 6:55 PM
The Dude said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 3/14/11, 8:28 PM
Silviu said...: Wow!That looks very dangerous!; 3/15/11, 9:22 AM