Another Dead Red Oak

[Jere39]

Still cutting the dead 100 year old Red Oak in the woods behind my house. Don't know exactly why they are dying, have heard several suggestions, not sure I put a lot of faith in any of the ideas. But, it leaves me with a ready supply of firewood for processing.

It's plenty cold, and the ground is snow covered. Great weather to saw another down and haul it out of the woods.

I made a video of this one, it's about 30" across at the cut height, so I had to saw from both sides with my Dolmar PS-510 and 18" bar.



I started bucking right away, and took this still picture after I ran out of gas (saw, not me this time).

 

[c5rulz]

Looking good Jere.

 

[zogger]

Came off that stump nice!

And just goes to show..it ain't the saw in the cut, it's the cut in the saw....getting a nice roostertail of chips in the last felling cut there!

 

[mdavlee]

Still cutting the dead 100 year old Red Oak in the woods behind my house. Don't know exactly why they are dying, have heard several suggestions, not sure I put a lot of faith in any of the ideas. But, it leaves me with a ready supply of firewood for processing.

It's plenty cold, and the ground is snow covered. Great weather to saw another down and haul it out of the woods.

I made a video of this one, it's about 30" across at the cut height, so I had to saw from both sides with my Dolmar PS-510 and 18" bar.



I started bucking right away, and took this still picture after I ran out of gas (saw, not me this time).

Nice job. My only suggestion is get you a hard hat to wear while you're out there dealing with those dead oaks. They can drop a big limb out on you easily.

 

[fuzz1500]

Nice cuttin ! Sorry to hear you are loosing Oaks . Thats a bummer

 

[ash man]

Nice job felling that big red oak.

 

[Whitespider]

Don't know exactly why they are dying...

Likely one of two fungal diseases (or maybe both), both of which kill relatively quickly...
1) Sudden Oak Death (Phytophthora ramorum)... normally the trees will have cankers that bleed a dark ooze. Sudden Oak Death started on the west coast and has been steadily marching eastward. It is here in Iowa, I'm not sure if it's as far east as you yet.
2) Oak Wilt (Ceratocystis fagacearum)... does not make cankers. Oak Wilt has been around a long time and infects trees throughout the US... once it gets into the root systems it can kill whole stands of trees.
Both can be spread through root systems and/or insects... The Northern Red Oak is particularly susceptible to both.

Google them...
*

 

[farmer steve]

nice vid jere. cut about 10 like that here in york co.not sure whats killing them ,but both things spidey said i have heard of from some loggers in our area. great firewood for sure.

 

[Jere39]

Likely one of two fungal diseases (or maybe both), both of which kill relatively quickly...
1) Sudden Oak Death (Phytophthora ramorum)... normally the trees will have cankers that bleed a dark ooze. Sudden Oak Death started on the west coast and has been steadily marching eastward. It is here in Iowa, I'm not sure if it's as far east as you yet.
2) Oak Wilt (Ceratocystis fagacearum)... does not make cankers. Oak Wilt has been around a long time and infects trees throughout the US... once it gets into the root systems it can kill whole stands of trees.
Both can be spread through root systems and/or insects... The Northern Red Oak is particularly susceptible to both.

Google them...
*

I haven't noticed oozing on any of the Red Oaks, but the Oak Wilt sounds like a strong probability. Thanks. It seems the woods regrows with Birch and Beech. Not as majestic, though several of the Beech are nearly as big as some of the largest Oaks now.
Thanks for the comments.

 

[flyboy553]

2) Oak Wilt (Ceratocystis fagacearum)... does not make cankers. Oak Wilt has been around a long time and infects trees throughout the US... once it gets into the root systems it can kill whole stands of trees.
Both can be spread through root systems and/or insects... The Northern Red Oak is particularly susceptible to both.

Google them...
*

Back when I started cutting firewood, some 35 yrs ago, the first woods I cut in was an 80 acre red oak woods. The landowner had sold 40 acres of the woods to the University of Minnesota. Those numbskulls, in their infinite wisdom, intentionally injected oak wilt into their portion of the woods. This of course, killed the entire 80 acre woods, which I promptly turned into firewood. Once that stuff gets in to a woods, it is almost impossible to get rid of until all the oak is gone. Just ask the UofM! BTW, they had to pay for the other half of the woods, by the tree! Old farmer made out like a bandit on the money end, but was screwed out of a nicely wooded lot!

Ted

 

[cnice_37]

A lot of dead red oaks here too, I've been told it was the gypsy moths.... but who knows

Nice fell, do you go back and drop that stump? There's a day + of heat left on there!

 

[Chris-PA]

Well, I have lost many red oaks lately, but most were uprooted by storms. I suppose the roots could have been weakened by disease, but likely seeing that is beyond my knowledge. They looked OK.

My guess is that probably 60% of the red oaks in my woods are Shumard Oaks, with only 40% being Northern Reds. It took me a long time to figure out what was different about them - I had one of each right off my front porch, both large. It's only some times of year where there is much difference. During the Halloween storm a couple of years ago the shumards had lost more of their leaves and so the northern reds took more of a beating.

 

[c5rulz]

Nice job. My only suggestion is get you a hard hat to wear while you're out there dealing with those dead oaks. They can drop a big limb out on you easily.

I agree.

I would really suggest looking UP when that tree is getting close to coming down. Everything that can hurt you is above.

 

[Jere39]

A lot of dead red oaks here too, I've been told it was the gypsy moths.... but who knows

Nice fell, do you go back and drop that stump? There's a day + of heat left on there!

I will, I often cut a stump lounge for future rest stops

 

[c5rulz]

Scout is looking mighty handsome there Jere.

 

[CTYank]

Superstorm Sandy blew down many Northern Red Oaks around the CT/NY border. Some were simply uprooted, especially in areas with shallow soils. Many big ones snapped at or about the root flare, with lots of "tunnels" in that area. Red Oak Borers, I'm told.

 

[Jere39]

Back today "Fisker-izing" a couple loads

 

[c5rulz]

On big rounds of oak like that, I find the Fiskars works better if you "slab" off the outsides squaring the center, then work towards the center rather than trying to split through the center at the beginning.

 

[Dirtboy]

Nice video, enjoyed it.

 

[Jere39]

On big rounds of oak like that, I find the Fiskars works better if you "slab" off the outsides squaring the center, then work towards the center rather than trying to split through the center at the beginning.

I don't like to run the Fiskars with my rounds on the ground, and I couldn't lift these rounds. So, I used my old maul (it's laying there on the stump) to split them in half, then I could lift them onto one of the bigger rounds and do the serious Fiskar-izing.

The maul often took me three whacks, working across the diameter to halve these rounds, no big thing for a serious Timber Sports team member like me.