Happy Valentines Day, Girlfriend of PU. You're invited to come tomorrow if you want. We'll put you on the earth end of the zipline and me and your guy will be aerial zenmen. We can do lunch. Bring chocolate!
The pine is a 42" DBH white pine that's about 110 feet high. It's limbs are so long and overextended that they have begun snapping under their own weight. Only 4 or 5 have done so, and no damage has happened below. However, the resultant growth acceleration in other parts of the tree has resulted in a LARGE number of limbs approaching their breaking point. All are big, and if they're not big, they're at the top of the tree, way up in the stratosphere.
the clients wanted the tree down because of fear of it falling over on their house to the northeast and the next house to the north. The bulk of the limbs are north and east. There's a slight lean to the northeast, and prevailing weather usually blows east or northeast. The tree is only 10 feet from that house, so the majority of the crown is over the house.
Our mission, if we choose to accept it, is to prune in every single limb on the tree, and selectively remove some limbs in the really dense areas completely. There is a fence and a house and a basketball goal below, so most need to be roped down. Also, since most are overextended and extremely weighty and ready to snap under their own weight, walking out on them is rather precarious, dangerous and downright stupid. The low cuts need to be made 15-20 feet out from the trunk and the upper ones 8-12 feet out. Since walking out on them is asking for trouble, and the tree is not accessible by bucket, and most all the limbs need to be rigged down, this presents us with a most interesting positioning/rigging/cutting problem.
It should get hairy up around 80 feet because that's where it gets the thickest, densest and most overest the house. Other than getting pitch all over the ropes and gear, I live for this kinda technical situation.
Would you like to climb it with me? You can be right where it all happens and we'll team up on the rigging. I have to reserve the 'going out there and doing the cutting and lowering' because, well, because that's what I so very love to do.