Ok Here's my quick list:
1. No helmet
2. Two points of tie in when running the saw!
3. TWO HANDS ON SAW!
4. Snap cut for blocking down small to medium sized wood (Notch and pull line or notch and block with bull line for larger)
5. Keep yourself in the cut zone, meaning use the saw from your shoulders to waist if possible. It keeps your face out of the kickback zone.
6. Your notch is terrible. Please practice BEFORE you're up in the tree. 45 degree top cut and flat bottom cut. Make the bottom first, set your depth by the 1/3 rule or one of the other many commonly followed notch depth rules. Meet with the 45 on top and you'll be fine as long as you make that back cut a little above the bottom cut.
7. DONT LEAVE STUBS. They are BOUND to screw you up. You have spikes, a lanyard, and a climbing line. You CAN get down.
.....did I miss anything?
Mike Platt
1. yes, that was covered
2. i think i aswered this one already, but yeah I think I'm just on my flip line there, but throughout the job I always tried to tie in in more than one place.
3. can't argue that one. in some cases i had to use a hand to grab onto something cause the trunk would swing after dropping the weight of the limb.
4. are you suggesting for this job or just letting me know? i'm assuming you're suggesting as this would be considered small/med size wood.
5. i can see you're really on me about that pic with the horrible notch. much is wrong there.
6. yes i know. i do much better notches than that. look at my last pic of the stump. it doesn't say much for my notch but nice hinge wood can give you an idea. in this particular case i was opting for more of an open notch so that there would be more control over the fall as the notch closed.
7. lol... yeah i learned that by now. but don't misjudge me on using stubs as a crutch to get out of a tree. i left the stubs to give me options as i worked my way down. they also came in handy as something to push/pull on to right myself in the before i made a cut cause the tree had some lean. for the record i used to do recreational rappelling. spikes or not, getting out of the tree is easy.
Thanks for all your commentary. It is exactly what I was looking for and need. I didn't post these pics to be macho.