ROLLACOSTA
Addicted to ArboristSite
110' redwood,yep we do have them over here,most don't get any bigger due to lightning hits
What's The Tallest Tree You've Climbed
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NickfromWI
Addicted to ArboristSite
280' in a redwood. "Just" a rec climb a few years ago.
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treebogan
ArboristSite Operative
bit over 200foot removal
Be a bit over 200foot on removal,in B.C,the tree was on a hill and we couldn't get a propper reading off the 'Clino".Sport climbed some big ol girls on the Queen Charlotte Islands in B.C.250foot maybe?Any wind firming guys on the Charlottes have any more of an idea?
Be a bit over 200foot on removal,in B.C,the tree was on a hill and we couldn't get a propper reading off the 'Clino".Sport climbed some big ol girls on the Queen Charlotte Islands in B.C.250foot maybe?Any wind firming guys on the Charlottes have any more of an idea?
arboralliance
ArboristSite Operative
E. regnans
Bout 10 year ago got called in to climb (on spikes as they were to be felled within 5 years) for seed recovery of E regnans at 1100 meters altitude as they had run out in felled coupes (so about a 2 hour drive to the nearest town, middle of nowhere)...
E regnans is altitude sensitive...
With groundy and two ranger's headed out to an old logging area logged 65 years earlier (so regrowth) and fought my way into the cold climate rain forest understory that towered above me with mid story Acacia melanoxylon towering above it then the regnans towering in the upper story, found a tree thin enough to get my 10 foot steel core pole strap around after free spiking 15 odd foot up the buttress...
Got maybe 1/2 - 2/3 rds the way up this smaller tree and leaned right out to check how much of my 150' rope was on the ground as I was gonna choke just below the bottom branch on the way down SRT and flick the rope to release and drop to the ground after descending; finally after looking and fanning my rope I glimpsed the tail some 30+ feet off the ground so had to be 180'+ where i was and still 30 below the lowest branch!!
Went bought 400' ropes (7mm static abseil for abseiling double and resetting on lowest branches to make ground, get a good 20 -30 foot stretch near ends on way down to make extra length from that long a rope) and headed back in with extra 10' steel core pole strap linked to other 10' to give 23' of me (harness) and pole straps...
Still had to climb up buttress's to get pole strap around with help from groundy and unique techniques, carried secateurs to cut away the bark after "walking" around the tree at height intervals as it would build up over the pole strap (a_loppa would know of the long tough stringy bark that hangs off the giant regnans)...
My groundy was a scientist doing some "outdoors" work, he estimated the trees to average 280'...
From my ropes I knew I was climbing to 300'+ as I always had to reset my ropes from the top. (I would go so far as to say i may have been getting up to 320') The tops are where the best and most seed was and you had to keep the trees alive so couldn't sit back 30' - 40' from the top and scarf them out so I went right up and cut the seed out with secateurs where the trunk (apical leader) was 2- 3 or so inches thick, I would literally lead climb above an attachment point 15' - 20' from the top, with my rope set below me in case the leader broke out under my weight and touch the very tip of the tree...(Cant remove the apical leader from regnans or they die).
When the branch-lets would fly to ground in the rain forest sometimes they would just sail away and we couldn't find them; when the wind blew up I would hum a little mantra about being a koala and close my eyes as I could reach out and touch the crowns of other trees more than 60 feet away they would sway so much as of their height and the strong wind; I wasn't so much scarred more numbed by it...
One day I only climbed one tree as it was on the edge of the track and had gargantuan limbs that were near impossible to climb around or over but i did some dumb ass free climbing at 170' up with my rock climbing techniques and some hand and arm jamming and heel hooking...
One day I actually climbed 5 trees as 3 I could access by swinging out after dropping down about 150' from the very top and jumping out 40 or so feet and whipping my pole strap around the trunk of next tree and then onto the next after doing that one but the avg was 2 - 3 a day...
My groundy went to grab my kit bag without chainsaw and made this woeful grunt one day and swore he would never give me grief about only climbing 3 trees a day as he could hardly pick up the software I carried up the top let alone the chainsaw as well (was using SRT 5 hole gold whale tail on descent to dissipate heat)...
Sometimes i would stuff up and set the rope too high in a branch so jump out to the top of a black wood or musk tree and down climb or abseil out of it, sometimes if I got within 20 - 30' of the ground, well, rain forest floor is like a big soft mattress, hehehe...First time i did that groundy came climbing, crashing and scrambling through the forest floor debris yelling at me thinking I had fallen and swore he would never come out again if I did it again; made sure he was not watching from then on...
Heaps of stories from out there...
And to think they were only 65 years old and less...
The stuff grows like grass...
Mmmhh, memories, limb walking at 250' feet on a "low" branch with the ground below...
Ah to be young again...
p.s. Came out of this monster one day, had got heaps of seed out of it, was awesome, get to ground and rope wont come out, try all tricks in the book for nearly an hour and then decide to flick the 20'+ pole strap around and climb back up the 200'+ to un jam it from the bark in the fork i set it in, was about 35c middle of summer... And yes, some horror stories also...Its good to finally write about it...
Bout 10 year ago got called in to climb (on spikes as they were to be felled within 5 years) for seed recovery of E regnans at 1100 meters altitude as they had run out in felled coupes (so about a 2 hour drive to the nearest town, middle of nowhere)...
E regnans is altitude sensitive...
With groundy and two ranger's headed out to an old logging area logged 65 years earlier (so regrowth) and fought my way into the cold climate rain forest understory that towered above me with mid story Acacia melanoxylon towering above it then the regnans towering in the upper story, found a tree thin enough to get my 10 foot steel core pole strap around after free spiking 15 odd foot up the buttress...
Got maybe 1/2 - 2/3 rds the way up this smaller tree and leaned right out to check how much of my 150' rope was on the ground as I was gonna choke just below the bottom branch on the way down SRT and flick the rope to release and drop to the ground after descending; finally after looking and fanning my rope I glimpsed the tail some 30+ feet off the ground so had to be 180'+ where i was and still 30 below the lowest branch!!
Went bought 400' ropes (7mm static abseil for abseiling double and resetting on lowest branches to make ground, get a good 20 -30 foot stretch near ends on way down to make extra length from that long a rope) and headed back in with extra 10' steel core pole strap linked to other 10' to give 23' of me (harness) and pole straps...
Still had to climb up buttress's to get pole strap around with help from groundy and unique techniques, carried secateurs to cut away the bark after "walking" around the tree at height intervals as it would build up over the pole strap (a_loppa would know of the long tough stringy bark that hangs off the giant regnans)...
My groundy was a scientist doing some "outdoors" work, he estimated the trees to average 280'...
From my ropes I knew I was climbing to 300'+ as I always had to reset my ropes from the top. (I would go so far as to say i may have been getting up to 320') The tops are where the best and most seed was and you had to keep the trees alive so couldn't sit back 30' - 40' from the top and scarf them out so I went right up and cut the seed out with secateurs where the trunk (apical leader) was 2- 3 or so inches thick, I would literally lead climb above an attachment point 15' - 20' from the top, with my rope set below me in case the leader broke out under my weight and touch the very tip of the tree...(Cant remove the apical leader from regnans or they die).
When the branch-lets would fly to ground in the rain forest sometimes they would just sail away and we couldn't find them; when the wind blew up I would hum a little mantra about being a koala and close my eyes as I could reach out and touch the crowns of other trees more than 60 feet away they would sway so much as of their height and the strong wind; I wasn't so much scarred more numbed by it...
One day I only climbed one tree as it was on the edge of the track and had gargantuan limbs that were near impossible to climb around or over but i did some dumb ass free climbing at 170' up with my rock climbing techniques and some hand and arm jamming and heel hooking...
One day I actually climbed 5 trees as 3 I could access by swinging out after dropping down about 150' from the very top and jumping out 40 or so feet and whipping my pole strap around the trunk of next tree and then onto the next after doing that one but the avg was 2 - 3 a day...
My groundy went to grab my kit bag without chainsaw and made this woeful grunt one day and swore he would never give me grief about only climbing 3 trees a day as he could hardly pick up the software I carried up the top let alone the chainsaw as well (was using SRT 5 hole gold whale tail on descent to dissipate heat)...
Sometimes i would stuff up and set the rope too high in a branch so jump out to the top of a black wood or musk tree and down climb or abseil out of it, sometimes if I got within 20 - 30' of the ground, well, rain forest floor is like a big soft mattress, hehehe...First time i did that groundy came climbing, crashing and scrambling through the forest floor debris yelling at me thinking I had fallen and swore he would never come out again if I did it again; made sure he was not watching from then on...
Heaps of stories from out there...
And to think they were only 65 years old and less...
The stuff grows like grass...
Mmmhh, memories, limb walking at 250' feet on a "low" branch with the ground below...
Ah to be young again...
p.s. Came out of this monster one day, had got heaps of seed out of it, was awesome, get to ground and rope wont come out, try all tricks in the book for nearly an hour and then decide to flick the 20'+ pole strap around and climb back up the 200'+ to un jam it from the bark in the fork i set it in, was about 35c middle of summer... And yes, some horror stories also...Its good to finally write about it...
