The problem and the solution

A large oak tree lived in the woods behind the shop, behind the chicken coop.  For years it has lost a limb here and there.  Of concern were two large branches which threatened  beak and feather but because of their size, because they would need to be climbed to be cut and because we like living on the edge the branches lived on.  The garden has expanded and yet the branches loomed, until Monday, bloody Monday.  We hired a tree service that has a bucket truck which could do the cuts rather than having to climb.

It actually was awesome I expected someone in a bucket with a saw, ropes, many men and many hours.  Instead I don’t think it took an hour, no bucket, no ropes, only two men, a joy stick kind of controller and a claw that reminded me of my wayward youth spent at the county fair trying to use the crane to grab a prize.  He would make the cut then use the claw to carry the branch over the heads of some very freaked out chickens and set it down near the driveway.  All of this was great.  When he came out to give a bid we thought we heard, for x dollars I’ll cut those branches and clean up.  What we  got was for x dollars I’ll cut those branches.  No problem it’s done! It wasn’t on my list of things to do this week but still no problem.

The tree service left the trimmings in two different piles rather than one big pile close to the driveway, I think it worked out for the better.  Dividing it up made it easier, at least for me, to get in there with the clippers and cut off as many small branches as the clipper could handle.  Normally Bill would do this with the chainsaw or I would do it with the hand loppers.  This past spring Bill bought the Dewalt cordless power pruner and I laughed at him.  I’ve used them a few times and they are nice but this was the real test.  I was able to power through all the trimming on the pile by the driveway in less time than it takes for a husky to get bored.  Yesterday I went out and tackled the larger pile up on the hill AND got the first load in the trailer and the second load staged before the husky got bored.  Here are my thoughts:

• I admit to no longer being 20 and a little bit of arthritis has creeped into my life.  Being able to just pull a trigger and cut through branches is amazing.
• I broke my arm earlier this year and have been babying it until my brand new bone gets here.  Not having to use that arm to make the cuts was huge.  It would have taken me a lot longer to work through those piles if I had to keep taking breaks because my arm hurt.
• It makes the work so much quicker.
• There are limits to the size of the branch you can cut.  I can cut larger branches with my lopper.  I found that about 2″ is the limit and then I have to work through it a little bit at  a time,  If the branch was already dead it cut much better.  It wasn’t a problem I just needed to keep moving the blades into the cut and then cutting again.
• They aren’t heavy but they aren’t light either.  You have the weight of the tool plus the weight of the battery.  I was able to do it all in one go and my arm was fine.
• Battery life could be an issue but I got through the pile and still had battery life left.  Since we have multiple tools that use this same battery we have multiple batteries and keep two on the charges at all times.
• If there is a safety I’m not sure where.  If you accidently get a finger in the blade you will no longer have that finger.  Like any tool you have to be aware and keep safety in mind.

Would I recommend this tool, YES!  Holy cow YES!  Am I sorry I laughed at Bill when he bought it?  Yes, but don’t tell him.

It took me minutes to make that pile look like this.  The only reason I stopped there was my cart was full and I had another pile ready to go.  Plus I started to worry that this was like Kerplunk adult edition.  I was standing on or in the pile cutting.  Some of the branches were holding up the larger pieces and when I made my cut shifting occurred.  I decided it might be better to wait and let Bill come through with the chainsaw to deal with the bigger pieces before doing any more trimming.

Also I love my lawn cart. Maybe it makes me weanie, but not having to use the wheel barrel or carry everything one arm full at a time makes things so much more effective.  My only regret is that when we made the garden we did not have the space to allow for driving the tractor and cart.

Speaking of the garden now that the looming limbs have been lopped we can start construction of the larger greenhouse.  We always thought that to have any kind of greenhouse there would need to be a significant cost involved.  The plan had been to use cattle panels to build one until we found on Amazon a kit for just over $100.  We bought a small one for up by the house to put the herbs in and a large one for back in the garden.  The small one is built, it was under $100 and went up in two days.  Most  of that time was spent prepping the area where it was going to go.  They are cheap and who knows how long they will hold up but what fun to be able to try them out.  At the very least we can see if we even like having them without a huge investment in time or money.