'Pede meets plunger; Oak takes on chainsaw. . .

Its the season of destruction apparently. I should have posted this kill immediately after creating the previous blog, but I was very tired and ran out of blog energy. If you haven't seen this yet, it's a keeper. No explanation needed really - just watch it.




What did I do for spring break? Glad you asked, reader! I went to tropical Kansasville, WI to watch a 300+ year old oak tree fall. Think about that. This behemoth of a tree stood long before our country was even a country. That's some heavy shit right there folks. Naturally I got all art-faggy with my new digital camera I'm obsessed with. The video and pictures do need a bit of backstory.

I want to say the year was 1994 or 95. We have a ton (50?) trees surrounding the four acres of land we have. One stormy night, a bolt of lightning hit this oak tree, right in the middle. Unfortunately for the native foliage, it met it's demise. Years passed as large limbs fell to the ground. (This lightning strike also made my golden lab 'Sam' permanently afraid of thunderstorms. From that point on - the dog would literally piss himself every time a clap of thunder was heard 23 miles away. Sad really. I digress...) My grandfather, who lives in the house next door to me, was determined to cut down this tree, along with all the other dead ones on our property. Whatever. He knows a lot of people - and these people were gonna cut down the trees and take the wood - for free. Knock yourselves out.

Cue four middle aged men. Aged 45 to 70. The lead...er, chainsawer guy is named Mike. Mike is one determined boozehound. No lie - apparently days before I got home, this guy would would go up in a hydraulic lift 25 feet in the air with a chainsaw and a cooler with 10 beers. And, well...cut down limbs off this tree while suckin down some cold ones. In a matter of 2 to 3 hours. I can't think of a better combination really. Chainsaws and relaxed motor skills.

I won't go into detail of the process it took to take this tree down - it was a 2.5 hour debocle. A tension chain wrapped around a maple 25 feet away creaked & groaned more than the Oak did. It was almost comical.

Final tree trunk dimensions: Circumfrence: 21 feet. Diameter: 6' 1" Size: Frickin' huge.

Pics? Sure why not.

(About 30 feet away. Looks normal. But compare it to the trees next to it. Yeah)

(Really, really far away. I'd say 100 yards.)

(This picture is great. We got 4 guys slammin brewskis deciding how to conquer the beast)

(The tension chain strapped to the maple that I was blabbing about)

(Timber. Yeah...at 8:40 pm. Tough sum'bitch. The guy is holding the ROTTED inside part that was holding the tree up. Nature. It's magical.)

(Hah. My mom is 2 feet smaller than the diameter of the oak.)

I have video of the tree falling but it's kinda weak. That and youtube isnt working now. For future reference, my youtube page is http://www.youtube.com/hayjp20 . Seacrest Out!