Tree Felling Advice

[crazy4saws]

Hey everyone, This is my first time posting in the logging forum but have done alot of reading here on the site along with posting in the chainsaw area. I cut wood for my OWB regularly and have a modest assortment of saws.

My question is how do I locate an experience feller/logger in my area who is willing to show me tips/pointers on felling trees? I've read many posts about people asking for advice on tree felling and many say to just go and ask a local logger. I've tried that with little success. I believe they think I'm going to steal their work or they don't want to waste their time, or possibly they don't want the liability.

My goal is to be able to fell trees properly and know what I'm doing with larger ones when I'm cutting fire wood. Im not pursuing this to make extra cash. To me the best experience is hands on with someone who does it everyday and my goal is to be as good as I can at felling.

I've watched many videos online, read different articles and tried to implement them while I'm in the woods but I still don't feel I'm educated enough on it. Ideally it would be great to work with a logger when he needs help.

So what do you guys think? Is this weird for someone to ask local timber fallers for lessons or training in return for free help on a job? Are there other options out there for learning to fell trees? Any and all I out is appreciated. Thanks guys
By the way I'm located in northeast Indiana.

[gww]

When I cut fire wood I always pick on the trees that are leaning so bad that there is no question on which way they will fall.  I think now that you mention it I am going to watch a couple vidios and see if I can learn anything.

Sorry, I can't help you cause I need help myself.
gww

[beenthere]

Good that you are looking for some help to add to your tree felling talent.
But the response that you mention from asking a local logger is probably well based... time, liability, results, etc.

Don't know the circle of friends that you have access to, but they can offer good training examples.

Finding a course in felling, such as the Game of Logging (GOL), would be my best suggestion.

Very hard to just go with someone that is willing to show you how to fell trees, and get much more than a few examples. Every tree is just a bit different, IMO, and knowing the basics of what you are removing with a cut, and what you are leaving, along with reading the tree all go together. And even then, the trees have a mind of their own and don't always do what you very carefully plan for them to do.

Keep enjoying the wood cutting, and cover yourself well with protection and if at all possible, work with a buddy to share ideas, thoughts, and help each other out of the jambs that you will get into.

And to gww, some of he biggest trouble trees for a beginner are ones that "lean so bad", as they are the ones that can barber-chair and knock your head off or similar trouble.

[Ron Scott]

Ditto! and I would also recommend "The Game of Logging" course for starters.

[treeslayer2003]

well said been there. op, there is no way i could explain or even show you what to do in every situation. how ever a good grasp of basics is a solid foundation. other than that us loggers learn every day, there is no such thing as an expert, no one knows every thing. there are several styles of falling and every one has an opinion.......i prefer directional falling wich is odd in this part of the country. if you can sort of befriend a logger, that would help you alot, i would be skeptical of a strange dude asking to come out. far as helping him, leave that out and just ask for a lesson.

[gww]

beenthere
No doubt and it is probly worse that most of them were already dead.  I have been luck and am nervous everytime I cut a tree of any size.  I only recently ever tried notching and trying to direct the fall at all.  I have hung several up and kept cutting peices off it untill it falls on tis own or is light enough to drag.

I have gotten in some situations but I really don't know how to get it done but to just go do it and try to use what common sence I have (?) and do my best.

I used to have rentals and could never make myself give some one a couple hundred bucks to take down a tree. 

I don't want to deal with a widow maker but usually get it done some how.  I can't believe I lived through my teens much less this long and it isn't because I am smart.

I have spent a quite abit of time in the woods but I really haven't felled that many trees for being in my 50s and cutting as much as I have.

I am watching this thread just for the kind of advice like you just gave.
Thanks
gww

[wfcjr]

Courses & hands on are definitely the ideal approach.

At the same time, one reference that I have found enormously helpful is a book called
"To Fell A Tree", by Jeff Jepson.

[treeslayer2003]

far as books, check DDent's books. you can apply the same principles even though you may be dealing with smaller trees.

[Spartan]

Here's an idea.  Find someone to go with you for safety...  Find some relatively simple trees to start out with (ones that do not have a lot of surrounding things for obstruction, and ones that look sound as well)  Do some practicing.  Take along a video recorder and have your buddy take some videos.  Then, post them on a forum with fallers on it and ask for a critique.  Fallers LOOOVE to critique falling.  Might be the next best thing to getting someone to go out and show you something.

Just an idea.

[treeslayer2003]

Here's an idea.  Find someone to go with you for safety...  Find some relatively simple trees to start out with (ones that do not have a lot of surrounding things for obstruction, and ones that look sound as well)  Do some practicing.  Take along a video recorder and have your buddy take some videos.  Then, post them on a forum with fallers on it and ask for a critique.  Fallers LOOOVE to critique falling.  Might be the next best thing to getting someone to go out and show you something.

Just an idea.

lol

[crazy4saws]

Thanks guys, there are a lot of good suggestions that you posted. I'm going to check out the books to fell a tree and DDents stuff aswell. GOL is something I looked into several months ago. However most of the classes where held several states away. I also read that the GOL method used to fell trees isn't what the pros do and thatnits a waist of time. From what I've read this is how GOL has you fell trees: face cut, then plunge cut the back cut, clearing out the middle,leaving a few inches of holding wood in the very back, when ready to drop tree simply cut the holding section out. I could be wrong as I have not attended the classes but that's what I've been told they teach.

Personally I like this method as it allows me to check my hinge thinkness and make sure everything else looks good before cutting the holding wood. correct me if I'm wrong please.

I might try the video recording suggestion aswell and get feedback that way. I watch these guys that cut day in and day out and they make it look so easy. True they do this every day and at some point had to learn the basics.
Thanks again for all the comments. I'll post back with a video as soon as I can.

[beenthere]

The GOL will give you the basics, and plunge cutting is just one of the ways they teach felling trees. So don't prejudge the importance or lack of when it comes to learning the basics of cutting down a tree. GOL isn't the only way, but for anyone looking to do better felling trees with less risk to themselves and the material things around them when felling, then GOL is the course I'd recommend.
I felled trees for years with some learning as I went (only one in Forestry Summer camp who would fire up the old Homelite EZ gear drive and saw up ponderosa pine for camp wood and it was my first time holding on to a chainsaw), to working with loggers felling trees all over the Western states, Alaska, and hardwoods in the East (all who had years of experience but didn't talk about how they were going about the felling of those trees) to permitting the originator of GOL Soren Eriksson to use my woods for a demonstration of his felling techniques back in the 70's. Then I had the opportunity to take a GOL course (4 days) and learned even more. Probably still have a lot to learn as every tree is different and seems all have a mind or a twist of there own.
If you have the desire to learn, then seek out a GOL and I don't think you will be disappointed. And probably will get it done faster than trying to find a logger to teach you.
I suspect a lot of tree fallers do their falling second nature and don't even think about the individual steps they do automatically between the time they walk to a tree and have it on the ground.

Update your profile with your location and we may be able to find you some help close by.  ;)

[Holmes]

  You  are close on the GOL description. You would insert a wedge before releasing the back , drive the wedge in tight  release the back cut  then drive the wedge in some more til the tree starts to fall and walk away at a 45 degree angle.

[Ianab]

You might not use the GOL technique all the time. Personally I think it's overkill for a straight forward tree felling. Conventional notch and back cut / wedges work just fine 95% of the time. BUT there are times when it will really save your bacon, especially on tricky forward leaning jobs.

So what  you want to work on is recognising when you have a hazardous tree, and have a selection of different methods in your arsenal to tackle them. And learning and practising those methods on a regular tree is the safest way to get familiar with them.

[CCC4]

I personally would not want someone with me trying to learn to cut. I had to teach myself, and that is the way it really should be. Best way of learning is screwing up and living through it. Just because I say don't do this because of such and such....doesn't mean you are going to fully grasp what can happen until you have it actually happen. Does that make sense?

I guess books can be decent for learning the basics maybe, however...the book may say this and this "SHOULD" happen...well that doesn't mean a dang thing in the real World...stupid crap can happen in the woods...and it does on a daily basis.

I full time fall and find myself "Sport Falling" a lot when I'm waaay ahead of the skidders. I'm not one to take much advice on say so alone...I need to see it. Therefore, with me throwing different styles and tricks at given situations, I have a better idea of what might work and where I can apply it.

Thing about watching videos, the faller in the video may have 20+ years under his belt, he may be reading something about that tree that you won't pick up from the video...therefore, if you try and copy what is going on in the video...you could get yourself hurt by not knowing what the faller is actually looking at, why he is doing what, and why he is using that particular cut in that particular situation. Make sense?

[John Mc]

CCC4 makes a good point that a video probably won't pick up on all the subtle things that the person cutting can see easily with they are doing it in person.

There are some good youtube videos out there, and some really bad ones. The trouble is, if you don't already know the stuff, you may have a difficult time telling who are the ones who know what they are doing, and who is just lucky.  (You can have the same problem when asking a friend to give you pointers: if you are not already experienced at this, how do you judge whether someone knows what they are doing?)

GOL does teach some good techniques. I got a lot out of their courses (I took levels 1 through 4, plus "storm damage clean-up"). As important as the techniques shown is that it's an organized course: someone has put a lot of thought into not just how to get a tree down safely, but also into how to get that information across to someone who is not familiar with the techniques being demonstrated. Yes, there is no substitute for experience, but getting some sort of organized, formal training is a good way to get a jump on some of that experience.

[luvmexfood]

I have watched about all the YouTube videos I can find by searching. The ones I put the most stock in were the one's that had BC something in the title. A series of them. Some of the others are good but if the guy presenting the video does't wear safety gear I sort of discredit it from the get go.

Huskvarna has a video that is about 45 minutes and I watched it but don't remember much about it. One thing that has helped me if I cut a tree and things don't go exactly as planned is to go back and look at the stump. Hinge thickness, height of backcut above face cut etc. Sometimes it's pretty obvious what you did wrong.

I bought the book Professional Timber Falling by D. Douglas Dent. It was ok but some of the diagrams were a little hard to follow.

[Phorester]

I once participated in a shortened one day course based on GOL which we had arranged for our fallers on our forest fire crew.  We had one full-time logger on our crew taking the course.  He was politely and openly derisive of this falling method throughout the morning, since he was the "expert" and "knew more" than the instructor.  But he did listen and cut a few trees following the instruction.  By the end of the day he was converted and 20 years later (still working on his first Million dollars as a logger  ;D ), still uses this method for felling trees. In other courses I've witnessed or help teach, most of the criticism I've heard about GOL, directional felling, etc.,  comes from people who are "experts" and feel threatened by the possibility that their method used by them for years and taught by their Daddy will be proven to be not as effective or as safe as these "new" methods.

As has been stated, it's not for every tree, and I think it's used more in the South and East than out West.  Hardwoods, with all their different leans, tapers, big limbs, are not as straight forward to fell as are those tall, straight conifers.

A full course is not short or cheap.  And it should not be short.  Whenever you stick a chainsaw into a standing tree you become a logger, no matter how little experience you have.  And that's one of the most dangerous occupations in the USA.

The S212 wildland chainsaw course we require as a minimum to operate a chainsaw on fires is a 40 hour course, and limited to 20 participants with an instructor for every 2 - 4 students.  One day in a classroom, 4 days cutting trees. Covers everything from chainsaw maintenance through felling and bucking methods. Then you become a Faller "A", and can progress up to Faller "C" category with experience. It is not a course for professional loggers where you are trying to maximize timber volume and log quality from a tree. It is to learn to cut trees safely on forest fires.

I'd suggest taking a GOL course the first chance you can swing it.

[John Mc]

Since it looks as though there are no GOL classes out your way, you may need to pay a visit to one of us in the Northeast? (Hard to justify the trip just for that course, but if you have an excuse to come out here anyway, you could do it while you are here). Check out Northeast Woodland Training If you are going to be out in the Vermont/New Hampshire/Eastern NY area.

There are probably forest landowner organizations out your way that could steer you towards some good safety courses, or perhaps a state or county forester would know some places in your area offering good training. Around here, a lot of the "career centers", adult education, or tech schools offer courses from time to time (most of them just contract with the GOL trainers in our area to teach the course). Maybe one of these types of organizations in your area does something similar?

[CCC4]

Phorester, you have a very valid point. I would love to attend the wildland chainsaw course and get certified "C" faller course.

I know you weren't directing at me, but I would like to just through it out there that my Dad wasn't a logger...he was actually top 10 in the Nation female pelvic cancer surgeons...no falling info coming from there! ! 

...but I understand what you are saying

[Puffergas]

In the 80's dad and I took the GOL courses and they were well worth it, at least we thought so. Give your local ag  or forestry office a call to see if there is a local forestry land owners organization and join it. They sometimes have short courses but you will meet other land owners that might be more willing to help you.


Work save and enjoy,

Jeff