When tree's fight back

squatting dog

squatting dog

We don't have as far to go, as we've already been
Location
Arkansas, and also Florida
Ouch...
Laid up in bed right now with a leg swollen to twice it's normal size. :( Long story short, went out yesterday to cut down a dead 60' tall hickory tree in my lower meadow. All went as it started to fall where I wanted. Then, it gave a slight twist and hit a smaller tree next to it. When it did, about 6' of the top broke loose and landed on me just as I started to turn away. Crawled to my tractor and drove back to the house and I've been icing it up ever since.
I don't think it broke any bones, (didn't see any protruding anyway) (y)cut the side of my leg a but, it's sure going to leave a huge bruise.
Looks like my wood gathering is on hold for a day or three. :)

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I've had similar experiences, several times, over the years. I cut down several dead trees in our forest, every year, to feed our big outdoor wood furnace. At least 1 out of every 3 or 4 seems to fall on an angle differently than I expected. I've learned to clean an area around where I'm cutting, and formulate an "escape plan" if it falls wrong. So far, I've managed to avoid getting in trouble, but I remain Very Cautious when chainsawing. I did have a big branch hit me in the head, once, and it knocked my helmet off, but I survived, and this served as a good reminder to Never "assume" that the tree will fall as expected.
 
fuzzybuddy said:
Trees are devious critters. Do you really think this was an accident? This was a tree bite. Thankfully trees haven't yet learned to swallow. Do you really think all those drunk drivers are hitting trees by mistake? No, it's trees attempting to bite us. In the ocean, the killers are sharks. On land, it's killer trees.
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Ahhh, that explains the tree that got me so many years ago. (snicker). :) :D

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StarSong said:
Is you any better today, @squatting dog?
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A little. Thank you for your thoughts.
Ice has brought down the swelling a little. Hurts like hell, and bruised a bit, but it's not the worst that I've been hurt. (does that make sense?) :D The scrape looks worse then it is.
I figure about another week or 2 and then I'm going to go back and hack up the killer tree. :)
Thinking about it last night, I realized how lucky I was that this limb missed hitting my head by inches. More proof God love's a fool. (y)

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RadishRose said:
Jeeze, that looks terrible. Go to a walk-in clnic for an xray, please.
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That's going to be next if I don't feel better in another day. (did I say how much I hate doctors?) Only time I've been to them was when I'm leaking blood. At least now though I can go to a closer hospital and the VA will pick up the tab.
 
We lived in an apartment complex in Santa Ana, Ca. Both our husbands were stationed at Camp Pendleton. Both had been in Vietnam. Both had been in field hospitals. Both had been transferred to Hawaii (my husband had been blown off a tank, no flesh wounds just back issues, concussion, probably TBI. Don’t remember her husbands issues.

Anyway like most vets that have been in a field hospital they HATED doctors. (He was, in the early years, a downright baby about it.). So, one day she comes over and says that her husband had hit his leg getting off a truck. Ok. It did not seem to be healing. Ok

Then she says that she has to use tweezers to pick the green stuff off his leg and out of the wound. Holy hell. Would I come look at it? Nope. Put your idiot husband in the car and take him over to the ER at the navy hospital in Long Beach. (Closer than Pendleton)

He won’t go, she says. Well, he can go to the doctor or he can lose his leg. He has gangrene. As I look back on those early days, it seems I was always telling other wives how to deal with their husbands. I was as young, stupid, and ignorant as the next person, but my husband was a sergeant.

If there is nothing wrong, waiting does not hurt. If there is something wrong, you could get in deep trouble really fast. But, as I told her, it’s his leg if he wants to carry it around in his duffel the rest of his life, that’s his choice.

He went. Saw the doctor. Yup, gangrene.
 
squatting dog said:
went out yesterday to cut down a dead 60' tall hickory tree in my lower meadow. All went as it started to fall where I wanted. Then, it gave a slight twist and hit a smaller tree next to it. When it did, about 6' of the top broke loose and landed on me just as I started to turn away
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Been there
I use cables now

Still...a bit risky

Leg gets worse, get an x-ray

Too bad we can't x-ray trees before we cut
 

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