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Outside Magazine October 2004

Outside's Guilty Pleasures
Lumber Whack
The sweet science of chopping a huge tower of wood

By Bill Vaughn


	Down, big boy: What is it about chainsawing trees that provides such a thrill? (Jeff Riedel)

FIRST I HUGGED THE TREE. Then I cut it down.

The hug was a supplication: Fall here, and not there; but whatever you do, please don't fall on me. My embrace confirmed that this ponderosa was the biggest pine I'd ever tackled. Nine feet around at my shoulder, it rose 170 feet, as true as the mast of a

I adore the power of the saw, the thunder of the fall, the triumph of bringing to earth something that's far bigger than I'll ever be.

sailing ship. Stored in its ten-ton body was enough energy to heat our house all winter.

As I plotted the epic crash of this colossus, my heart began to pound in anticipation. Although I pretend that felling a big tree is a necessary but regrettable task, in truth I adore the power of the saw, the thunder of the fall, and the sublime triumph of bringing to earth something that's far bigger than I'll ever be.

Back at the shop, positively giddy, I fitted a brand-new chain around the 20-inch bar of my Stihl Farm Boss saw. Then I bolted on the plate, used a screwdriver to ratchet up the tension, checked the reservoir to see that there was plenty of chain lubricant, and filled the fuel tank. I grabbed my safety glasses and earplugs and went to work.

The Stihl roared to life and bit hungrily into the ponderosa, spraying shavings with an eagerness that seemed feral. I guided the blade slowly through the lines I'd sketched with a marker on the rough plates of sienna-colored bark. To my great pleasure, these cuts produced exactly the notch I wanted, a foot-deep, foot-wide wedge all the way across the side of the tree, facing its landing site. Now that the path of least resistance was established, I fished out the wedge and moved to the other side for the coup de grâce.

I began making a deep cut aimed at the notch. At the moment of truth, when there issued from the tree an almost imperceptible shudder of forward motion, I pulled out the blade and escaped. The ponderosa hesitated, as if making some final decision. Then it surrendered to gravity and began its fall in an elegant arc toward the precise place I'd chosen for it. My cheer was drowned out by a boom that was four times louder than I'd expected, a primal whump that jumped from the ground straight into my brain.

Even before the tree's limbs stopped tossing in its final throes, I began to feel the regret of seeing a great thing leave the world. But this tree was doomed before I cut it down. It was infested with bark beetles, and if they didn't kill it, the meandering river would have taken out the bank around its taproot in a year or two.

Scattered all around the trunk were pinecones knocked loose by the crash. I gathered up a dozen and dropped them on the floor of the forest, far away from our reckless river, at a spot where the sun was shining through.

Next Page: When critters are getting eaten, I'll be there

Contributing editor Bill Vaughn is the author of First, a Little Chee-Chee (Arrow Graphics).

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