The Curse of the Black Cherry! (lake, water, wild, tractor)

[BrokenTap]

I have never seen this before...I was cutting firewood for my cousin in a spot pretty isolated from the rest of the farm. 25 years ago my father and I had cut some wood out of there but we have not been back since. Well I looked at this big cherry tree and could not believe what I saw. My Dad had apparently tried to fell it 25 years ago. He made the notch, made the back cut, but the tree must have pinched his saw. He must have got the saw out, but the weird part is...the tree never fell over. Typically in high winds they will eventually fall towards where you wanted them to go. But not this tree and it was not dead either. I can't believe it was cut all but an inch through (the hinge wood) and yet never died. Well I set about changing that, but never in my wildest imagination did I think it would be cursed.

So I cut a small off-shoot off from it (an 8 inch diameter little tree) and the tree falls behind the stump and makes twitching it out impossible. So I back my tractor up in this awful wet hole, boulder strewn forest to try and push it with the bucket. Its a very tight fit but I move it from behind the stump, then drive ahead to try and winch it out with my tractor's winch, only to have it slip back behind the stump when I go to tug on it. 3 TIMES THIS HAPPENED and it was not an easy place to get my tractor into!

Then my shoes laces came untied as I tried to work the bigger section of the tree...the tree my dad tried to cut 25 years ago. I slipped in my unlaced boots since I was on a big moss covered rock bruising my knee. Now keep in mind, not one lace...both boots. Odd but hey stranger things have happened to me like hitting a sheep while felling a tree...but we have all heard that story and I digress.

Now I am getting really upset. Now typically I don't talk to trees but today I let that rule go and I flip the tree off, then tell the tree what a daughter of a swamp its mother was and how she was nothing but firewood and that is all this tree will ever be. Feeling pretty cocky, and with a snarl to my face, I fire up the ole 046 Stihl and rip right into its heart. "Take that you cantankerous useless pile of photosynthesis." It falls to the forest floor with a thud and I think I got the last word with her. Hardly! (It had to female because only they tend to make loggers the most annoyed and never give you the last word.)

Oh no, not so. The tree was too big to be hauled out by my little tractor so I had to cut the tree in two. Wouldn't you know it, the tree pinched my saw. It was so bad I had to take the tractor, back into that wet hole, boulder strewn area again and push the tree over so I could dislodge my saw. And guess what, it took three tries to do that before it was finally hauled out.

All in all it took two tries at felling spaced 25 years apart, 6 strong attempts to get the tree pulled out of the woods, two untied laces and a bruised knee, one stuck saw, and one hour of my time...all for one tree. I guess it shouldn't surprise me that Halloween is 3 days away...that tree was cursed! [SIZE=1]
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[ki0eh]

I do trail maintenance work with a volunteer group. One time our folks were out in a park and the ranger wanted our group to take down the rope swing tree beside the lake. Well we did what we were told - but at one point we had three (3) saws stuck in the tree at the same time. All the while a crowd of personal watercraft was assembling and booing. For some reason, we haven't gone back to that park in a while...

[kshe95girl]

Maybe the tree just wasnt ready to give up the ghost?