Opinions on re-doing a trident maple chop in late August.

[Dav4]

Thanks Ethan's Dave, well reasoned conclusion! Sounds like a great plan. Thanks for giving me an idea of a price range, that is surprisingly inexpensive for a tree that size I would have guessed st $500+ easily! I think you are correct that some of the challenges probably contributed to the lower cost of this one.

It seems everyone wants those perfectly shaped, winding tapered monsters you see come from Japan... I would love to have a tree like that myself too, but they cost thousands! Cannot wait to see where you take this one. Maybe I will get my S together and go txt he winter show myself!

Yeah, then we can visit the Growing Grounds together and maybe do some wheeling and dealing...and fwiw, I love these massive, gnarly trunked trees with all their scars and pimples as much as the highly polished 'no visible trunk chop' trees. There's something liberating in working on a tree that's already had the crap kicked out of it...sort of.

 

[Eric Group]

Yeah, then we can visit the Growing Grounds together and maybe do some wheeling and dealing...and fwiw, I love these massive, gnarly trunked trees with all their scars and pimples as much as the highly polished 'no visible trunk chop' trees. There's something liberating in working on a tree that's already had the crap kicked out of it...sort of.

True, they have character!

The fact you can usually get them for less than the cost of my car is just a bonus!

Sounds like a plan on the trip to the growing grounds... December is far enough away I might actually be able to make that happen. I wanted to make a trip to Nationals but that is too far, too soon and I am too busy! Studying for the series 7 right now and need to get that and the 66 passed before the end of Sept! No time for road trips till this winter! LOL

 

[Dav4]

A pleasant sight for me was seeing this one pushing new growth from all over the canopy a bit over a week ago. It clearly is enjoying the hot summer weather my back yard has offered, along with a bit of TLC from me.......... soooooooooo, I decided to do a bit of carving. The chop on the main trunk won't get touched until next February, but the chop on the secondary trunk is just as UGLY, and needs a lot of work. The main reason I felt comfy working this one now is that there's much more foliage in that area to assist in healing. Anyway, here are the pictures. I'm relatively new to carving on deciduous trees so I'm still refining my technique and style and I suspect this is just the first installment for this one.

 

[Dav4]

The finished product. All the cut edges were sealed. I hope to do a bit more work on a few other stubs this week and will post more pictures after the leaves fall.

 

[vicn]

The finished product. All the cut edges were sealed. I hope to do a bit more work on a few other stubs this week and will post more pictures after the leaves fall.

View attachment 117429 View attachment 117430 View attachment 117431 View attachment 117432 View attachment 117433

So many questions....When you carve in this fashion, are you cutting back to live wood? Just carving for a pleasing shape? Why carve in so deep? Won't water collect in there? Or do you treat the inside of the hole?

 

[Eric Group]

Whew boy you did the damn thing didn't you Dave!? You must have passed that beaver off!!

My experience with carving on Maples and D trees is limited too, because any time I have done it, the wood became soft, "punky"and rotted away quickly. Not ideal. I'd hit it with some wood hardener or something if you don't want that to happen! I have decided I am just not gonna do it much any more. Maybe a nice hole here or there, but fancy carving, big gaping wounds... Just haven't worked out well for me.

Perhaps olives are an exception to that rule! But Elms, Maples, CM... All heal wounds so fast, I fine a nice diagonal or flat smoothed out cut can normally be healed in under a season for holes not much smaller than these! Obviously it is all about your plan and vision for the tree, but that is my experience.

I am watching with interest to see how this turns out.

 

[Dav4]

So many questions....When you carve in this fashion, are you cutting back to live wood? Just carving for a pleasing shape? Why carve in so deep? Won't water collect in there? Or do you treat the inside of the hole?

Whew boy you did the damn thing didn't you Dave!? You must have passed that beaver off!!

My experience with carving on Maples and D trees is limited too, because any time I have done it, the wood became soft, "punky"and rotted away quickly. Not ideal. I'd hit it with some wood hardener or something if you don't want that to happen! I have decided I am just not gonna do it much any more. Maybe a nice hole here or there, but fancy carving, big gaping wounds... Just haven't worked out well for me.

Perhaps olives are an exception to that rule! But Elms, Maples, CM... All heal wounds so fast, I fine a nice diagonal or flat smoothed out cut can normally be healed in under a season for holes not much smaller than these! Obviously it is all about your plan and vision for the tree, but that is my experience.

I am watching with interest to see how this turns out.

The chop I worked yesterday was over 3 inches wide and was at the end of a section of trunk with little taper. If you look at the picture, you can see the different shades of wood that was carved...the dark brown wood at the surface of the chop is weathered and beginning to deteriorate. I really had two options here-1) Create another flat chop that "might" get me some taper and perhaps try to heal the chop site over (this one would be almost as obvious as the first chop as the scar would always be visible), or 2) Create a more natural looking transition to hide the old chop site and make that trunk section less telephone pole straight. Anyway, my work was done to add taper and interest that hides the fact that this one was chopped straight across several years ago. Most of the wood that was removed was heartwood, though I did carve a fair amount of live wood to get the taper I was looking for.

I have a few thoughts on the idea of rotting wood and it's impact on our trees. The thought that one can prevent this from happening is misguided. You can treat it with hardeners and fungicides that may slow it down but nothing can keep exposed wood from rotting eventually...and that's ok. There are plenty of old trees, both in pots and in the woods, with rotted out, hollow trunks that do just fine. The main chop on this one already appears to have deterioration below the surface and I suspect that if I own this tree long enough the main trunk will end up hollowed out, too. I don't plan on treating this one with anything, though I may use my micro torch at some point, but not now. One last thing...whenever I create a hollow or depression in a branch or trunk where water might collect, I always drill out the bottom of the hollow to allow the water to drain. In some instances, that might mean drilling through the center of the trunk into the soil. In this case, I connected the hollow to the outside by drilling through the stump of a smaller dead branch on the tree's front at the base of that secondary trunk. It's not obvious at the moment, but will likely become enlarged over time, either in a natural fashion, or because I'm wanting to create a uro there to enhance the design.

Stay tuned, more to come!

 

[Eric Group]

The chop I worked yesterday was over 3 inches wide and was at the end of a section of trunk with little taper. If you look at the picture, you can see the different shades of wood that was carved...the dark brown wood at the surface of the chop is weathered and beginning to deteriorate. I really had two options here-1) Create another flat chop that "might" get me some taper and perhaps try to heal the chop site over (this one would be almost as obvious as the first chop as the scar would always be visible), or 2) Create a more natural looking transition to hide the old chop site and make that trunk section less telephone pole straight. Anyway, my work was done to add taper and interest that hides the fact that this one was chopped straight across several years ago. Most of the wood that was removed was heartwood, though I did carve a fair amount of live wood to get the taper I was looking for.

I have a few thoughts on the idea of rotting wood and it's impact on our trees. The thought that one can prevent this from happening is misguided. You can treat it with hardeners and fungicides that may slow it down but nothing can keep exposed wood from rotting eventually...and that's ok. There are plenty of old trees, both in pots and in the woods, with rotted out, hollow trunks that do just fine. The main chop on this one already appears to have deterioration below the surface and I suspect that if I own this tree long enough the main trunk will end up hollowed out, too. I don't plan on treating this one with anything, though I may use my micro torch at some point, but not now. One last thing...whenever I create a hollow or depression in a branch or trunk where water might collect, I always drill out the bottom of the hollow to allow the water to drain. In some instances, that might mean drilling through the center of the trunk into the soil. In this case, I connected the hollow to the outside by drilling through the stump of a smaller dead branch on the tree's front at the base of that secondary trunk. It's not obvious at the moment, but will likely become enlarged over time, either in a natural fashion, or because I'm wanting to create a uro there to enhance the design.

Stay tuned, more to come!

Good info, and so true on the rot! It WILL happen, we can only slow it down, but some trees happen faster than others for sure!

 

[Dav4]

 

[Dravantree]

cool tree

 

[Dav4]

cool tree

Thanks.

 

[Giga]

Nice root movement - My trees are pushing there fall growth right now too

 

[Dav4]

Nice root movement - My trees are pushing there fall growth right now too

I was happy to see this one push like it did. I'll feel more comfortable when the real work starts toward the end of next winter.

 

[Dav4]

So, I pulled this one out from under the deck to begin selecting and cutting back the existing branches. Mind you, one week ago it was 15f in my back yard and this was frozen solid until Wednesday or Thursday.

 

[JudyB]

Oh my.

 

[Dav4]

Soooooo, the sap is rising.....and that means it's time to redo the ugly chop.
I broke out the die grinder for this and it made short work of the job.

The grinder got away from me for a split second, but that's all it takes to put an ugly wound where you don't want it. I'm sure it'll heal and just add a bit more character to the image, so

There was a fair bit of punky wood to remove, but I was able to do it. The edges have been sealed, and I applied some pc petrified to the brown wood at the center. Once it dries, I'll cover the rest of the chop with paste.

There's still a bit of reverse taper but I think so far so good. There's a bud at the very top of the chop that hopefully takes off to be the next apex. Root work in a month, assuming it really doesn't start to push sooner, then let 'er rip in the grow box.

 

[dirk hoorelbeke]

i like it. What is PC (petrolium gelly or something?). You must love those early springs...

 

[Dav4]

i like it. What is PC (petrolium gelly or something?). You must love those early springs...

PC Petrifier, http://www.pcepoxy.com/our-products/wood-repair/pc-petrifier.php is the brand name for a water soluble wood hardener product. I used it to stabilize that wood at the center of the cut with hopes that it'll be covered by rolling callus in 3-4 years

 

[dirk hoorelbeke]

Thank you.

 

[Dav4]

Sooooooooo, it was 72 f today and I had the day off......





4 weeks early