Dead Standing

Barber chair:

Anyone else starting to get afraid to go back out into the woods!

Yeah, I read up on barber chairs a couple months ago. Seems as though most of them occur when the tree has a decent amount of lean to it or the tree is loaded pretty heavy on one side up top. Putting a load on the tree with a truck, etc., can also cause a barber chair. There are also felling methods to help prevent a barber chair from happening. I would have to read up on them again before even attempting to deal with a leaner or top heavy tree, but I believe you make the face cut, then two relief cuts on the side, then cut the back cut quick but leave a hinge to direct the fall.

At this stage of the game though, I would probably leave any dangerous tree like that alone unless it was on my property and it HAD to come down.

I've had a few barber chairs over the years,none too severe thankfully.When a big one goes,it sounds like a 30.06 going off & you tend to run like Hell!! You do what needs to get done,always use proper techniques/safety procedures & dont take any uneccessary risks.

There's been some jobs I've walked away from,waited for mother nature to bring it down or used other means to bring it down however.

They call them ''widowmakers'' for a very good reason....

So is Barber chair a tongue-n-cheek colloquial expression for a bad cut?
As in bad hair cut. I understand the split thing..and I dont mean to be splitting hairs here. But Im trying real hard to make the association between a barber chair and a split tree. Or a badly split tree.
My dumb hick guess is there is none.

I'm thinking it is because, in less extreme cases than pictured above, the piece sticking out into the air looks like a barber chair leg rest, and the part still connected to the ground looks like the post holding the barber chair up.

Okay got it. A tree that splits and remains attached to the stump. Or there abouts. But like I was thinking the wood is usually under tension of some sort. Thanks Shane...great pics!!

I see AccuWeather is calling for wind gust to reach 60 mph on Wednesday night, that would take the tops off of some of that dead standing.

I'm hoping they are high on that.

That is serious wind Zap

I agree Chief. The bark that is on the bottom of that tree and the way it is splitting and crazing up the side say elm. Zap the elm that grows in forests is alot easier to split than the yardbird/open field trees. If it's elm, that's a good wood. It's ready for the stove by the looks of it!

A barber chair is when the tree starts to fall and all of a sudden the trunk splits, usually at the same plane of the trunk as the hinge.. the length of the split is unpredictable nd it can literally slap you into next week... that is assuming the tree didn't suddenly lurch backwards and crush you. One of the most dangerous situations you can come across (besides a standing dead bull pine) is a windfalled tree with the roots still attached... there are so many ways it can kill you... it's hard to catalogue them all...

Yeah them 2 wheelbarrows of snags is alot of wood to some.

I have a few more in that area, maybe on Saturday I can grab some for us. If we get that wind they are calling for I might have some bigger stuff down.

With the big melt going on tomorrow...add some high winds it should be a very interesting day.

I always wanted the Cherry with the heavy lean but worry about it barber chairing, maybe this wind will take it.

This should make for an interesting early morning/day tomorrow, we're in the 50-59 mph zone.

It's supposed to get windy here too but probably not as much as up there! I'm looking forward to a walk in the woods this weekend to see if mother nature has provided me more wood on the ground.

*gives Zap "the look"*

you know, you should always have a second person around when dropping trees, for safety's sake. Many times when I hear of a cutting death it's because someone was pinned for hours cuz they were alone. I have very few "wife rules" (you know, like the honey do list, but rules instead, lol) and on the very absolute top is no cutting unless someone else is there (I don't care who-me, a friend, a neighbor, the property owner-just SOMEONE, with access to a phone or car, preferably both). And that goes for dropping trees or cutting ones already down, even though we have saws with chain brakes, you just never know.

I agree and cut under the same conditions from my wife....

dayam.... I've never seen a tree that small do that...

Come Monday I'm putting Stihl to a great big standing dead water oak in a clearing on the edge of our woods. Very accessible, even with my truck. It's only been dead a couple of years, due to our killer drought in 2011. A lot of the big limbs have already fallen off. I'll use extreme care, and a hard hat, when working on the tree. Good thing about standing dead... while the trunk may still need two years or so to dry (once it's split and stacked) the limbs in the crown could very well be ready to burn 'right now.' Especially those which have already broken off and are on the ground. Even the part of the crown still attached can be burnable right away.

I'm guessing the main trunk, which is too big to reach around and goes straight up close to 30 feet before there are any branches, will still be pretty wet. Typical for water oak. I love water oak because of the very straight grains, especially in the trunk. Makes it very easy to split, even by hand, but will be easy-peasy with my Huskee 35 ton. I haven't had the MS390 out in many months and I'm looking forward to some winter time wood work. I'm at least three years ahead now and I'm guessing I'll get a cord just out of the trunk on this one- maybe more. So, I'll be set for at least four years.

Be safe out there.

I just talked with my neighbor, the wood in pic 100 6732 I posted was a touch punky but he said it coaled up nice, I thought it was basswood after loading it. Does elm leave nice coals?