Stalking Tree Cutters and Midnight Scrounging

[BamaScroungr]

On a semi-annual basis, municipal crews trim tree limbs around the power lines in my neighborhood. They also cut down entire trees, apparently by request. They started cutting a couple days ago, and I've been stalking them.

So if a bucket truck is paired with a chipper truck, forget it--I'm not getting any of that wood. But apparently there are more bucket trucks in the fleet than chippers. So what they'll do is trim a tree, or even down one, and leave all the wood until a separate crew comes around to pick it up and take it to the dump.

So my first day stalking, my first potential scrounge (a few good logs of beech) is thwarted by one of those dump-truck-with-a-crane vehicles arriving just minutes after I get there. So I keep driving around and looking. By the end of the day I've managed to score about eight six-foot lengths of pecan from two different trees, ahead of the collection crews. I could have gotten more, but thought, "Screw it, I'll come back tomorrow."

Well I should have gotten out of bed earlier, because the rest of the pecan was gone when I came back today. But I did manage to score a few logs of mulberry. I continue to search the neighborhood, following the power lines, and find nothing more. So be it. I'm happy.

Just tonight, around midnight, I'm walking the cat (he follows me, actually) and come across some more mulberry about a block from my house. There are two eight-foot-long, eight-inch-diameter pieces in the pile that are too long to fit in my car. Well, by now I know better than to come back "tomorrow" and I'm only a block from my house, so I heft one heavy ass log over my shoulder and hike it to my front yard, then do it again.

Ah, the scrounge life...

Does anyone else do this?

 

[Applesister]

No, I tried it once with locust and couldnt lift any of it. All of the smaller stuff was already missing. I got the okay from the homeowner but she gave the ok to everyone who asked. And it turned into a shark frenzy.
I had a neighbor who had 2 giant sugar maples cut along the road. It sat in his driveway for 5 yrs and I finally mustered the nosy courage to ask about it. He told me it was promised to someone else and a couple weeks later it was gone.
On the few other occasions I was told it was spoken for.
Now I bully my BIL into cutting stuff down on my own property. I could call tree service companies, I have 5 in a 3 mile radius but I have misgivings about it. One is bringing bug infested sick diseased trees here to add to my bugs and diseases.
Another would be accumulating piles of wood I wouldnt be able to process.

 

[drz1050]

I was scrounging construction/ land clearing zones around here.. but just got a load of log length delivered 2 days ago. This is gonna keep me busy for a while.

There's also a sawmill nearby where I can get free slab wood. It's mostly pine, but that's ok with me. After I get done splitting up these logs, I'm gonna go grab a cord or so of slab, then I should be set for a few years.

 

[bholler]

At least in our area if the trimming crew leaves stuff behind it is because the land owner aske to keep it make sure this is not the case before you do this or you may have some pissed off people on your hands if you get caught

 

[BamaScroungr]

At least in our area if the trimming crew leaves stuff behind it is because the land owner aske to keep it make sure this is not the case before you do this or you may have some pissed off people on your hands if you get caught

I don't think that's a problem here. All trees between the sidewalk and the road are considered city property, I know that much, and that's mostly what they're cutting. I did ask one crew waiting on a truck if I could take some logs, and they said, "take all you want." Thanks for the heads up, though.

 

[bholler]

I don't think that's a problem here. All trees between the sidewalk and the road are considered city property, I know that much, and that's mostly what they're cutting. I did ask one crew waiting on a truck if I could take some logs, and they said, "take all you want." Thanks for the heads up, though.

ok good deal then