"Volfie" wrote in message
...
If the trees have not been tended to (ie: thinned) properly for a long
time,
it is quite possible that a good storm could topple them ALL. Pines are
shallow rooted and tend to go down like dominos. I once saw an entire
hillside with a 40' swatch of downed pines that ran from bottom to almost
the top. Some tree maintenance might be a good idea even if you don't
plan
on removing them all.

Giselle (who even on a recently maintained/logged property lost about 10
hardwood trees to wind this year)



Where was this?

However, he could cut the stumps off at about 4 feet, put table tops on them
and have a nice, sunny outdoor restaurant -- specializing in BBQ with a
unique turpentine & kerosene flavor.

On Tue, 02 Nov 2004 12:35:37 -0500, Janet Price in
rec.gardens wrote:

If you remove the trees, you may end up with lots of stumps that are
uglier than the trees.

Janet

Doug Kanter wrote:

"bandu" wrote in message
om...

I am looking at a house to buy which has one third of its half acre
backyard
covered in aboout 40 or so tall pine trees. As you can guessed
backyard looks quite neglected and I guess thats because its difficult
to grow anything there.
Should I buy this property. How about spending on removing some of
those trees.
Thanks
BK


What are the redeeming qualities of the property? Are they compelling enough
to make you comfortable with spending some serious money to have some of the
trees removed?

In article , FACE
wrote:

However, he could cut the stumps off at about 4 feet, put table tops on them
and have a nice, sunny outdoor restaurant -- specializing in BBQ with a
unique turpentine & kerosene flavor.

On Tue, 02 Nov 2004 12:35:37 -0500, Janet Price in
rec.gardens wrote:

If you remove the trees, you may end up with lots of stumps that are
uglier than the trees.

Janet

I happen to think stumps are beautiful. I'd leave several heights from
four feet to ten feet for variety These will become trellises for, say,
banks roses, or longer-blooming types of climbing roses, or large vines
that would turn the stumps into the appearance of towers of foliage. The
top of the some of the stumps can be hollowed out to use for planters,
especially for huckleberry shrubs which LOVE to grow out of decaying
stumps better than any place else they could be planted.

But one should also always bare in mind it takes decades to grow a
nice-sized pine tree for oneself, though only one afternoon with a
chainsaw to deprive oneself of trees altogether. Cleaning up the
undergrowth could well be enough to make it all quite lovely, & installing
substory native shrubs & cultivated forms of semi-shade loving flowering
shrubs that would enjoy life in naturally acidic soils undre pines, with
natural tamped paths &amp installed flagstone trails winding about under
the pines, &amp drifts of crocuses at the driplines of all the trees,
scillas & cyclamens in the shadier spots closer in under the pines.

-paghat the ratgirl

--
"Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher.
"Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature.
-from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers"
Visit the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com

"Doug Kanter" wrote in message
...

"Volfie" wrote in message
...
If the trees have not been tended to (ie: thinned) properly for a long
time,
it is quite possible that a good storm could topple them ALL. Pines are
shallow rooted and tend to go down like dominos. I once saw an entire
hillside with a 40' swatch of downed pines that ran from bottom to
almost
the top. Some tree maintenance might be a good idea even if you don't
plan
on removing them all.

Giselle (who even on a recently maintained/logged property lost about 10
hardwood trees to wind this year)



Where was this?

Indiana. We had a hell of a storm in late August (iirc). We were without
power for four days and when you are on well water, that gets annoying
really, really fast.

Giselle ( nevermind having to cut your way out of your 1/5 of a mile long,
tree covered driveway)

I find it hard to belive a pine has a shallow root system...during
Ivan and many other hurricanes its always been th pines that stood the
test of the wind and rains. Yes, they may have hgad a top snap out but
none ever blew down at the root level...............I lost more large
oaks and hickory with Ivan than I care to think about......I was
pretty paranoid with the pines around my house (long leaf pines most
over 90 feet in height), but only lost a limb or two, but the oaks and
hickory were another story.......nothing but massive holes where the
entire root system came up when the tree went over........


On Tue, 2 Nov 2004 13:36:06 -0500, "Volfie" wrote:

===If the trees have not been tended to (ie: thinned) properly for a long time,
===it is quite possible that a good storm could topple them ALL. Pines are
===shallow rooted and tend to go down like dominos. I once saw an entire
===hillside with a 40' swatch of downed pines that ran from bottom to almost
===the top. Some tree maintenance might be a good idea even if you don't plan
===on removing them all.
===
===Giselle (who even on a recently maintained/logged property lost about 10
===hardwood trees to wind this year)
===

Visit my website: http://www.frugalmachinist.com
Opinions expressed are those of my wife,
I had no input whatsoever.
Remove "nospam" from email addy.

"starlord" wrote in message
...
aged pine make fine firewood, I helped cut up a falled pine tree once and
the wood was stacked and aged and the next year the people used it in
their
fireplace just fine.

Makes great firewood, if you want to burn the house down. Pine produces a
lot of oil and resin that builds up in the chimney, a great way to start
chimney fires. Burning pine as firewood would be an incredibly bad idea.

Snooze

In article , "Snooze"
wrote:

"starlord" wrote in message
...
aged pine make fine firewood, I helped cut up a falled pine tree once and
the wood was stacked and aged and the next year the people used it in
their
fireplace just fine.

Makes great firewood, if you want to burn the house down. Pine produces a
lot of oil and resin that builds up in the chimney, a great way to start
chimney fires. Burning pine as firewood would be an incredibly bad idea.

Snooze

This is a common misconception. It is MOIST wood that generates the most
creosote, not the wood with the most sap, oil, or resin. In so far as some
softwoods have more moisture in them than some hardwoods, it would be true
the wet softwood generates more creosote, though not so much as unaged
poplar or willow with an even higher moisture content. The advice, then,
is to not burn unaged wood of any kind.

Anyone who does PROPER maintenance of their fireplace is not at greater
risk from burning properly aged pine. But someone who is NOT properly
maintaining their fireplace, including an annual professional cleaning, &
failing to burn only well-aged wood, that person is not safer for avoiding
pine, spruce, or fir. The type of wood is not as important as the mosture
content of the logs.

Likely 90% of cords burned in the Northwest are softwood evergreens.
Hardwood is not so commonly available. If you could get nothing but
hardwoods it wouldn't necessarily improve the situation. When assessing
properly DRIED wood, it turns out that hickory, oak, & other dense woods,
release more creosote per log than do pine or fir -- exactly the opposite
as so often believed. This reality is mitigated by the fact that softwood
logs burn faster, so a larger volume of wood is burned in the same period
of time. It tends to average out -- hardwoods release more creosote per
log but one can end up burning fewer logs than with softwood. So it's a
wash & either wood is dandy.

The thing to bare in mind is creosote is a natural byproduct of burning
ANY wood, & the way to control it is with regular scheduled chimney
cleaning, good fireplace maintenance, for airtights enough oxygen to not
turn the firepladce into smoke-&-creosote generators, & never burning any
wood aged less than six months to a year (six months under ideal drying
conditions, stacked for aeration, up off the ground, & in covered but
fully ventillated sheds).

Another common misconception is that wax & wax-&-sawdust logs burn dirtier
& hotter & are more dangerous in the fireplace, a misconception born of
the fact that most manufactured logs are made from mill waste of pine,
spruce, & fir lumber manufacture, then adding a petroleum bonding agent.
It is SO common to see "fireplace advice" that says "do not burn softwood
including pine, or artificlal logs," but this advice is simply wrong, & in
fact softwood & artificial logs are the most common woods being burned.

A study by Shelton Research Labs in Santa Fe, the Canadian Combustion &
Carbonization Research Laboratory, & OMNI Environmental Services funded by
the EPA, found that wax-sawdust logs burn cleaner than even hardwood,
producing fewer pollutants of any kind. Popular in the Pacific Northwest,
but not so commonlyu available elsewhere, is a densified pressed log
without petroleum binder, purporting to produce fewer pollutants, but the
studies don't bare that out. The pressed product burns cleaner (& hotter,
due to a greatly reduced moisture content) than softwood or hardwood, but
no better or worse than wax-sawdust logs.

Relatively new products are reaching the fireplace market, logs made of
reycled grass clippings, junk mail, coal dust, husks & shells from hulled
nut packagers, glued cardboard, molasses, peach pits, & polyethylene
plastic (which in a proper mix burns as cleanly, or uncleanly, as any
petroleum product). The clean burning nature of these products is as
variable as their content, but when compared to the toxins generated by
burning softwoods & hardwoods, it is no worse, & the goal of the
manufacturers is to produce a product that burns as clean as the pressed
sawdust logs.

A lot of the mythology of pine & other softwood dangers is promelgated by
the pressed-log industry itself, which wants the public to believe
softwoods are dangerous to burn, knows that in most regions hardwood cords
are not available, & that leaves the pressed logs as allegedly the only
safe product. In reality they're all about equal in safety so long as
fireplace maintenance is not slipshod. Maintaining a properly functioning
damper, used properly, & chimney-cleaning when creosote reaches 1/8 inch
thick, is a far better than hunting down sources for oak or hickory cords
in parts of the country where pine or fir is the dominant wood.

I quickly checked a dozen "advice" pages for choices of burning wood &
cealing with creosote, & fully two-thirds of these pages include
statements that from controlled studies are now known not to be true. But
this page (read admittedly at a speed-read) seems to be accurate:
http://www.howtocleananything.com/hca_springarticle3chimneys.htm

-paghat the ratgirl

--
"Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher.
"Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature.
-from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers"
Visit the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com

On Wed, 03 Nov 2004 00:01:28 GMT, "Snooze" wrote:

===
==="starlord" wrote in message
...
=== aged pine make fine firewood, I helped cut up a falled pine tree once and
=== the wood was stacked and aged and the next year the people used it in
===their
=== fireplace just fine.
===
===Makes great firewood, if you want to burn the house down. Pine produces a
===lot of oil and resin that builds up in the chimney, a great way to start
===chimney fires. Burning pine as firewood would be an incredibly bad idea.
===
===Snooze
===


I wholeheartedly agree...........pine is not the best wood to use for
firewood seasoned or not!
Visit my website: http://www.frugalmachinist.com
Opinions expressed are those of my wife,
I had no input whatsoever.
Remove "nospam" from email addy.

Well, the house is still standing, and it was built just about 1900 and has
a freestone fireplace and chimney. I see that the trees have been trimed
and there is firewood stacked up at the base of the hill behind the house.
And this house is in the foothill above Los Angeles.


--


The Forgotten
http://home.inreach.com/starlord/forgotten.htm


SIAR
http://starlords.netfirms.com
Telescope Buyers FAQ
http://home.inreach.com/starlord
Bishop's Car Fund
http://www.bishopcarfund.netfirms.com/

"Snooze" wrote in message
. com...

"starlord" wrote in message
...
aged pine make fine firewood, I helped cut up a falled pine tree once
and
the wood was stacked and aged and the next year the people used it in
their
fireplace just fine.

Makes great firewood, if you want to burn the house down. Pine produces a
lot of oil and resin that builds up in the chimney, a great way to start
chimney fires. Burning pine as firewood would be an incredibly bad idea.

Snooze




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On Tue, 2 Nov 2004 17:47:12 -0500, Roy wrote
I find it hard to belive a pine has a shallow root system

I think there are some, but I agree that those I'm familiar with all
have tap roots. In the SE US, the problem with pines is that they can
be brittle. Many years ago a tornado went through my parents'
neighborhood, not quite touching the ground. You could follow the path
by all the pines broken off 30'-40' up. These were mostly loblollly; I
suspect that longleaf would have sustained less damage.

Sweet gum also have strong tap roots but are brittle and fall after
breaking.

I've read experts say that hickories are strong. But you say you lost
hickories, and a 2' diameter hickory destroyed my mom's carport (same
house 25 years after the tornado) during a completely calm spell after
Jeanne passed over. Pulled up the root ball.

Southern live oaks generally do well. (For those on the west coast,
this is NOT the same oak that's called a live oak there. Any evergreen
oak is likely to be called a live oak.) But water oaks are notorious
for rotting in the center with no visible damage, and several of them
fell around my mom's house this year, luckily none on the house.

Edward

On Wed, 3 Nov 2004 10:16:28 -0500, Edward Reid
wrote:

===On Tue, 2 Nov 2004 17:47:12 -0500, Roy wrote
=== I find it hard to belive a pine has a shallow root system
===
===I think there are some, but I agree that those I'm familiar with all
===have tap roots. In the SE US, the problem with pines is that they can
===be brittle. Many years ago a tornado went through my parents'
===neighborhood, not quite touching the ground. You could follow the path
===by all the pines broken off 30'-40' up. These were mostly loblollly; I
===suspect that longleaf would have sustained less damage.
===
===Sweet gum also have strong tap roots but are brittle and fall after
===breaking.
===
===I've read experts say that hickories are strong. But you say you lost
===hickories, and a 2' diameter hickory destroyed my mom's carport (same
===house 25 years after the tornado) during a completely calm spell after
===Jeanne passed over. Pulled up the root ball.
===
===Southern live oaks generally do well. (For those on the west coast,
===this is NOT the same oak that's called a live oak there. Any evergreen
===oak is likely to be called a live oak.) But water oaks are notorious
===for rotting in the center with no visible damage, and several of them
===fell around my mom's house this year, luckily none on the house.
===
===Edward
===


I should have stated my soil is very sandy, and we had gone many many
weeks without rain so when Ivan came through the initial rain soaked
right in the ground and soon became pretty darn water logged. Coupled
with the high winds it did not take much to layover fully grown mature
oaks and hickory trees. Especially with as much of a canopy as they
had.......probably would have been a lot different if the leaves were
mostly gone like in late fall or winter, but thats not when hurricane
season is........unfortunately.

Just because a tree does not blow over does not mean it did not get
injured in a heavy blow either. Its not uncommon for a well rooted
tree to have its roots fractured and die later on months after it
incurred its injury........Tornadoes are terrible on pine trees but
then again they usually stay firmly rooted and only get snapped off
about 1/3 or 1/2 the way up. To the best of my knowlege the loblolly,
sugar, yellow, long leaf, short leaf and virginia pines all have
pretty darn long tap roots. I have seen spruce and fir trees blown
over when I lived up north.

Back in 1995 when Huricane Opal came through I was pretty paranoid. I
just had visions of all thes epines laying on the house. Next morning
after Opal was over, I was surprised to find only one small oak blown
over, and one top of one pine snapped out..All the others had a
pretty good curve to them from the winds effects, but they did
straighten back up without any ill effects. Then my son cam up tome
and told me that the "Civil War" tree was blown over.........never in
a million years would I have expected that tree to get blown over or
broke.....It was a monsterous oak that measured close to 58" at
DBH.........and would have made the states record book if its canopy
was just a bit larger, and better shaped. Sure enough that tree was
broken off about 30 feet up the trunk and the entire trunk was
hollow. The cavity was large enough that 3 adults and two children
could get inside it............We did count 237 growth rings, in one
sectioin of thre trunk though. It was hard to count them rings, and
there was still quite a few we cold not count due to the cavity and
tree's condition after breaking. We used to call it the civil war tree
due to its size, we just knew it had to be planted and growing back
during that time frame.....
Visit my website: http://www.frugalmachinist.com
Opinions expressed are those of my wife,
I had no input whatsoever.
Remove "nospam" from email addy.

One big advantage would be that you would never have to mow or fertilize
grass back there! I had a back yard like that once in suburban D.C.
although I think our trees were mostly deciduous. Loved it!

Depending where you are, holly might grow back there too.

And if it's a hot climate, you'll love the air conditioning the shade
provides.
Lobo
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