Last Friday we were hit by a nasty storm, so bad it kept all of us bar Gary and T12 awake. Everyone was a little scared, and rightly so. We had a large fir-tree, situated approximately 2 meters from the house, which was swaying precariously. The storm, being characterised by its wind strength, had already brought one of our fir trees down, narrowly missing the wooden constructed house of our neighbour by inches. It wasn’t out of the question that this fir-tree could also uproot.
After a long, sleepless night, we took the decision the tree had to come down. During the night it had split in two vertically down the middle of the trunk and its swaying was causing the ground underneath to move. Gary spent most of the morning searching for a tree surgeon (most had been called out to other tree related and storm related emergencies) and finally found one who was willing to come in that day, quoting us £500 an hour. Ouch!
In the end he came and took one look at it, said it needed to come down immediately and said he would charge £800 for the whole job. We breathed a sigh of relief. Still costly, but better than five hours at £500 each hour and at least it would be down by night-time. The winds were still strong and I didn’t envy them, going up the tree in order to cut it down.
The tree surgeons got to work and over the course of five hours the tree gradually diminished in size:
So after five hours and £800 pounds we had a huge pile of woodchips (which we needed and had been planning on buying for our garden this summer), and enough wood to heat our home next winter:
So what does one do when faced with so much mess, wood and wood chip? Have a family work day, of course! And that is what we did, which I will post on tomorrow….
No wonder you’ve been so busy lately.
Sigh…yes lots of work to be done.
It is wonderful how God can bring blessings from things we see as burdens. Glad everyone is safe.
Have a wonderful day, Claire! (8 to go:)))
We are, and it was such a relief to have that tree down. No more worrying through the night for me!
I’m so glad you’re all safe! And, hey, you’ve got wood chips for your garden and some firewood, so that helps offset the cost a little bit. 🙂
We’ve got a couple of trees in our yard that I’m ready to have taken down. They make me very nervous when we have strong winds like that.
That was the stage we were at. We needed to take it down months ago but back pedalled due to lack of finances. Glad it’s down now though!
Blessings from difficulties. I have been having a few of those myself. I am glad it turned out alright.
Thanks Phyllis
I am glad you all are safe and sound. Thank goodness you got the tree down in time.
Blessings, Dawn
Yes, in the nick of time as well, I think.
Yes, thank goodness it was cut down before it could cause damage – that is a huge tree! What a stressful weekend.
It really was. I didn’t know how stressful until night time. I don’t think I have ever felt so exhausted – must have used up a lot of nervous energy!
Glad you were able to get the tree down before it caused damage. We had a similar situation last spring that ended with one tree coming down because it was uprooting and 2 more to prevent them from getting Emerald Ash Borers. It’s always sad to lose trees.
It is sad. They take so long to grow. I have to say though, I am impressed by the increased amount of light coming into our house now!