joshuabardwell
Elite Member
A street corner about two miles from my house is being widened, and many trees are being taken out to make room for it. The trees have been tagged forever, and about a year ago, I chatted with the homeowner on the corner and asked him if he would let me know when they started taking them down so I could try to get the wood for my stove. I heat with 100% wood in the winter, and burn about 2-3 cords each winter, so I can use all I can get. Mostly, I figured I'd never hear from the guy again, but surprise, surprise! Out of the blue, I get a call from the guy, nearly a year later. He's talked to the tree service and they've neatly piled the logs, about 10-15' sections, just waiting for me to come get them!
My normal procedure is to cut the logs into 22" rounds (the right length for my stove) and then hand-wrestle them onto my trailer or into my truck. But my chainsaw blades have both kind of bit the dust and it'll take a few days to order another one. But I hate to leave good wood laying around, especially after the guy went out of his way for me, so I drove my tractor over to the site and tried loading up my trailer with un-cut logs.
Above is my improvised ballast, to try to counterbalance the extra weight on the FEL. I dumped some heavy rounds into the box blade.
Here's one of the smaller logs, picked up in the bucket. I loaded about three of these logs, and a few smaller (maybe 8" x 10' long) ones before I finally ran up on one that gave me pause. It was 16" on the large end, 12" on the small end, and 15' long. The Internet says it was about 1100 lbs. The loader easily lifted it, but the ground was uneven, sloped, and very muddy, and I just didn't trust myself to make the final move of raising it up 5' in the air to clear the trailer's side rail. I ended up borrowing the homeowner's saw, cutting up half the log into rounds, and carrying the other half home in the bucket.
I will also call this a trial-by-fire of the bucket hooks that I welded on. They held, which is really the least I could ask of them. Woo hoo!
My normal procedure is to cut the logs into 22" rounds (the right length for my stove) and then hand-wrestle them onto my trailer or into my truck. But my chainsaw blades have both kind of bit the dust and it'll take a few days to order another one. But I hate to leave good wood laying around, especially after the guy went out of his way for me, so I drove my tractor over to the site and tried loading up my trailer with un-cut logs.
Above is my improvised ballast, to try to counterbalance the extra weight on the FEL. I dumped some heavy rounds into the box blade.
Here's one of the smaller logs, picked up in the bucket. I loaded about three of these logs, and a few smaller (maybe 8" x 10' long) ones before I finally ran up on one that gave me pause. It was 16" on the large end, 12" on the small end, and 15' long. The Internet says it was about 1100 lbs. The loader easily lifted it, but the ground was uneven, sloped, and very muddy, and I just didn't trust myself to make the final move of raising it up 5' in the air to clear the trailer's side rail. I ended up borrowing the homeowner's saw, cutting up half the log into rounds, and carrying the other half home in the bucket.
I will also call this a trial-by-fire of the bucket hooks that I welded on. They held, which is really the least I could ask of them. Woo hoo!
Last edited: