Saw Class At Dixon Springs Ag Center

Dixon Springs Ag Center (Deep Southern Illinois) recently hosted the second day of a chainsaw class for women. The greatest difference between a class for men and a class for women is that the women do not bring any bad habits with them. When you show them how to do a cut, they jump right in to do it too, without arguing about how they would prefer to do it, and why. We had a lot of fun, and the ladies in these photos had never cut down a tree before.

The top two photos show a couple of the students practicing on the bore post so they will be able to bore a tree when making a hinge.


They punched a lot of holes in the practice post.

This hackberry had about eight feet of forward lean, and was a prime risk to make a barber chair, but with the open face and bore cut method, the student dropped the tree safely.

Completing the aiming cuts.

Beginning the bore cut to make the hinge.

Swinging the far end of the bar toward the face, and making the hinge the proper thickness.

Success! I haven't found a person yet that didn't love cutting trees down after they learned how. I don't know if it would work on hippies, though.

Aiming cuts completed...

and a perfect stump!