Adventures In TSI

 Most TSI (Timber Stand Improvement) work is fairly straightforward and safe to perform, the most difficult part being the decisions you have to make on which trees to grow, and which ones need to be killed.  In large pole and immature sawtimber you work on wide spacings and look up at crowns constantly, checking for space around the trees you choose to help. 

You have to take out a cull occasionally, and these things bear watching.  This white oak toppled after being girdled, and I suspect that it fell while the cutter still had his saw in it.

Don't work on trees like this one if any spectators are hanging around.  The results are just too unpredictable.  If you are going to girdle a tree with just a thin shell, be sure to start on the compressed side, and finish on the tensioned side of the tree.  Don't kill a tree like this one in a high traffic area; it will go from being a hazard, to an extreme hazard.

 This tree had multiple fire scars, was hollow all the way up the trunk, and it also had fence wire imbedded in it, so even without the fire scars it would have been worthless.

Here is a look inside the hollow stump.  Old wire never goes away in a tree.  I get calls once in a while about putting nails in shade trees to keep them from fruiting, (It does not work!) and the caller always gets a lesson from me about not putting metal into trees.  It will be a problem for someone years in the future.