Axe WorkShop

I've just come back from a great weekend away camping up in a wood in staffordshire learning how to use axes. It was snowing when we got there but that only added to the fun!

We also made charcoal over the weekend and you can read about that here.

A very snowy tent

 

First lesson - learning not to embed the axe in your leg - an important lesson!



Splitting wood safely



Chopping down some small trees that needed to be removed



Learning to tie faggots using a woodmans clamp



Base camp for the weekend



Jonny showing a method of sharpening an axe



A extra safe and precise way of splitting wood - good for blanks for tent pegs



Some rough tent pegs



Dan making a mallet



Some spoon carving lessons



A rough shaped mallet

The group stood with our measured "cord" of wood

It was a great weekend, I learnt some new skills and practised old one. I also got to spend quality time with my brother doing what we both love.

This was our second axe course (find a link to our first one here) run by different firms and they were for completely different things so it would be unfair to compare the two. This one was from a bush craft point of view where the other was more to practise the traditional skills of the men that used to fell trees with axes for a living. 

This was our third course with Survival school and we weren't disappointed. It was nice to be outside and dedicate yourself to learning bush craft skills for the weekend with no other distractions. Going back to basics is great fun and although some of the things you can make straight off the axe are a little rough round the edges its a great skill to develop and learn and one I hope I'll be using more in the future (even if it's just to split fire wood) and I'll use the knowledge I've picked up to help me. The instructor were great making the whole weekend fun as well as some good company from the other students. I love weekends like this!

Tree Work On The Smallholding

I'm not sure this is how everyone spends their Sunday but I enjoyed it!

I managed to rope my poor old Brother into helping me yet again this weekend. I have a few trees on our smallholding that want some work doing to them. The first hadn't got its roots on our land but it was overhanging the footpath, it was blocking out a lot of light and was going to make access difficult when I get a tractor up here, so using my brothers special set of skills we managed to get the tree looking a little better.

I love watching him climb and he always makes it look easy, leaving the tree exactly how I wanted it.

The top gate is now a bit lighter and the views even better for Daves hard work.

The second bit of work I got him to do was to drop a poorly growing oak tree that had been strangled by ivy. It was under the canopy of a much grander oak so would never really do any good and i wanted it removed before I put my pig pen down in that corner!

Dave dropped it no problem and helped to dismantle it, now I've just got a lot of clearing up to do and firewood to cut in the evenings. I've planted 17 other trees this last week so I'm not feeling too guilty about getting rid of this one.

(Dave cut the tree high as it was full of wire - someone in the past had used it as a fence post) This lot should help keep us warm next winter (and no doubt I'll get pretty warm cutting and splitting it) and there's no doubt that the neigbours know I've moved in now!

Cheers for your help Bro

From Coppicing to Birmingham

I do like the variety that my life seems to bring.

The week before last I spent with my brother coppicing close to where we grew up, on a beautiful river bank coppicing trees as part of a grant program. My brother's a tree surgeon and it's always enjoyable working with him, I always seem to learn lots and its interesting seeing timber from a different perspective.

I even fell my first tree all by myself (with a chainsaw, this was before the axe course - sorry the posts aren't in order).

Then skip forward a week and I'm just taking on a job in Birmingham that's been offered to me. Luckily it's in the middle of a park (the only reason I agreed to do it - I can pretend I'm not in the city!) gutting and then restoring a turn of the century park keepers cottage into offices and mess rooms. I'm going to be on site as a working Foreman and a carpenter so it should bring more variety my way as well as a full diary for a couple of months. The place needs a lot of work but it's always interesting working on old properties - you never know what you might find. Also on a clear frosty morning the park looks quite nice. You'd never guess we were working in a city!

Chainsaw Milling

This is a continuation from the last post.

The second day of the course was chainsaw milling, as my brother has just brought a chainsaw mill we were keen to learn a few tips.

It stated off fine, a short talk on fuel mixes and chains then fixing the guide frame and cutting the top piece like butter. Sliding it off revealed beautiful grain under it, I love that we're the first people to see the tree like that.

One thing we did learn was not to clamp the frame of the mill to near to the end of the bar on the chainsaw as this is what the instructor did and ceased up the chain, preventing us from milling anymore. It didn't matter though as we'd seen what we wanted to see and we even got to take some oak home in the process. My little van was unimpressed with the weight of three slabs of green oak on the way home though!

In all it was a lovely weekend where we learned loads and found muscles we didn't even know we had. I always think a much better way to learn about history is to go and do it. I think now though I want to learn more about coppicing and how to use the wood you gain from it, I've already got some more courses in mind!

I had to put this last picture in as it's like a painting of the past. I think its great that people are still practicing these crafts and for me this picture sums up the beauty of a coppiced woodland.

Tree Felling with an Axe and Chain Saw milling

My brother pointed this course out to me from the Green Wood Centre website and I thought it sounded like fun and as my brother had just brought a chainsaw mill he thought it might be a good place to get a few tips.
I went thinking that we wouldn't really get to fell a very big tree, just something to get a rough idea.

How wrong I was.

We started on a sliver birch about 12" in diameter and the other half the group (there were 6 on the course plus 3 instructors) tackled a tree of about the same size. This was so we could practice our axe skills learning what angle to cut at and how to place it safely without it slipping and cutting your boot (or worse). We did this whole tree with axes, no crosscut saw and it was a lovely feeling as it fell over, 180 degrees from where we had first wanted it to go!

The main tree we were to drop was a large oak, 30 inches in diameter at the base. The first cut was put in with a two man crosscut saw and then the "birds mouth" was put in with an axe, everyone taking their turn.

The final cut was then put in with the two man cross cut saw and although it sounds a little big headed my brother and I were the best on this. We could keep and even rhythm easily and at one point the rest of the class were going to place money on which brother would give in first! it took quite a while to drop the oak but it was a great feeling when it did fall, as it went it made that great sound you only get when a big tree falls over.

The hard work wasn't over though as we had to limb it up (sned it up) all with the axe and chop through the main trunk ready for milling on Sunday. Again my brother and me took great pleasure in pushing each other to cut through the trunk getting a big cheer when I made the final chop! I love the picture at the end and you can understand the pride the woodsmen in the past would have had when they fell a big tree by hand.

I will do the milling in another post as I've realised how big this one is!