I'm soaking in a bath at the moment, my leg is bit swollen - and a little painful - from where I landed on the ladder.
We have some oak trees on the allotment. One of them has a branch which reaches over the Heras fencing a bit, and I realised on Saturday that it wouldn't be long before it provided an easy access point for a hungry fox. I decided I'd deal with it next time I came down, which was today.
So I packed my car with a step ladder, a pruning saw, and a pair of loppers. We have an electric chainsaw, but of course that's no help on the allotment. In the light of subsequent events - or event - that's probably just as well!
It was drizzling. I put on my padded coat. I inspected the tree and decided where to cut. I decided I might as well cut the thick branch, if I did the smaller ones I'd run out of steam too soon. To my surprise, my folding pruning saw made quite a lot of headway, quite quickly. The branch must have been dead or dying. It wasn't long before I heard a small crack, so I knew it wouldn't be long.
I moved round and cut from the other side, and from underneath.
I moved back to my starting point and moved up the ladder to cut some more. The ladder slipped, I fell.
My first reaction was to get up, but I made myself stay put while I checked out everything. My leg hurt a bit, but I could wiggle my toes. Everything else was in working order.
I got up and picked up the poor ladder. I was a bit shocked at the state of it (see previous post) and I realise my leg must have landed on it.
I looked at the branch and realised I had to finish. It was leaning heavily, and the easy access would be irresistible to even an aged fox. The ladder was out of commission, but I found a chair to use. I also realised that I needed to lop off all the smaller branches, otherwise it would get stuck coming down.
That took forever. There were so many of them. Then I got back up and sawed and sawed and sawed. The branch finally fell off on to the heras panel.
Round the other side of the fence, I couldn't move it. It weighed a tonne, and the "fingers" of smaller branches kept getting stuck in the ground. I lopped. I sawed. And each time Ihad to drag the branches well away to make sure they couldn't be used as a ladder by Foxy.
After what seemed like several hours (but wasn't, I was only there for an hour and a quarter in total), I finally managed to get the branch away, and I was able to put the fence back up. My leg was hurting by now and I was very thirsty.
I finished off seeing to the hens, put everything back in the car, came home and ran a bath.
And I cant remember if I switched on the fence, so I am going to have to go back.
Fudge
.
Oh well. The tree looks better.
