The AM Forum

I lose a tree every couple of years when the wind comes up or the ice builds up to the point where the trees can't handle the stress. It's usually no big deal, and like everyone else, I just grab the chain saw and clean it up in the spring. This winter I've lost five, which is a lot more than my usual quota.

The first one that came down fell right across the western end of the 250 foot center-fed and brought it down back in January. I guess that's to be expected when the wire is wandering out there among the trees. It took a couple of hours to untangle the wire and get things back in order.

A few storms later, a tree where I tied off one end of my 20/17 meter fan dipole came crashing down and that antenna was ripped apart. No big deal. The next day it was back in the air just a bit higher than before.

Following the 60 mph gusts a couple of days ago, I noticed that the 250 foot antenna was tight as a drum, in spite of about 5 feet of extra slack at the tie points to allow some windage relief. When I went out this morning to investigate, I found that a pine had snapped about 12 feet up from the bottom. As the top of the tree decided what it was going to do, it dropped and embedded itself into the snow and soil, and managed to grab the western end of the 250 foot center-fed as it came to rest against two other trees. It took about an hour to get the wire disengaged and back up in the clear.

A closer look at the pine shows some nasty work by a malicious, raging woodpecker. I can usually hear those things when they do work like this, but I don't recall hearing this one. It looks like he was pretty tenacious too! I had pretty much decided that the most hated creatures around here were the flying squirrels that were chewing through my fascia boards. I may have to reconsider that.

At any rate, the tree was heading for the house, but the two bigger trees intervened and made a nice catch. Should be interesting bringing this one the rest of the way down...

I read they leave you alone if you put suit out for them.

Rob,

Yep, falling trees are a ham's worst nightmare.

That pic#2 tree looks healthy inside.  But I wonder if trees are already diseased to attract woodpeckers to inside bugs?  There are a few trees here that are rotted and falling down with woodpecker holes all over them.


Tell the XYL the danger of falling trees. Tell her towers never fall and you have big plans... ;)

T

And Now Folks.......

hmm, I thought this was going to be a post about the "woodpecker" OTH radar.  ;)

Woodpeckers don't go after sound healthy trees with no insects inside. That one was probably destined to fall soon anyway.

Me too. I thought it was going to be about that big array over in Russia, the source of the Woodpecker being blow up for what ever reason.

That second pic looks like he was digging into a hollow center after some food. Would be interesting to see a pic of the end where the tree broke if you get an opportunity.

Woodpeckers here in East Texas go after the insects that are killing the trees, although we had one that liked to rat-a-tat-tat on our churche's copper clad steeple during the Sunday sermon.

I think one of the deacons brought a bb gun with him one Sunday, or Mr WP found something tastier than copper.

Jim

We have, unfortunately, lost several trees recently, as well.  Our heavily wooded lot(s) are becoming less wooded.  When you are talking about 86' oak trees that are over 4 1/2 ' across at the bottom, that is seriously dangerous business!  Most recently, we had a lightning strike which wiped out a skinny, but 70' tall tree in my neighbor's yard.  Scary business!  Wiped out one of my radios , as well. 

Yes, those woodpeckers can be destructive.  We put suet out in the winter, but they have been known to start pecking on the siding of the house when the suet runs out.  They were protesting, I guess...wanted more food.

73,  Jack, W9GT

I can never figure out why a woodpecker will tap on a road sign??What a racket!

Looks like the work of a Piliated woodpecker, Rob. They bore some incredible holes (caves, really) in trees pretty fast. I remember one working over a tree across from the old house in VT. I was in the yard one morning when he flew in. Then he disappeared into the tree. He'd tunneled inside in search of more bugs. They can hear the insects chewing on the wood, apparently, even in a tree that looks good externally.

I took a picture of a smaller one who was clearly confused, pecking on the telephone pole across the road here. Hard to see, but if you enlarge the photo, he's sitting on top of the pole. I've had them beat on towers, masts and tribanders over the years. Talk about noise....

I had a friend who seems to know about this stuff stop by and take a look. He agrees with you Todd that the perpetrator was most likely a piliated woodpecker. He did probe into the core of the tree and it was solid. No signs of insect ingress anywhere on the trunk. His comment was that they aren't terribly selective about where they drill, and will make little holes everywhere, but when they find something, they start tunneling like what's seen in the second photo. He's seen them pound away on vinyl and aluminum siding for no apparent reason, but they generally move on after a while. I do have a few unhealthy trees in the area, and he suggested that I take them down simply because they may invite further exploits by the woodpecker population. When I bring the "fallen" tree down, I'll look at the point where it broke and see if there's any evidence of little critters living inside.

Jack, I have the same concern about the thinning tree population. When my wife and I moved into this lot the surrounding stand of trees was much thicker. You couldn't see any other houses from my yard. Throughout the years, as they competed for sunlight, the trees all seemed to race to get taller. Now the canopy of tall spindly trees blocks the sunlight below, which seems to deter new growth. At this point, during the winter, I can now see through the trees to the houses a couple of hundred feet behind me. I'd love to find something I could plant in there that would thicken things up!

Tom, my wife uses my current tower as a tie point for one end of the clothes line. That's about the extent of her tolerance for the big metal tree! To be honest, I've been working towards making things simpler, so at this point all I have up there are some modest VHF/UHF antennas, with no plans for anything else. I like the simplicity of wire antennas! When they fall down, just throw them back up!

Jack and Frank, thanks for the tip about the suet. That would be easy enough to do. Of course that may attract more flying squirrels too...

Ah well. It's probably time to move to a smaller house with a bigger lot!

:O)

Eh, just get some woodpecker repellent.  :o

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opPf1PMOYVg

Jared,

That's an excellent video! I never expected to see THAT!! Looks like the anti-woodpecker prevailed in that skirmish!

:O)

Add red or cayenne pepper to the suet.  Birds cannot sense or metabolize capsaicin, the chemical in peppers that gives them their "heat."  The chemical passes harmlessly through birds' digestive systems.

Mammals such as squirrels, on the other hand... ;D

A couple of years ago I had a mentally challenged woodpecker every morning start doing his business on the side window of our bedroom and did this for about 2 weeks every morning, early in the morning, tap tap tap tap on the glass window, on the glass, go figure.  No bug problem whatsoever but just a nutcase bird. A couple of times I had to go outside and toss a tennis ball at it.  The problem stopped. definitely not a cock-a-doodle-do.

Bob confronts his woodpecker problem...

(http://img.youtube.com/vi/B1RRJhYy12M/0.jpg)

(http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/b85df739_htf_imgcache_35209_4058.jpg)

I had a problem with squirrels getting into the bird feeders.  The bird feeders were on a pole. The squirrels would climb up the pole and jump on the feeders and empty them in short order.  I mixed up a  nice batch of hot sauce and crisco vegetable shorting and smeared it on the pole. The greasiness kept them from climbing up the pole and the hot sauce was for entertainment.  They squirmed and jumped around like they had ants in the pants.  I later put up a shield to keep them from climbing the pole.