Is this a structural weakness?

[Buzzsurgeon]

Difficult to see from the pics, but has this limb self grafted to the main stem, hence the bottle neck?

[Tony Croft aka hamadryad]

Difficult to see from the pics, but has this limb self grafted to the main stem, hence the bottle neck?

 

Yeah I was looking at that too, looked to me like the old welds had failed though, more shots from other angles would help.

[shillo]

heres a few more pics, there is some more of the fibre rippling on the limb. i was going to shorten this limb a bit as it had a cavity in the top of the fork the size of 2 fists but no decay, i didnt like this fork the collar didnt look right to me.

 

no real targets just a shrub bed, it would miss the house, just!

 

never seam to get the perfect picture, sorry

[Tony Croft aka hamadryad]

now that horizontal limb shot has fibre buckles, see how discrete they are, mere ripples in the lower portion of the limb.

 

I also see som cryptococcus fagisuga.

 

as for that union, not quiet as bad as i thought it apears to have very long attachments, like it welded itself to main stem many moons ago at the lowest point, but i still dont like the bottle neck formation above the union.

 

is the last image a cup formation in that horizontal limb? those type junctions are typical summer droppers, high heat

Edited October 29, 2010 by Tony Croft aka hamadryad

[shillo]

yes it is cup like, this is another photo which shows it a bit more clearly. Now this limb does have a potential target.

 

thanks again for the comments Hamadyad

[Tony Croft aka hamadryad]

The side walls are very strong in the new image, but even so if its got a target thats unmovable, and permanent might be worth reducing that one back a ways. Thats as much as can be "reasonably" expected.

 

and the action is easily defendable.

[Tony Croft aka hamadryad]

was the climbing of this tree in the interests of a climbing inspection/VTA after a ground inspection dictated so?

[shillo]

Yes, there were also a couple of cavities higher up that I wanted to look at, I wanted to look at the tension side of that limb with what I thought might be fibre buckling and a closer look at the limb over the neighbours house with the fibre buckling as you pointed out, it was too dense for me to see well enough.

 

owners were also keen for me to climb it, had to be seen to be doing as much as possible to keep the neighbours happy.

 

It was also a really nice saturday morning with a beautiful view over Dartmouth:thumbup:

[Tony Croft aka hamadryad]

None of your shots give a "feel" for the targets or the scene as a general view.

 

Sounds to me from your wordings that this tree has significant targets, this is important as this beech is reaching its old age, from here in judgments will need to be made and will be critical in the long term retention of this valuable asset.

 

as this tree moves into its old age it will be prone to many issues that will need careful consideration over the next decades. good work at this stage could ensure longevity and retention of this tree before anything that would force the hands to remove it altogether, i.e a major limb loss that might scare the residents/owner into a knee jerk removal.

 

look after this one, these old beeches are worth retaining, if you ever need a second opinion I would happily pop along for a look.