Fordyce Maxwell: 'Why won't this chainsaw keep going?' 'Because you're a ham-fisted bugger'

Published on Saturday 24 January 2009 18:46

WE HAD tree fellers in the garden recently – not the start of a politically suspect Irish joke, there were only two of them, with chainsaws – who transformed my outlook in a couple of hours.

Not only can I now see more clearly from my office window, but a large area of arid soil has had its first rain in a century or so, and I've planned what can be grown there in the next few months.

More to the point, during the present gale – a seagull has just gone past the window, backwards – the chance is lessened of the phone wire being torn out by the thrashing branches that had grown past, round and over it.

I had kept the threatening branches at bay twice with a handsaw, by dint of some tricky climbing and balancing, but had been asked not to try again in case I drew a crowd taking bets or, worst-case scenario, shouting "Jump!"

Accepting that my Tarzan days were over, or would be if I persisted, I began to think of solving the problem by taking the ageing cypress off at the stocking tops as forestry veterans used to say.

It was not a decision taken lightly, and not only because of the probable cost. No one – except possibly rampant property developers in the good old days of 2007 when there was still property to develop and banks to lend them the money to do it – cuts down a tree without good reason or thinking hard about it.

I'd been thinking about it for 16 years every time I looked out the office window – yes, yes, never in the mornings because that would leave me nothing to do in the afternoons – which probably qualifies as considerable thought.

More proficiency, make that any proficiency, with a chainsaw might have encouraged me to do the job myself. But, as a singular exception to the general rule of "never trust a farmer with a chainsaw", starting and keeping one going long enough to cut through anything thicker than a fence post has always defeated me. My opinion is that I suffer from being left-handed with the artistic and creative sensitivity and lack of empathy with machines and technology that go with this, but I admit that is a minority view.

"Why won't it keep going?" I remember asking during my last attempt at using a chainsaw, to clear a dead elm tree on the farm.

"Because you're a ham-fisted bugger with anything more complicated than a hammer," was the reply. "Here, I'll cut and you load the trailer."

Ah, how much better a place the world would be if we could all accept such simple truths. Exasperation might have had something to do with that particular opinion, but I've never touched a chainsaw since and watching the two professionals take down our tree a few days ago convinced me that has been a wise decision.

With safety first at all times – helmets, gloves, leg-guards, goggles, ropes and harnesses – they reduced what had been a tree to shredded chips and logs. Then, men after my own heart, they raked and tidied away the small debris. In less than two hours they were gone and I was left with a stump, some sawdust, a better view, a cleared phone line and another area of useful garden.