Today I’m helping cut down some cedar trees for the Boy Scouts. At next weekend’s camping trip, we will be building three catapults. Two kind people have each offered to let us harvest 6 trees from their respective groves. Each catapult requires six 15 foot long spars no bigger than four inches in diameter meaning we have materials for 2 out of 3 of the catapults.
If you are in Knoxville, and have a cedar tree or two or six that you wouldn’t mind us cutting down, please let me know. And thank you!
Update: To prepare for next weekend’s camping trip, our troop’s Scout leaders met from 7am-8:30am. One volunteered his truck but no one could volunteer additional labor so the tree harvesters were our Scout Master and me. By 10am we had the truck and were at the first cedar grove to pick up the trees that were felled Thursday late afternoon but had to be left since there was no truck to carry them. The property owner asked that the spars be hoofed out because of Friday’s rains. He didn’t want ruts left in his property. After a bit of friendly chatter, the spars were loaded and we were off to the ranch with the next cedar grove. The first property was younger trees and dense. The second property was older trees and more sparse. The owner offered to let us get enough trees to make 2 catapults but toward the end of the day we were wearing down and felt we had thinned the trees enough. We stopped short of what we thought we needed. Once back at the church, we unloaded the trees, returned the truck then came back to the church to size the spars. As it turns out, we harvested exactly the right amount of cedar trees to build three catapults. This wood should last several years and allow the scouts to build many catapults and monkey bridges. We wrapped up at 5:30pm. My thanks to these generous property owners!
