Those of you who have had the pleasure of growing up on a farm will relate to an experience I had with my dad when I was younger. We had a John Deere tractor that was used for everything around the farm. This tractor had been a life saver many times, and has created some very memorable experiences. On this beautiful summer day, our tractor gave us quite an experience.

I woke up one Sunday morning, and my dad told me we were cutting down some pine trees to make room for planting. I knew it was going to be a long day, because the trees where side by side all through the wood line. If you are from the south, you will know what I am talking about. We started on the smaller pine trees and I would haul them off with our John Deere tractor. This tractor was not very large, only around 50 horsepower. The task of cutting down the trees went fairly well, until it was time for the larger ones.

When it came time to cut one of the largest trees, we had a problem. The tree was dangerously close to the fence line. We thought of different ways to cut it down, but could not come up with a sure fire way to cut the tree down and not have it fall on the fence. After taking a break and thinking, my dad had a brainstorm. While this idea of his seemed great to him, I had second thoughts. His idea was to have the tractor pull the tree down as it was half cut. You would think this is a decent idea, but you would not realize how he wanted to do it.

His idea was tie a rope close to the top of the tree and tie the other end to our tractor. After the rope was tied, he positioned the tractor to pull the rope around another tree to try and pull the tree away from the fence. So he started by getting the rope tight. Then he proceeded to cut the tree a little over half way through the trunk. Now that the tree was close to being pulled over, he climbed in the tractor and pulled forward slowly. Everything was going great until the tree started to fall and swing to the right. This was a bad spot to fall because this is where the tractor was. As the tree fell toward him, his eyes opened wider than they have ever before and he leaped from the tractor as it was moving. All I could hear was the cracking of the tree and him yelling "RUN". After the tree fell, the tractor kept going and proceeded toward another tree. As the tractor met the tree, it literally started to climb the tree. I had never seen anything like it, a tractor climbing a tree. My dad managed to turn it off, but it was definitely a site.

I know many people who grew up on a farm have just as good a story as this. Some people always come up with interesting ways to use farm equipment. I did not think that anyone would use a tractor in this manner, but they do. After we repaired the tractor, it was ready to perform such feats again. This was definitely an experience I would never forget.