Hurricane warning!

There was warning of a hurricane (or at least hurricane-force winds) on Sunday night/Monday morning and I thought it would be prudent to lop a few branches off the conifers by the patio to take some weight off the top.

I've been cutting those trees down by stealth for a few years, taking off branches each year, but they grow at quite a rate and next year, I've resolved to take them all down. I'll have a bit more time then.

They were topped around 10 years ago, but if you think you've stopped a cupressus leylandii by chopping the top off, you're mistaken. They simply grow six new stems from the point the trunk is severed and so your original problem is multiplied several times over.

I've kept ours under pretty tight control. We removed lower branches to expose the trunks some years back and then some higher branches, so a large expanse of trunk was bare and the greenery concentrated at the top. They're quite nice-looking trees and I'd be happy to leave them, except that they're getting taller and taller. If one of them blew down now, it could take out a chunk of the house, extension or my sister's fence, house or shed.

Anyway, I've got that task on my list of retirement projects, but the job at the weekend was to take some bulk out before the storm hit. The branches that sprouted from the point where the trunk was topped are now quite thick, almost like trees in their own right, so one has to be careful where they fall and who/what is underneath. Margaret is ladder holder and chain-saw passer-up, so she's in most danger, but I'm careful not to injure my wife.

We moved chiminea, patio furniture and pots and I went round carefully lopping branches off and stacking them in the border. There's a surprising amount of weight in even a seemingly small branch, so it's not something you want to get wrong. A few branches were tricky as they had grown up into others and become entangled. They needed to be cut and then tugged clear. I saved the biggest branch until last. This had grown out of the trunk and was 8-10 inches thick at the join and some 15ft long. I wasn't sure whether it would fall outwards or drop straight down like a piledriver. It fell outwards and luckily it landed on the patio with an almighty crash, just short of the house and missing a handsome clay pot by a foot.

On Sunday, we made an early start on processing the debris. Thicker branches are sawn up for firewood, smaller ones for kindling, smaller still go through the chipper and the green stuff goes through the chipper or into the brown garden-waste bin for collection by the council. We just managed to get it all in and had a pallet full of logs ready for next year. Tree pruning is definitely a good work-out.

When the storm came, it was more rain than wind for us. My sister's patio chair blew over, but that was about it. However, there was a gust of 99mph recorded at Needles on the Isle of Wight and four people were killed by falling trees across southern England. Lots of trees were blown over and there were no trains all day Monday so I couldn't get to London. It's extraordinary that a few trees can't be cleared more quickly (Margaret and I could have sorted them out double quick) but I was able to have a day working from home, which was nice.