Why?
If you're very anxious about infection, you might look into putting some lanolin or grafting wax into the pre-drilled hole before inserting the screw. Researchers who core trees sometimes recommend that treatment,[1] although I am aware of no research addressing its utility.
Una
[1]Several people have mentioned installing the light box so it stands off from the tree, to permit less frequent preventive maintenance. However, there is one possible shortcoming of this arrangement. If the box is mounted on just 2 screws and not against the tree, in windy weather the the box may pivot slightly around its virtual axis between the screw attachment points. That could make the illumination jittery, which can be very annoying.
And yes, for screwing into a live tree the screws do need to be set in a radial plane (meaning, pointing to the center of the tree), and in a vertical row.
Una
Just nail a board to the tree, use long nails, leave the nails a little loose so the board moves outward as the tree grows. Attach light to board. I'd suggest stainless steel nails, but I dont think they make them, so use galvanized, or just check and replace them every few years. Also, the tree moves from wind. Will this affect the wires? A wooden post might be better. Just a plain treated 4x4 placed about 30 inches or more in the ground would do. We're only talking $10 or less for the post. That will make a more permanent installation.
From the Star Trek movie "The Voyage Home". It's the line Kirk uses to explain Spocks strange responses to Jillian when she asks "Does he always talk like that?"
Yes I'm a Trekkie.....
The ones I put up are lagged in place with 4 stainless lags each. They are headless lags with machine threads on one end and lag screw on the other. Drilled a pilot hole and screwed them in about 4" and left about
4" sticking out. To them I mounted a nice piece of stainless plate and the light was mounted to that. Nice and solid and there is space for the tree to grow. Now I am just waiting for a new tree to grow out in the middle of the yard so I can mount a light there... May be a while!
Wouldn't it be more fun to install a pole and light and report on it here? ;-)
Cheers! Rich
LDS? Later Day Saints? That sounds more like Utah.
Or did you mean LSD? :-)
Enjoy, DoN.
On 10/22/2010 9:39 PM DoN. Nichols spake thus:
It was a Trekkie in-joke.
Gunner Asch wrote: ...
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Tree growth occurs in three places-- At the twig tips and root tips (meristem) and around the outside of the trunk, branches, and roots (cambium).
The meristem region of tissue expansion or tree growth is at the tips of both twigs and roots. This is unspecialized tissue that can form wood, buds, or flowers. Each year, trees will lengthen twigs and roots, produce flowers and fruit, and grow new buds.
As another poster has already noted, most of the bulk a tree trunk, branch, or root is dead wood. The living part is only a narrow of regenerating tissue (the cambium layer). Cambium produces new wood on its inside and new bark on its outside. The cambium grows only from the inside out, not up or down the length of a trunk, branch, or root.
Each year the cambium produces two distinct rings of tissue. In the spring, a layer of thinner-walled cells are grown. In the summer, a layer of thicker-celled, sometimes larger cells are grown. The layers are called "springwood" and "summerwood," respectively.
There's much on tree physiology at the Forest Products Laboratory web site as well as wood characteristics, drying, usage, etc., etc., etc., ...
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