Taking Them Down

     Today, my ham antennas have to come down.  Partially, anyway, because starting tomorrow, the tree service may begin removing the giant hackberry tree and the two-of-three-trunks-remaining maple.

     Both trees have been involved in supporting my antennas, though the hackberry was not a major part of the supports for my G5RV.  The "Carolina Windom" off-center-fed multiband dipole is another story -- the feedpoint transformer hangs from the maple.  I'm not sure if I'll be able to to anything with it before Spring.

     My guess is that they'll show up inconveniently early or not at all.

     The tree service started out strong -- established firm, professional estimate, in line with other estimates I'd gotten for the work in the past -- and then, once I'd accepted he estimate but before any money had changed hands, they went silent.  No reply to e-mail.  Okay, they were busy, then we had the Christmas and New Year's holidays, but then....  I telephoned them last week, and they were nice but non-committal (bear in mind, these are big trees in tight quarters, power and telephone drops strung on each side of them, calling for specialized equipment), then called back that afternoon and asked, "How about next Monday?"

     Okay.  So down come the antennas, the grill and firepit get tucked in the narrow walkway between the garage and the fence and I'll see what happens next.