Tree felling is the process of cutting down a standing tree so that it falls to the ground in a controlled manner, leaving behind a stump. It’s the first step in converting a live tree into usable wood, whether for lumber, firewood, or land clearing. Felling can be done by hand with a chainsaw or by machine, but either way, the goal is the same: put the tree on the ground safely and in the right direction.
How Manual Felling Works
When a person fells a tree with a chainsaw, the process relies on a series of precise cuts that create a “hinge” in the trunk. This hinge is a strip of uncut wood that acts like a door hinge, guiding the tree as it tips and falls in the intended direction. The basic sequence involves two stages: a notch cut on the side facing the desired fall direction, followed by a back cut from the opposite side.
The notch is a wedge-shaped chunk removed from the trunk. As the back cut approaches the notch from behind, the remaining strip of wood between the two cuts becomes the hinge. Gravity takes over, the hinge folds, and the tree falls toward the open notch. Plastic felling wedges are often hammered into the back cut to nudge the tree forward and prevent it from settling backward onto the saw blade.
Historically, trees were felled with axes and crosscut saws. Chainsaws replaced those tools because they’re faster and require less physical effort, but the underlying geometry of notch and back cut hasn’t changed in principle.
Notch Types and Directional Control
Not all notch cuts are the same, and the type of notch determines how precisely you can control where the tree lands.
The conventional notch, which pairs a flat bottom cut with an angled top cut, was the standard for decades. Its weakness is that the notch closes as the tree falls, sometimes causing the trunk to hang up before it reaches the ground. The tree ends up partially fallen and still in the air, which is extremely dangerous.
The open-face notch has largely replaced the conventional notch in professional training. Popularized by Swedish felling expert Soren Erikson, it uses a wider opening of about 70 degrees between the top and bottom cuts, plus a plunge cut (where the saw enters the wood horizontally from the side). This wider opening keeps the hinge intact much longer during the fall, giving the feller far more directional control. The sequence is three cuts: a top cut, a plunge cut, and a final back cut.
Mechanical Felling
For commercial logging and large-scale land clearing, machines do the cutting. A feller buncher is a piece of heavy equipment that drives up to a tree (or reaches it with a hydraulic boom arm), grips the trunk, and severs it at the base using either a circular saw blade or a chainsaw-type cutting head. Older machines used shears that pinched through the trunk, but those fell out of favor because they crush the wood fibers and reduce timber quality.
After cutting, the feller buncher gathers several trees into a pile, or “bunch,” for later processing. More advanced harvesters go a step further: they fell the tree, pull the trunk through delimbing knives to strip off branches, measure the log’s length and diameter, and cut it into optimal log sizes, all in a single pass. These machines handle smaller-diameter trees efficiently and cover ground much faster than a person with a chainsaw. That speed makes careful planning essential, since mistakes also happen faster.
Assessing a Tree Before Cutting
Every felling operation starts with reading the tree and its surroundings. The key variables are lean, crown weight, nearby obstacles, and wind.
A tree’s natural lean is the single biggest factor in where it wants to fall. Trees leaning less than 15 degrees can typically be felled in a range of directions with proper technique. Trees leaning 15 degrees or more are a different situation entirely. Their failure zone, the area where they could land, extends from the base outward 1 to 1.5 times the tree’s height, fanning out 90 degrees on either side of the lean direction. Trying to fell a heavily leaning tree against its lean is dangerous and generally avoided.
Crown shape matters too. A tree with most of its branches on one side carries more weight in that direction, pulling it that way during the fall. Forked trees with V-shaped unions between their stems are more prone to splitting apart unpredictably than those with U-shaped forks. Dead tops, large dead branches (3 inches or more in diameter), and cracked limbs can break loose during the fall and fly in unexpected directions.
Wind adds another layer of unpredability. Gusts can carry broken treetops and branches farther than the length of the part itself, well outside what you’d expect from gravity alone. Professional fallers typically avoid working in high winds for this reason.
Common Felling Hazards
Tree felling is one of the most dangerous occupations in the world, and a few specific hazards account for most serious injuries.
Kickback is probably the most common cause of chainsaw accidents. It happens when the upper quarter of the saw bar’s tip contacts wood or another solid object. The chain catches, and the rotational force flings the bar backward toward the operator’s face and upper body. Modern chainsaws have chain brakes and low-kickback chains to reduce this risk, but it remains a constant threat.
Barber chair is a particularly terrifying failure. It occurs when a heavy, forward-leaning tree splits vertically up the trunk instead of hinging and falling cleanly. The bottom of the split trunk kicks upward while the top comes down, resembling a reclining barber’s chair. This can happen with front-leaning trees or when too much pulling force is applied with a rope. The split trunk moves violently and unpredictably.
Widowmakers are dead branches or treetops lodged in the canopy that can fall at any time during felling, often with no warning. They’re called that for a reason.
Setback is less dramatic but still dangerous. It happens when a tree settles backward onto the saw blade during the back cut, pinching and trapping the chainsaw. The feller then has to free the saw from a partially cut, unstable tree.
Safety Rules and Protective Gear
OSHA’s logging standard (1910.266) sets specific requirements for anyone felling trees professionally. The most important spatial rule is the two-tree-length rule: no one is allowed within two tree lengths of a tree being felled until the feller confirms it’s safe to approach. Adjacent work areas must also be spaced at least two tree lengths apart, and no machinery can operate within two tree lengths of manual felling.
Required personal protective equipment for chainsaw operators includes:
- Leg protection: Chaps or pants made with cut-resistant material like ballistic nylon, covering from the thigh to the top of the boot on each leg
- Foot protection: Heavy-duty waterproof logging boots with cut-resistant material and ankle support
- Head protection: A hard hat rated for falling and flying objects
- Eye and face protection: Safety glasses or logger-type mesh screens
- Hand protection: Gloves that resist punctures and lacerations
Permits and Local Regulations
If you’re thinking about felling a tree on your own property, local regulations may require a permit before you cut. Many municipalities protect trees above a certain size. A common threshold is 6 inches in diameter at breast height (about 4.5 feet above the ground). In Strongsville, Ohio, for example, no tree at or above that 6-inch threshold can be removed without a permit from the city forester.
Protected species, trees in wetland buffers, and heritage or landmark trees often have additional restrictions. The specific rules vary widely by city and county, so checking with your local planning or forestry department before cutting is the practical first step. Even on rural land, state forestry regulations or conservation easements may apply.
Reducing Environmental Damage
How a tree is felled affects more than just the tree itself. Careless felling damages surrounding trees that are meant to remain standing, compacts soil under heavy equipment, and tears up the forest floor. Research across Southeast Asia, Africa, and Central and South America has documented that these impacts drop significantly when logging crews follow reduced-impact logging practices.
Directional felling is a core element of every reduced-impact logging guideline. By controlling exactly where a tree lands, fallers avoid crushing neighboring trees, keep logs out of streams, and reduce the number of skid trails needed to haul wood out. For the same reasons, directional felling matters even when you’re dropping a single backyard tree: putting it where you want it means less damage to fences, structures, and the trees you’re keeping.