Truly. People out west complain about all sorts of thorns and cacti and other painfull stuff but until you have walked, in boots, through a yard full of those little mother-humpers you really haven’t felt pain.
Yes, they are that MF evil
For all y’all who don’t know what that is, it’s a sweetgum ball. Which the sweetgum tree will drop a gazillion of the little bastards all over everywhere.
Even worse, the sweetgum is the retarded red-headed stepchild of all the other hardwoods. It’s a semi-hard, semi-soft wood that is easily infested by wood-boring insects and is known for just suddenly for no reason at all dropping the top half of the tree. High winds, low winds, no winds, there it goes. Shit wood doesn’t even burn well. Doesn’t split well, doesn’t saw with a chainsaw well. MF tree will go out of its way to try to kill you in a thousand ways. Dropping the whole top of the tree? Yep. Dropping instant widowmakers? Yep. Doing it while you are rolling around on those little balls of death trying not to fall on those little balls of death (seriously, looking like you just walked out on slick ice, but instead more like the punk-rock version of ball bearings.
Hate sweetgums. Hate them with a passion.
Stick tights are far worse and burrs are not to be mentioned in polite company. I’ve never had any trouble with those things in the pic.
I would say they’re worse than Legos, but that’s just me.
You haven’t stepped on one of these in bare feet when they’re green then…
There was one of those trees off the corner of our house, next to the driveway, when we bought it. As soon as we closed on the deal, the tree came down.
Add a little gas or diesel, the burn just fine!
I’ve got one in the corner of my front yard and one along the property line about half way to the back of the yard.
I’ve got a Granberg Alaskan Sawmill and remodeled one of my daughters rooms using wood from my back 30.
Pine, Wild Cherry, Cedar, and Sweetgum for the wainscoating.
The Sweetgum has the most beautiful chocolate core when cleaned up and polyeurothaned.
But yeah, pretty much junk wood.
-rightwingterrorist
Apparently you folk are not familiar with the legendary and painfully nefarious southwest Florida sand spurs. Sand spurs eat those sweetgum balls for breakfast and shit em out at lunch. You haven’t lived until you’ve ran barefoot across the yard and hit a patch of sand spurs. Devils teefs. Look em up.
We call ’em goat heads around here.
Same here, in the Wild West… They go through bare feet and bike tires like crap through a goose!
Oh, I’m familiar with those bastards, and I thought they were bad. Until I stepped on sweetgum balls while wearing combat boots and felt every damned spine on the ball.
Sandspurs suck. But you can kill them pretty easily.
Sweetgums? Chop it down and more will grow from the roots, some will grow from the fallen trunk. Actively attack it and it will grow back in spades. Ignore it and it will just grow.
Those trees aren’t strictly “Southern…” We had one of them across the street when I was growing up on Long Island. I moved out West and lo and behold, there were TWO of those damned trees in the yard of our new house! The most USELESS trees on Earth, except for, say, palm trees. Those balls couldn’t be picked up with a mower. They couldn’t be raked up. They’d DESTROY a leaf blower in “vacuum” mode. I HATED those trees!!!
The adults called them Gumball Maple and Liquid Amber. We called them “Itchyball Trees.” One of those balls, green, shot out of a wrist rocket was a force to be reckoned with!
In SoCal, we used to have fights with them. We called ’em ‘Monkey Balls’ and yes, when green, they were very painful. Dried up, they weren’t so bad.
Horse chestnut hulls are similar with shorter and less flexible pigstickers.
Most useless tree in the world.
Truly. People out west complain about all sorts of thorns and cacti and other painfull stuff but until you have walked, in boots, through a yard full of those little mother-humpers you really haven’t felt pain.
Yes, they are that MF evil
For all y’all who don’t know what that is, it’s a sweetgum ball. Which the sweetgum tree will drop a gazillion of the little bastards all over everywhere.
Even worse, the sweetgum is the retarded red-headed stepchild of all the other hardwoods. It’s a semi-hard, semi-soft wood that is easily infested by wood-boring insects and is known for just suddenly for no reason at all dropping the top half of the tree. High winds, low winds, no winds, there it goes. Shit wood doesn’t even burn well. Doesn’t split well, doesn’t saw with a chainsaw well. MF tree will go out of its way to try to kill you in a thousand ways. Dropping the whole top of the tree? Yep. Dropping instant widowmakers? Yep. Doing it while you are rolling around on those little balls of death trying not to fall on those little balls of death (seriously, looking like you just walked out on slick ice, but instead more like the punk-rock version of ball bearings.
Hate sweetgums. Hate them with a passion.
Stick tights are far worse and burrs are not to be mentioned in polite company. I’ve never had any trouble with those things in the pic.
I would say they’re worse than Legos, but that’s just me.
You haven’t stepped on one of these in bare feet when they’re green then…
There was one of those trees off the corner of our house, next to the driveway, when we bought it. As soon as we closed on the deal, the tree came down.
Add a little gas or diesel, the burn just fine!
I’ve got one in the corner of my front yard and one along the property line about half way to the back of the yard.
I’ve got a Granberg Alaskan Sawmill and remodeled one of my daughters rooms using wood from my back 30.
Pine, Wild Cherry, Cedar, and Sweetgum for the wainscoating.
The Sweetgum has the most beautiful chocolate core when cleaned up and polyeurothaned.
But yeah, pretty much junk wood.
-rightwingterrorist
Apparently you folk are not familiar with the legendary and painfully nefarious southwest Florida sand spurs. Sand spurs eat those sweetgum balls for breakfast and shit em out at lunch. You haven’t lived until you’ve ran barefoot across the yard and hit a patch of sand spurs. Devils teefs. Look em up.
We call ’em goat heads around here.
Same here, in the Wild West… They go through bare feet and bike tires like crap through a goose!
Oh, I’m familiar with those bastards, and I thought they were bad. Until I stepped on sweetgum balls while wearing combat boots and felt every damned spine on the ball.
Sandspurs suck. But you can kill them pretty easily.
Sweetgums? Chop it down and more will grow from the roots, some will grow from the fallen trunk. Actively attack it and it will grow back in spades. Ignore it and it will just grow.
Those trees aren’t strictly “Southern…” We had one of them across the street when I was growing up on Long Island. I moved out West and lo and behold, there were TWO of those damned trees in the yard of our new house! The most USELESS trees on Earth, except for, say, palm trees. Those balls couldn’t be picked up with a mower. They couldn’t be raked up. They’d DESTROY a leaf blower in “vacuum” mode. I HATED those trees!!!
The adults called them Gumball Maple and Liquid Amber. We called them “Itchyball Trees.” One of those balls, green, shot out of a wrist rocket was a force to be reckoned with!
In SoCal, we used to have fights with them. We called ’em ‘Monkey Balls’ and yes, when green, they were very painful. Dried up, they weren’t so bad.
Horse chestnut hulls are similar with shorter and less flexible pigstickers.