Let everyone climb trees!

[Tom Dunlap]

http://www.fiftydangerousthings.com/2010/06/some-thoughts-on-28-climb-a-tree/

 

[tomthetreeman]

It certainly makes you think about the topic... As an industry we are pushing safety so hard, but should we ask our kids to be tied in at all times?

I think part of children's experience with trees should be free climbing, learning to trust themselves. Just my opinion.

...I guess I am a bit contradicted on this set of issues.

-Tom

 

[moss]

A friend's 11 year-old boy fell out of a tree when a skinny branch he was hanging on broke, he survived but suffered permanent brain injuries.

I free climbed trees starting when I was 7 or 8, by the time I was 12 I was climbing into the tops of tall trees, moving from one leader to another at height etc. All of my friends were, none of us had any serious falls.

Kids do a lot of things outside of their parents control (at least we used to) best a parent can do is teach their kid solid free climbing principles like 3 points of contact at all times, feet and hands on branches close to the trunk, stay off dead branches etc.

The desire to climb trees is deeply rooted in our evolutionary history, I've seen 3-year olds grab around a small trunk and start shinnying right up. There's no way any parent is going to stop a kid who wants to climb unless they hover over them 24/7.
-moss

 

[Crazy_Jimmy]

Some kids have no desire to climb trees at all,does that mean we are further down the ladder.

 

[moss]

[ QUOTE ]
Some kids have no desire to climb trees at all,does that mean we are further down the ladder.

[/ QUOTE ]

Nah, it means the kids who don't want to climb are spending too much time on their video games and texting. Humans are evolving to be flabby extensions of technology, it's up to tree climbers to save the human race! Ok, I admit I had too much coffee already this morning.
-moss

 

[MattyD]

HAHA! So True Moss!

 

[treebing]

there are safe ways to freeclimb and unsafe ways to freeclimb. harnesses ropes and helmets are not necesarily correlated with safety. See Dan Osman. There are unsafe kids and safe kids the unsafe ones are going to figure out how to hurt themselves one way or another no matter what you do.

 

[Sam Hodgson]

My son climbs our trees all the time not tied in. But once he wants to go over about ten feet then he has to have his harness and ropes other wise I wount let him go up. When I was young I would climb 50 ft. up into pines and swing side to side at the top with no tie in pertection. Now I get scared when my son wants to do it.