Tree-cutting

Last summer when everything was green and the leaves were out, I went through the woods with a marking tape and tagged a number of trees that were dead. Now that winter is here and the leaves are gone, it is time to take them out.
My son sharpened the chain-saw. His first time. It’s been used casually a couple of times and needed it. The first tree had already fallen since I marked it. The ants and rot had gotten into the lower part. The trunk had given way and the tree was leaning into a nearby tree. This is a particularly bad situation for cutting since it is difficult to tell which way the trunk is stressed and will move when cut. We set up some cargo straps as tensioners to try and persuade the trunk to move away from the current lean. This was supposed to let the trunk come off the stump after it was cut. He cut a wedge to give the tree a place to lean and the cut from the tension side to get it to break. It did not go as planned and fell into another tree. We dragged the butt away from the stump until it came down.
We cut down and cut up 3 trees that day. A few weeks later we cut down 3 more and cut up 4, including one that had fallen in a wind storm.
Subsequently, we gave a chain-saw lesson to the my daughter, her friend and my son’s friend.