In order for spiking to be effective, it must be done thoroughly and advertised broadly. If potential owners, loggers, sawmill owners are not aware that the trees have been spiked they might end up getting cut anyway. So we’ll consider the nuts and bolts of tree spiking in two sections, hardware and software.

Hardware
Being a sawmill owner and operator myself, I would be wary of cutting into trees that had nails in them. Small common nails don’t do much damage, maybe dull a few teeth. If I thought that there was only a chance of one small nail in the log – I’d go ahead and saw it up. But if I thought the log might contain several large hardened nails in the log I’d refuse to cut it. Cutting into one of these could not only do more damage to the sawblade, but also throw out dangerous projectiles.

Spikes - Therefore I recommend and so instructed the crew that assisted us in spiking our future old growth to use at least 20 penny nails and, although they are more expensive, to use hardened or ‘masonry’ nails. For our tree spiking party covering initially 20 acres, we used 50 pounds total of 20 penny common and 3½” and 3” masonry nails, in equal amounts.

Tools - Each member of the tree spike team should have a heavy 16 - 20 oz framing hammer. Anything heavier can wear you out after hours of spiking. Muscles and liteweights can adjust hammer weight to suit.
Nail pouch – a necessity for comfortable tree spiking. Holds a pound or two of spikes, good for an hour's diversion.
Ladder - One or two ladders per crew. In order to further dissuade potential harvesters, a certain low percentage of trees should be spiked in several random locations both high and low. This helps prevent those who would hope to circumvent the obstacle of tree spikes by felling the tree by cutting them say 6 feet above ground. Remember, these trees, if the don’t get harvested in 50 or 100 years will be very large tempting targets for loggers.
Camera – be sure to document the event.

Software
Instructions to crew -
What trees to spike. For the most part we tend to head straight over to the straightest, tallest trees around to spike. Although these are the most likely targets of loggers, smaller trees and saplings should also receive these preventative inoculations. In a hundred years these will be the real beginnings of your ancient forest.

Crew members should be given or shown a map of the ‘future old growth area’. Alternately you can use that orange plastic ribbon to delineate the border of the spike area. I found it almost impossible to organize the crew, so that they didn’t wander off or end up criss-crossing each others areas. It’s a party after all, and it seemed to work best when spikers teamed up and I didn’t worry if some trees were done twice.

How to spike
*Generally one spike is enough, but every 10th tree, especially if its awfully nice, use 4 or 5 spikes; some close to the ground, some as high as you can reach. Use the ladder, or shinny up the tree. Trunks that lean are much easier to climb.
*Driving the spike in at an angle increases the chance that the chain saw will hit it.
*The spike should be driven in as far as possible. The quicker the tree grows over the wound the better. *Nails that are left protruding take longer for the tree to cover.
*Be sure to strike the nail squarely and not miss. Too many whacks on the bark of the tree causes ineffective wound healing

Informing the world
*All the spikes in Alfred Hall won’t protect the forest if you don’t make sure anyone thinking about timbering the land knows that the forest has been spiked. If they cut down half the forest before hitting enough nails to wake them up, then what’s the point? It might also be argued that you could be held liable for any injury that occurs due to your spiking, unless you make sure all potentially impacted will be aware of the spiking.
*The most effective way to let future land owners know about the spiking is to insert a notice into the deed for the land. You can simply transfer the land through your lawyer back to yourself, with the new deed explaining the nature of this new encumbrance, adding a map of the area if you like.
*You can also post your property much like ‘no hunting’ signs. “Warning trees growing on this property have been spiked with hardened nails to prevent their as commodity by humans”. Of course as we are looking to protect this land for centuries, ordinary paper signs have limited value, good plastic signs would be better, but in any case relying on this method would demand renewing the signs regularly. It would be a good educational tool.
*Thirdly, post information on your protected area on the WWW. Savage Forester welcomes legal spikers to post their forest here - On our Spiked Forest Registry.