The Lost Art of Tree Fishing

Now that the Northeast seems to have finally shaken off the icy grip of winter, I've taken the first reluctant steps outside of my cave to engage in some outdoor activities. This week I found myself "tree fishing" - which is my self-coined euphemism for hanging a random wire style antenna in one of my backyard trees to use for ham radio communications. This process involved me, standing outside and hurling a spool of bright yellow fishing line into the tree, over and over again, until I managed to toss it over a branch of sufficient height. I then attached some thin nylon rope to the line and pulled it over the branch, finally completing the process by securing 29 feet of suitable wire to the rope and hoisting that up into the air. The antenna was connected to a 9:1 UnUn transformer, which I housed in a water proof box mounted on some stockade fence a short distance from the tree. The UnUn also has connections on the box for a ground wire - which is running across the yard perpendicular from the antenna and a RG58 coax which is running up to the second floor office where it is connected to a 20 watt Xiegu G90 HF transceiver. This configuration works fairly well with bands 10 - 40 meters, and I had great success hearing stations as far away as Ireland and Scotland on 20 meters. I'll probably keep this up as a temporary HF solution through the summer while I figure out a more permanent installation for the fall.

 

My Neighbors must have been scratching their heads to see me flinging a spool of fishing line up into the tree over and over again. We finally managed to get the antenna hung from a reasonable height. 

 

The Xiegu G90. A surprisingly capable low-watt HF transceiver. Now if only 10 meters would open up!