Treehouses and Treeforts

Elevated living often comes up in discussions on the ZSDW as living in the trees seems like an ideal solution to a world of walking dead.

Pros

Living in the trees, ala Costner's Robin Hood: Prince of Theives, seems like a romantic notion. Tied to nature, free of the industrial world, and looking down on all the zombies below. There are some advantages worth noting:

- the view (altitude improves your radius of vision)
- safety (nothing is going to get up to you, at least not quickly or quiety)
- some resistance to flooding

Cons

There are, of course, several drawbacks to living in the trees.

- if you can see, you can be seen (making you an easy target to pick off from raiders)
- stability (trees move, and the higher you are the more you sway)
- everything you need must be hauled up, meaning several extra tons of material movement every years
- space is at a premium
- water is a serious concern
- a tree structure would need to be in existance before the apocalypse, making it meaningless to those not seriously considering building one now

Types

There are two ways of creating elevated living space: suspension and supported.

Supported structures are directly fastened to the trees (or support poles). Many pillar based beach homes are elevated structures for flood protection. Supported structures benefit from added strength and stability, but if built to living trees run the greatest risk of damaging (or killing) the tree. If built on sound pillars (like power poles), a structure can be as well footed as any house.

Suspension structures are held in the air by cables attached to trees. These can be as simple as one person hammocks or as large as a multiroom home held by dozens of cables connected to a variety of trees. Suspension structures tend to have the most sway, but they can exist in stands of trees and are not dependent on the life or strength of any one tree.

Trees

While using artifical pilliars is the best route (footings in concrete are stronger than roots, the posts are less flexible, and they are resistant to rot).

Otherwise, choose trees that are strong, long lived, and good compartment (tendency to grow over and around wounds, rather than opening up and rotting from the inside). Oak, hickory, beach, maple, and pecan are good choices. Pines, ceders, and poplars are generally poor choices.

Things to consider

(1) Are there building codes / permits you will have to deal with in construction of your treefort until the apocalypse?
(2) How will you aquire food, water, and fuel? Stockpiling is more complicated in the limited space of a treehome.
(3) Will you be okay sleeping in your treehome (height and motion sickness are real issues, particularly during a windy storm)?
(4) Do you have the engineering skills necessary to build and maintain such a structure? Tree homes must be overbuilt to compensate for continual shifting. When in doubt, drill and use bolts, as nails will pull out and screws will shear.

Helpful hints

Vertical and hanging gardens are made for tree homes. Hanging buckets can be suspended from cables that are not part of your structure like an old city clothes-line. Beans, tomatos, strawberries all already are often grown fron hanging baskets. Grapes can be grown from barrels across trellises, or with a few year's work, can be grown up from the ground and then allowed to spread at treehouse level.

Waterwells will need protection from freezing, but the water can be pumped up to the home as well as it can be pumped up to ground level. This is much more difficult with suspension building.

If you cannot climb a straight rope ladder, you should not plan for tree living. Climbing is part of the game and you need to be able to lower yourself from a plain rope safely - even in the middle of the night.