Topband: tree losses

[Tom W8JI]

<<<I found this and at least it makes a good old read.

http://www.rexresearch.com/squier/squier.htm
>>>

This is how things get started! once something is in print, no matter how 
wrong or unsubstantiated, it lives forever. Look at this statement:

<<
It will puzzle the amateur as it has puzzled the experts, how a tree, which 
is certainly well grounded, can also be an insulated aerial. The method of 
getting the disturbances in potential from treetop to instrument is so 
simple as to be almost laughable. One climbs a tree to two-thirds of its 
height, drives a nail a couple of inches into the tree, hangs a wire 
therefrom, and attaches the wire to the receiving apparatus as if it were a 
regular lead-in from a lofty copper or aluminum aerial. Apparently some of 
the etheric disturbances passing from treetop to ground through the tree are 
diverted through the wire --- and the thermionic tube most efficiently does 
the rest. >>

In about 100 years, we should reasonably believe there would be logically 
conducted experiments with documentation showing trees make reasonable 
antennas. We should also expect that trees would, by now, be universally 
hailed as useful antennas.

The article even claims it makes no difference if the tree antenna is in a 
thick woods, something we know cannot be true, and that simply disconnecting 
the wire from the tree causes the set to "go dead", something else we know 
is untrue. It also claims a 40 ft wire cannot work on multiple frequencies, 
which I suppose people who like magic 43 foot verticals would disagree with.

Instead we have only reports and measurements that trees cause increased 
loss, and all those multiband single length antennas.  :)

73 Tom