Heights may be one of Mark Mahorney biggest fears, but that didn’t keep him from achieving a lofty goal of carving a dying plains cottonwood tree into a work of art.
“I’m honestly scared most of the time,” Mahorney said as he was suspended about 40 feet off the ground in a cherry picker positioned next to the tree. “You get used to it after a while and don’t really notice how far up you are.”
Over a three-day period, Mahorney, a Kremmling resident, carved a pair of eagles into the tree.
He was commissioned by Adams County Fair administrators to turn the lower portion of the tree, which has sat on the Adams County Fairgrounds for about a century, into a work of art.
“We wanted it to be an event where people could actually come out and see the tree transform in front of them,” Kurt Carlson, an Adams County Regional Park Complex manager said. “We wanted something related to the venue and the history of the area.”
Melanie Snodell, an Adams County co-fair manager, said plans were initially in place to remove the tree last month after a county-commissioned arborist determined that the tree was nearing the end of its life span. Rather than have it removed, the Adams County Fair paid Mahorney about $3,000 to carve something into the tree that would represent Adams County.
Carlson said the subject of the carving — one nesting bald eagle and a bald eagle in flight at the top of two tree limbs — was inspired by the large number of eagles that settle near the Adams County Regional Park along the South Platte River.
Throughout the Adams County Fair, the subject of the carving was kept a secret so spectators could watch Mahorney work on his masterpiece.
Mahorney said the sculpture was not the largest he has made, but said it may be one of the most complicated.
For nearly six hours on Aug. 2, he and other fair workers worked to cut off a bee-infested tree limb before he could begin carving.
“When you have a tree that is so beautiful … it’s nice to be able to repurpose it somehow,” Mahorney said as he began carving one of the eagles’ wings with a chainsaw. “It’s a way to really preserve it and give back some meaning to it.”