TITLE: A 20 cm measuring stick
DATE: 2019-04-30
AUTHOR: John L. Godlee
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When I was in Mozambique in May last year I made a 20 cm stick from 
a piece of wood I found in a woodland survey plot. The purpose of 
the stick was to measure the height at which a tree tag should be 
nailed into a tree relative to the height of the trunk diameter 
measurement. Placing the tag relative to the diameter measurement 
means that in future years repeat trunk diameter measurements can 
be made in the same place without having to consult the original 
data. The stick also came to Angola with me and was very useful. I 
put it on a lanyard of bailer twine, added a few embellishments to 
the wood and polished it a bit with some beeswax/paraffin based 
boot wax.

  ![Measuring 
stick](https://johngodlee.xyz/img_full/measuring_stick/stick.jpg)

This got me thinking about useful measurements for certain tasks. A 
friend told me about a seamstress they knew that had a 1 foot 
measurement tattooed on her forearm for measuring the length of 
material. Maybe I could get 1.3 m tattooed somewhere on my body to 
mark the default location of a DBH (Diameter at Breast Height) 
measurement. Maybe measuring from the ground up to a place on my 
chest would worl. This would be more symbolic than useful I think, 
as the tattoo would be covered by clothes nearly all the time, but 
given that I've measured the DBH of well over 8000 trees I would 
say its formed a fairly important chunk of my life over the last 
few years and might deserve a symbolic tattoo. I thought about 
getting "1.3 m" tattooed somewhere near the line, but I think 
actually I'd prefer to leave it simple looking.