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Garnier Limbs for Treehouses
Tree house builders everywhere have often wondered about the best ways to support tree houses in trees. They usually have dual concerns about both supporting heavy loads (with a safety factor above expected loads) and minimizing damage to (or growth interference) with their trees. The original garnier limb, or GL, was a jump forward for treehouse attachment methodology and today is still a decent piece of hardware for certain lighter treehouse applications. The original GL was developed by several professional treehouse builders in the 1990's. It didn't take long before some rudimentary testing took place with hydraulic jacks, and as a result, bigger and better attached limb systems were developed to safely put even larger loads on a single bolt in a living tree.
Other Names for Treehouse Fasteners
The naming of garnier limbs (GLs) has always been an area of confusion for everyone involved. The original garnier limb was never patented, and so many look-a-likes followed, some better, some worse than the original. But a uniform generic name for the class of fasteners has not yet taken hold throughout the industry. Some of the leading names we have heard so far are GL Type Anchor Bolts or GL TABs, Artificial Limbs, Artificial Limb Systems, Special Tree Fasteners or STFs, Attached Limb Systems, Tree Anchor Bolts, Heavy Limbs or HLs, or Tree House Attachment Hardware. Have you heard of others? Let us know!
Our Website is Branching Out!
We are still under construction, but just think, if you came here last summer, there wasn't even color, just text! I have been building it a little at a time. Last fall, I added the installation and specs pages. I am always interested in learning more about GLs and similar fasteners for treehouses, including brackets that fit on them and alternative attachment systems. Please email us if you have or know of any websites, information, pictures, manufacturers, or testing results that will help make this site the most thorough source of GL information on the web. We'd love to have pictures and stories from people who have built treehouses with garnier limbs and other tree house specific bolts or fasteners, especially if they show the attachment methods up close, and particularly if the treehouses are over 10 years old... Happy tree house building!