An old friend rescued me from a bit of a jam last week. He's one of an elite group I've come to count on for more than four decades now.
I happened when a young river birch I had planted fell flat in a driving rain. Tying it into an upright position immediately, rain or not, seemed the only reasonable option for saving it.
After furiously pounding three wooden stakes into the ground, I quickly snipped off three hunks of rope. But how does one expediently attach and properly tighten three ropes in a downpour? My old pal, the taut-line hitch, specializes in such difficulties.
The taut-line hitch is a knot that slides along a rope so that its tightness can be adjusted and maintained. So after rapidly tying hitches on all three ropes, easing the tree into the proper stance took only moments.
When I entered the Boy Scouts at age 12, knots presented an agreeable challenge, even a fascination. After learning all the ones described in the Boy Scout Handbook, I bought an illustrated book of 100 knots and tackled a bunch of the new ones. Each soon manifested its own personality, strengths and preferred uses.
For simple cases of tying two ropes together, for example, I usually offer the square knot first dibs as it's both easy to tie and untie. But for ropes of different sizes, I defer to the sheet bend. Difficult and slippery cases may even demand a double sheet bend.
Knots have other applications. Once I captured a fast-moving stray dog, intending to hold him until Animal Control arrived. I quickly hooked a rope to his collar with two half hitches and efficiently secured the other end to a post with a clove hitch. But the once-mobile dog, upon finding himself firmly affixed to a stationary object, promptly chewed the rope in half and trotted away. Knots have limitations.
Some call the bowline "the king of knots" because it neither slips nor jams when properly executed. Thus, it's excellent for tying around a person in a rescue. I still recall the simple word picture we memorized to help recall which way to loop the loose end of the rope: "the rabbit comes out of the hole, around the tree, and back down the hole."
Slightly more complex is the bowline on a bight which has the advantage of not requiring one end of the rope be free to tie it. But the "rabbit and hole" picture works with it also.
Whenever a rope is a slightly too long, the sheep shank can temporarily take up the slack. Unfortunately, there's no knot for making a rope longer.
Tying a good knot is seldom enough; it must eventually be undone. So the choice of which knot to use may hinge on the difficulty to undo it once its job is done. Released with one quick jerk, the highwayman's hitch supposedly freed many a steed waiting to charge into the night.
Lifting the leaning. Securing the straying. Taking up slack. Knots perform all these jobs and more. And with both knots and people, the best friends do what the situation demands–but turn loose at the right time.
Copyright 2005 James McAlister
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