pruning

Clean up: Spruce grove perimeter, reaching the fence!

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It’s been a while, but today I was able to continue working on the perimeter of the spruce grove.  I started off at the little maple I had stopped at, last time, and made it to the fence line. :-D

The last time I went through the area, looking ahead to what needed to be done, it was still green.  The leaves are completely yellow, now!

Here are the before and after pictures. (click on the images to see them better)

The cluster of trees is made of up 3 poplars and 2 spruces.  One of the poplars has lost its top, and I’m pretty sure that’s what’s lying on the ground near the little dead spruces I took out.  There is some dogwood at the bottom of this group of trees that I cleaned up a bit, but otherwise left to grow.  It’s one of those things that will spread quite handily, given the opportunity.

The next section is an open, mossy area.  I’ve been using it to turn around with the riding mower.

Most of the clean up here involved pruning shears instead of saws.

Once that was done, I was at the fence line and had to make some decisions.  How far to the north did I want to go?

In the end, I decided I needed to at least clear out a dead tree that had fallen on the fence, so I could access it for repair.

Though the dead tree was a big poplar, the remains of two other trees had also fallen on it.

The poplar itself was growing on the outside of the fence line.  There are a few larger trees on the outside that I will have to leave, but I will be taking out any smaller trees on that side, as soon as I am able.  I’m not sure about the bylaws in regards to municipal land along the roads, as far as who is responsible for keeping it clear, but I don’t want it to become overgrown with trees like it has on the other side of our gate.

I didn’t do much more in this area, as I want to focus in the other direction, so this section is unfinished.  There are a couple of trees that will be taken out, because they are too close to the fence line.  Otherwise, it’s mostly undergrowth that will need clearing and cleaning.  There seems to be some juniper in there that I intend to leave.

Moving southward, now.

There are some pretty massive spruces here!  There isn’t really a lot that needs doing with the trees themselves; a few low hanging branches and dead branches to clear out.  I could see that, at some point – long ago – someone had gone through and cleared the lower branches, so they were already pretty good.  Again, I spent more time with the pruning shears!  There are quite a few poplar on the outside of the fence that I will have to go back to, later.

If you look in the before picture, at the big spruce to the left of centre, you can almost see a potential problem.  The top of this tree is broken off, and its top is still there, hanging upside down.  I have no idea how long it’s been like this, but at some point, it’s going to fall.  Ideally, we’d get it down before it falls on its own and potentially damages something, but for now, it will have to wait.

It’s starting to open up quite nicely.

Though my priority is clearing the fence line, so it can be accessed and repaired as needed, I might have to clear out some of the dead wood further into the grove.  There is a large spruce that has come down in the area that I am leaving for next year, but I might have to cut away at least some of the branches, just so I can drag out some of the stuff I know I will be dealing with, further down.

And that is my progress for today!  It might be another few days before I can work on it again, so I’m glad I was able to at least get this little corner done.

The Re-Farmer

Clean up: spruce grove perimeter, start

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I got a few hours work on the spruce grove this morning/afternoon, and plan to head out again, but here’s progress so far!

I’ve started at the north west corner, where the stone cross is.

This is more or less what we see out of our living room window.  I went farther into the underbrush than I intend to, elsewhere.  This is part of the reason why.

That’s the top of the dead tree we watched come down in a storm this past winter.  The top alone is bigger than some of the dead trees I’ve taken down!

Here’s another view of the corner.

The topsoil here is decades of decayed spruce needles, so it’s quite loose.  This meant a lot of the spirea I cleared out could be pulled right out of the ground.  Every  now and then, I’d find myself yanking out anywhere from 2 – 8 feet of rhizome!

After this, I started working my way down the north side of the trees.

After clearing the lower hanging branches from the first couple of trees, I found a whole crop of little dead spruces that I cleared out.

Of course, there is always going to be some unusual finds!

The first was what I think is the top of an oil drum that was half buried in the needles at the base of a dead spruce.  I pulled it out, then took the photo of it right where I found it.

Then, as I was finishing up for the afternoon and bringing the wheel barrow over, I found the glass jar.

I expected it to be broken, but when I pulled it out, it was fine.

I have to say how much I appreciate my girls.  While I was working in this, I left what I cut or pulled out, off to the side.  My older daughter came out and started hauling it away for me – a much bigger job than the clean up!  My younger daughter didn’t have a shift today, and between the two of them, they took care of the household stuff, like cooking, washing dishes, laundry, etc., freeing me up to do the yard work.

We’ve started a new wood pile outside the yard for this.  It’s kinda in the middle of the outer yard, between house and barn.  This pile shouldn’t need to be moved, when we are ready to burn it.

20180820.cleanup.sprucegrove.newpile

We do plan to rent a chipper, but there’s only so much we can chip!  Plus, even the biggest ones only do up to 4 inches in diameter.

It’s going to be much bigger, before I’m done!

Now, back to see how much I can get done, before it gets too dark. :-)

The Re-Farmer

Clean up; west fence area trees

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We had another cooler day today; after this it’s supposed to heat up again, so I took advantage of it to continue in the west yard trees.  I am so close to being finished here (I’ve decided not to do the rest of the fence line itself for now), I’m getting excited, because it means I can finally move on to the spruce grove perimeter. :-D  I’d like to get as much as I can done there, before I have to stop for the year.

The first thing I did was finally take down the two dead trees by the smaller willow. (The before and after pictures are taken from opposite directions)

The one that was about midway between the two willows was a bit of a job.  It was tall enough, and leaning enough, that it was well into the branches of the big willow.  Which means that, after I cut the trunk, the base just swung over to the big willow, and there it hung.  It did not want to come down!

The wood from these trees is going to be kept for the fire pit.

The tall stumps are being left until we get a full size chainsaw.

On to the next area…

There’s not a lot of visible difference here, since I worked in this area yesterday.  I took down the dead half of the maple trees.  After that, most of what I did was take down dead branches from above, except from the one mostly dead spruce that will be taken down entirely.

Next areas; the last of those rows of spruces!

Also, I found a third little tamarack hiding in them.

It really looked like a spindly, dead spruce.  I honestly probably should have taken it out, but I really want to keep the tamarack. I also should probably have thinned the spruces out more, too, because of how close together they are, but they look strong and healthy enough to make it.  So for now, they will stay.  Next year, perhaps, we can transplant the tamarack, instead.

After this, I finally got to working among the beeches.

The before picture, I’d taken yesterday.  If you look along the beeches, you can see a single trunk, slightly out of line.

It turned out not to be a trunk at all.  It was a branch that had fallen straight, and was standing there, held up by the other branches!  You can even see the broken bit it had come from.

I’ve been finding quite a lot of dead branches held up by others.  One I pulled down earlier and moved out today, filled the wheelbarrow all on its own!

In the northernmost row, I found another Colorado Blue spruce, with an elm tree growing right next to it.  Well.  Two elms, really, right up against each other.

The spruce was planted deliberately; the elm would not have been.  Because of how big a Colorado Blue can potentially get, I took out the elm and some small maples near it as well.  I probably should have taken out the maple to the right of the foreground in the after photo too, but it seems to be doing okay.  We’ll see how the spruce survives.

Here’s another view of the rows.

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By this point, I didn’t really have the energy to keep breaking down the cut pieces and hauling them out of the yard, or dragging out entire trees.  I opened the gate at this end, so I wouldn’t be weaving through trees to the gate by the fire pit, then around the pile.  Instead, I was pushing my way through really tall grass, and wearing down a path.  As I was taking down bigger and bigger dead branches, and thinning out more trees, I just started piling it all in the space that had been plowed.  I will drag it out another day.

The row of trees closest to the beeches appears to be all crab apple trees.  Most have no apples, and the one that does, has almost none on it.  This is not a good place to plant fruit trees. :-/

Moving along the rows…

This area is not complete, though I might not do much more than this, this year.  The elms in the north row needed to be thinned out; one was right up against another, and it turned out to be dead.  The larger maple to the right in the photo will also be thinned down.  The side branches would have been suckers that never got pruned back when they should have.  The main trunk in the middle is suffering for it.  I wasn’t able to get all the dead branches out of it, and won’t be able to reach a lot of them until the side trunks are cleared out.

Once that is done, it will allow more light to reach the apple trees, too.

Speaking of which…

This is where I was working when I stopped to take a phone call.  Which was well timed.  I was at the point of telling myself it was really time to stop for the day, but I kept doing just a little bit more, a little bit more, a little bit…  and before I knew it, an hour had passed. :-D

I don’t know that I’ll be able to work in here again over the next few days, but when I do get back to it, I will continue thinning the crab apple trees out.  There is a big one at the end, with large branches reaching towards the power pole.  That part of it is covered with apples (it looks like another of the ornamental apples trees, they are so tiny), but only where the morning sun touches those leaning branches.  The rest of the tree is struggling, with few leaves and many dead branches.  It’s all just too crowded in there, with elm and maple tangled around each other in the canopy, blocking the light for most of the day.

The eastern end of this area of trees is where they are growing under the power line, and where the arborist will be trimming some of them back.  They can do the tall stuff.  I will do the short stuff! :-)

When I came out after my phone call to get the last after pictures, I got a couple of others of interest.

Last month, I decided to take down a small elm tree because it was growing directly under the power lines.  As I have been doing in many other places, I left a tall stump to go back to later.  You can see it here, next to the spruce tree I’d pruned the lower branches from.

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This is what it looks like, now.

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Maples and elms are very resilient trees.  You can cut them back like this, and they will start growing back!

I could leave it to grow, and just keep pruning it short so it will never reach the power lines.

I don’t know if that’s a good idea, though.

A decision I can make another time.  For now, I will leave it and see how it does.

Later, while visiting Beep Beep and her kittens by the old garden shed, I saw something I’ve been finding in a number of places around the yard.

20180814.mystery.holes

A whole bunch of holes, dug into the ground.

I’ve found some in the open area between rows of trees behind the storage house.  Now that I’ve cleared up so much of the trees, I’m starting to find them there, too.  I am guessing it’s a small animal digging up insects or grubs?  Some of the holes are quite deep.

Anyone know what might be making these holes?

The Re-Farmer

Clean up; west fence line, moving north

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It’s been a much cooler day today, so I took advantage of it and continued working along our west fence line.

In all, the before and after photos below represent about 2 1/2 hours work.  This includes pausing to take some video, and also pausing to drag away the branches and tree trunks I took down.

What a job!

Let’s start at that group of three maples, where I left off last time. Continue reading →

Clean up progress; west yard trees

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Today, I went back to around the west side of the maple grove to continue cleaning up.  This time, however, I focused on the area nearest the fire pit and gate.  This area seemed to have been mostly spruces, though only a few have survived.

Let’s look at the before pictures.

20180730.cleanup.firepitarea.1before

This spruce tree is right behind one of our piles of wood for the fire pit.  It’s doing rather well, though as with most spruces, the lowest branches on the trunk were dead and hidden by the ones above.

20180730.cleanup.firepitarea.2before

Right at the wood pile is an elm tree that we thought was dead, but after we finally got some decent rain, suddenly shot out some green.  It is still mostly dead, but we’ll be leaving it for now.

Most of the spruces behind it are completely dead.  Only two are still alive, plus one scrawny little thing that I’m hoping will survive now that I’ve cleared away the dead stuff.

I went further under the trees for these next photos.

 

Going through here, looking at all the dead wood, all I could think of was “that’s a fire hazard, that’s a fire hazard, that’s a fire hazard…”

I started by pruning the spruce in the top photo and working my way in a bit, then went to taking down the two bigger dead spruces.  These ones have been making a mess of my nerves, every time we used the fire pit and a breeze blew towards them!

I took the bigger one down first, because it was easier to get at.

20180730.cleanup.firepitarea.1tree.down.1

When it finally started to drop, it got hung up on the trees on the other side of the gate.  The cut part also just stayed on the trunk.  I finally grabbed a piece of wood from the log pile and swung it like a baseball bat against the trunk.

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It still just dropped straight down, being held up by the other trees.

I finally got it to fall, though!

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After this, I cut the tree up into small sections so I could move it and work on the next one.

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Which also got stuck and needed whacking.

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It, too, was being held up by the trees on the other side of the gate.

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My older daughter happened to come out to ask me something, so she got to do the whacking…

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And also got it down from the other trees.

After this, I took down the two smaller dead spruces.

Then I realized I had completely blocked the gate, so the smaller stuff I would have taken to the pile outside the yard with a wheel barrow had to wait.

Here are the after pictures.

20180730.cleanup.firepitarea.1after

In the foreground is the spruce from the top photo.  As I cleaned up after taking down the dead spruces, including cutting back some spreading lilac and caragana, I kept finding more and more dead stuff, buried under dead leaves and grass, and especially along the fence line.

20180730.cleanup.firepitarea.6after

I’m leaving the stumps of the trees I took down for now.  You can see the pruned trunks of the two remaining spruces here; the skinnier one has just a few live branches at the top.  There are still dead branches I want to prune away, but for those, I’ll need the extended pruner, so it will wait for now.

There’s still lots to clear out of here but, at this point, the heat was becoming and issue and I was getting ready to head inside.

20180730.cleanup.firepitarea.trees.down.after

The remains of the 4 dead spruces I took down, plus some of the larger dead pieces I dragged out while cleaning up.  Lots of dead caragana and lilac hidden among the living.  It seemed every time I thought I was done, I kept finding more and more to pull out!

I was just taking these last photos when my daughters came out to haul it all out of the yard for me.

They are so awesome!

Though it’s no where near done, the difference is still pretty amazing.

The Re-Farmer

After and after-after shots

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This afternoon, I went back to the area in the maple grove I worked on last.  Rather than working my way farther down the rows of trees, I focused on taking down dead and dying trees, pruning away lower branches, and so on.

So here are the after pictures from before, and the after-after pictures from today. :-D (click on them for larger images)

When I took pictures last time, I had worked closer to ground level, so you can’t really see as much of what I cleared away higher up.  There’s a nice, straight spruce tree in the middle that had a lot of dead branches that I pruned away.  In this section, that tree saw the most work.

I pruned as many branches as I could reach.  One tree has a large dead and rotting branch that will have to wait until I’ve got a full size chain saw.

Aside from pruning, this area had a small, dead spruce tree taken out, too.

I did nothing with the big dead spruce tree in front (with the rock at its base), though some of the lower branches were a bit in the way.

This area is where I started to need to do a lot more picking and choosing.

The maple that’s under the power lines came down.  I left the stump tall for when I have a full size chain saw.  If I were to just leave it, it would probably start growing new branches.  Maples are resilient that way.

More small trees had to come down.  I’m trying to salvage some of those spruces, but the more I look at the one on the right of the photo – the healthiest looking one out there – the more I realize I will probably need to take it down completely.  It’s just too close to the power line.  It’s not a problem now, but it can potentially grow another 20 ft or more, and it’s already just a few feet shorter than the height of the line.

I think I will leave it for now and ask the arborists when they come out.

Lots to clean up in this area.  I got to one tree that was clearly planted deliberately; the sticks that had been put in the ground to mark and protect it when it was planted were still there.  When I got to it, however, I discovered that the only green leaves on it were from those vines!  Once I pulled those free, I could see the tree was quite dead.  In other areas, I took down a dying spruce that had been planted in the row, but growing out of its base were two self-sown maples.  I ended up taking out one of them.  We shall see how the other one survives.  In other areas, I was pruning branches from a couple of elms so close together, I couldn’t fit between the trunks, but they seem to be doing fine, so I’m not going to thin them down.  Unlike the dead spruce that was also right next to them.  The spruce was planted.  I think the elms sowed themselves.

As I was working, I noticed I was getting pretty close to the birch trees I’d noticed when I was surveying the area a while back.  I had shown the pictures I took to my mother and she was happy to see them.  She had transplanted them from saplings she dug up while visiting her grandparents’ homestead up north, years ago.

I also found some apple trees further in.  A strange place to plant them.  The one closes to the power pole gets enough light that it is now producing apples, but these ones are practically in the dark.  It will be good when I finally go through that area to thin and prune.  Hopefully, they will be able to do better, next year, because of it. :-)

Not back for a couple of hours.

My branches piles are getting huge. :-/

Next time, I will finally start working further West down the rows.

The Re-Farmer

An Afternoon’s Work

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Yesterday afternoon, I got some progress done in the maple grove.  I don’t expect to do more later today, as it’s supposed to get quite hot again.  We shall see.

At this point, I’m just slowly working my way Westward from the garden path I recently cleared out.  I had already gone through here and taken out the fallen branches that I could find.  Well.  At least the bigger ones.  I’m always finding more, hidden under the tall grass!

Here are some before and after pictures. :-)  (click on them for larger images)

This is the area directly North of the trees I’d been working on a little while ago.  Quite a bit of dead brushes that I couldn’t tell what they were.  Some seemed to have either very long thorns, or very pointy twigs!  Those pretty much pulled out of the ground, they’ve been dead for so long.

Just past the elm tree on the right of the photo was this…

20180717.cleanup.maplegrove.west.mossy.maple

I really liked it when I found it; that moss covered stump of an old maple looks to nice.

Most of what was around it was dead or dying, with little bitty new growth coming up and making it look more alive than it really was!  I did keep the two strongest ones, which you can see in the after photo above.

Lots to clean up, here!

I would have loved to keep the two maples in front (you can see their remains in the after photo), but they were right under the power lines.  Maples can get so huge, there was just no way it was worth leaving them.  Better to take them down when they’re small then when they’re big.

I had gone in with the weed trimmer, first, just enough to clear away the grass so I could see any hidden branches.  Even though I’d cleared a lot out already, there was quite a lot left to take out, even before I could start cutting and pruning.

The spruce tree with the rock at the base is dead, and is the one we will be getting the arborists to take down when they clear the power lines.  It isn’t at the line, but is tall enough that if it falls, it could land right on it.

You can’t see it in the after pictures, but I was able to clear a smaller dead spruce behind the big one.

I didn’t think to take a before picture that included the power pole.  I hadn’t expected to clear anything that far.

The maple tree in the foreground is going to have to come down.  I hate to do it, as it’s a nice, healthy tree, but it’s also right under the power lines.

I also cleared some small elm and maple from by the power pole for the same reason.  I cut away the bottom branches of the spruce near the pole, but am considering if it’s worth the risk of keeping.  It’s not directly under the power lines, but when it reaches its full height, it would be a falling risk.  I think I’ll wait until we are ready to get the arborist in and ask them.

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Some of the dead spruces could just be torn out of the ground, like this one!

I cut back the lower dead branches on a couple of little spruces, but some of them have only a few living branches barely above my head.  As I work my way down, I’m going to have to pick and choose which to keep and which to take down.  Once there’s more space between them, while also clearing away more from the trees near them, I’m hoping the survivors will have enough sun and space to fill out and grow stronger.

Oh, and those vines!!  They are everywhere!

Unfortunately, I may have done something to my new little chain saw!  After a while, it start to “scream” and get easily jammed.  I took it into the sun room (where I keep the packaging, and the tools that came with it), opened up the side and started cleaning out the blade oil soaked sawdust that was jammed around the blade.

Then the blade and chain fell off.  I was hoping to avoid that.

No worries.  I’ll just pop it back on, right?

Suddenly, I couldn’t remember if the blade had landed upside down, or right side up!  I took out the instruction booklet and read it over.  According to the diagram, the logo should be facing me as I put it on; except the logo is already warn off.  The print on the other side is still very visible, but that isn’t anywhere on the diagram.

If I look at the image elsewhere, however, the logo is on the other side of the chainsaw.

Now, I know I put it on facing the right way.  My head knows that.  But I can’t help but keep double checking.  Finally, I was done, brought it back to where I was working, tried to cut my first branch and…

It’s still screaming, and jams easily.

So I just stopped it and set it aside.  Then went back to using a hand saw.

Not going to take any chances!

Some of what is in here is going to have to wait for a full size chain saw, anyhow.

It’s going to look so good in here when I’m done!

The Re-Farmer

Windblown clean up, and finding things

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While cleaning up after yesterday’s winds, I did the usual circuit around the yard, including behind the storage house.

Funny how, no matter how many times we go through different areas, we still find things we missed before.

Somehow, I missed this.

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It looks like someone dumped the lava rocks from their BBQ behind the storage house.

My parents didn’t BBQ.  Though I do remember seeing several old BBQs in the barn at some point.  I believe they are all gone now.

Well, it’s better than old cat litter and toilets, I suppose.

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By the time I finished my round, this is what I’d picked up.

Yes, there is a wheelbarrow under there.

This isn’t everything, of course.  Just the stuff that was big enough that they would be in the way of mowing.  There will always be little stuff around.  I did end up getting a rake out to pick up what was under the Chinese elm outside the kitchen window.  They were all of a size I would normally leave behind, but there was so many of them, they would have hampered mowing, while also too small to be practical to pick up by hand.  That, alone, half filled the wheelbarrow.

Before I started cutting down the apple tree that fell, I checked the few raspberries we have, and found this lovely Painted Lady.

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I’d actually seen another, larger, butterfly first – I don’t know what kind – but it flew away before I could get a photo.  This, and another Painted Lady were quite content to stay and pose for me. :-)

After breaking down the fallen tree (oh, how good it is to have my little chain saw, and a supply of chain oil!), I took a look at the next closest apple tree.  It had a dead branch that I decided to take down as well, but on closer inspection, I noticed something.  This tree splits into 3 major trunks, one of which had split off to make a fourth that grew straight up.  The part that grew outwards had already been pruned back quite a bit, but did have new green branches growing out of it.  The part growing straight up was dead.  While I had noticed a few dead branches before, it was so hidden by the leaves of the rest of the tree, I didn’t see that the whole thing was dead.  I was able to cut it free and untangle it from the living branches, finding it much larger than I expected.   By the time I took off the dead branch, plus this dead trunk, the tree looked a lot less crowded!  Which should be good for the crab apples.  More light, air and room to grow.

While talking to my sister in law about their apple trees that they’ve been pruning back due to an insect infestation, she commented that apple trees seem to be very susceptible to problems.  Judging from what I’ve been seeing with ours, I tend to agree.  Thankfully, we don’t seem to have insect issues, but I don’t think the signs of fungus I’m seeing on so many of them is any better. :-(

Ah, well.  We deal with what we find!

The Re-Farmer

Clean Up: Maple Grove, evening progress

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I wrote up my last post while taking a hydration break from working in the maple grove.  By the time I was done, I found myself nodding off at the keyboard.  I figured lying down wouldn’t be a bad idea.

Three hours later… :-o

But, I’ve got it done as much as I can for now.

Here are the before and after pictures of the two North rows.

I cleared out two of the tree spruces in the foreground of the second picture.  The two I took out had a few green sprigs here and there, but were otherwise dead.  I also cut off the dead branches from the one in the middle.  I am hoping that, now that it’s open and clear, it will survive.

The remaining spruces in that northernmost row are doing pretty good.  I trimmed the lowest branches, as well as the dead ones that I could reach with a hand saw.  The dead ones were mostly on the south side of the trees, where they had no light.  The other living spruce trees, I only took off what was in my way as I moved around.  I will finish cutting away the dead branches when my birthday gift comes in. :-)

20180702.cleanup.maplegrove.eastside.raspberry.patch

This is the remains of a row of raspberry bushes.  I can see some dead canes from years past, but no fresh canes in this area.

To the right, you can also see a gooseberry bush I found.  I had cleared out a broadleaf tree that was between two spruces, and discovered the gooseberry under it!

20180702.cleanup.maplegrove.eastside.big.gooseberry

Then there’s this gooseberry bush, in dire need of having the deadwood cut away.  It’s growing next to a chokecherry tree, which was also overgrown and in need of pruning at its base.

20180702.cleanup.maplegrove.eastside.gooseberry.chokecherry.cleared

It was amazing how cutting just one sucker at the bottom of the chokecherry tree cleared almost everything up!  A few downward hanging branches to clear away, and various saplings, burdock and stinging nettle to clear away at the base, and what a difference!  I even found some raspberry bushes with baby berries on them.

The gooseberry, on the other hand, has almost no sign of berries on it at all, and what little it does have are not looking good.

20180702.cleanup.maplegrove.eastside.appletree.before

This is the very end of the “raspberry” row, with an apple tree near the compost pile.  There’s even a lonely little asparagus fern growing in here!

20180702.cleanup.maplegrove.eastside.appletree.after

I found more salvageable raspberry canes.  After cutting away some lower branches and saplings at the base of the apple tree (including maple and elm saplings), it was basically just weeding and removing old raspberry canes.  There are some plants in there I recognize as flowers my mother planted, so I tried to avoid taking those out.  Lots of creeping charlie and burdock in here.

At this point, I called it a night.  Which worked out perfectly, because that’s when I got a call from the second tree care company about coming over.  It was another father and sons team. :-)

When they got here, I showed them the areas I wanted work done on, plus the trees to come down.  He asked questions about how far back I wanted to cut things (basically, enough to not have to do this again for 5 years).  He wanted to know about the overhanging branches, which would normally be left if they are not touching the lines.  One of them is a very healthy maple tree, and cutting it back would mean removing pretty much half the tree.  When I pointed out it was from those overhanging branches that we got the burned branch from, and that it had happened before, causing a power outage, he understood why I didn’t want ANY overhanging branches at all.  They even measured the trunks of the trees that will be taken down, including the dead spruce.  They had to take into account being able to get their equipment in, too, and I told them about the three different gates that were available.  We also talked about cleanup.  He charges extra if they bring in a chipper, but I did say I wanted to keep the chips for mulch, and to keep the bigger wood, too.  He mentioned they don’t usually chip dead branches, because it dulls the cutting edges, but the stuff they’ll be cutting back will mostly be life branches.

He took a whole bunch of notes, and I will get the estimate emailed to me.

I told him about how we don’t own the land, and that I am getting estimates to talk to my mother and brother about before a decision is made, and that I’m hoping to get it done in the fall.  Or spring, if the cost is higher (which I suspect it will be, with these guys, but we shall see).  He was good with fall, mentioning after August is when they’d be available to do the work, so that works out.

And that’s it for the next while.  Tomorrow will be a trip to the city for my daughter, which should give my body time to rest.  Feeling pretty stiff and sore right now! :-D

The Re-Farmer

Area Shift

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It was another really hot day today, so outdoor work was limited.

My daughter and I loaded the items from the sun room that we will not be using, into the storage shed, and noticed that stinking nettle was starting to crowd the stairs.  The area is in need of another mow, too.  So before things go too hot, I decided to clear away the nettles, then maybe do some mowing.

I cleared away the nettles, but it was hot enough that I didn’t want to stress the motor on the mower.

Instead, I shifted to a different area.

Some time soon, the electrician will be coming by to install the broken power pole, and also hook electricity back up to the barn.  There are some trees between the main pole, and the one between it and the barn, that will be in the way of the wires and the installation.

So I started cutting them back.

Ideally, I’d be taking them down completely.  They seem to have sprouted out of a stone pile, around a support wire for the power pole, and I could tell that they had been cut back several times in the past.  Just not recently.

20180619.clearing.power.pole.trees

There is only two trees here; a maple and an elm.  This photo is after I’d cut away a substantial amount on one side, stopping when it simply became too hot to continue.

It’s the branches on the other side, however, that are in the way of where the power line is going to do.

Do you see the problem?

Yeah.  The car.

My father’s old car has been parked there for quite a few years.  Long enough that I think the tires are now flat.  As far as I know, however, it can still be repaired and made roadworthy without too much work; it’s not one of the scrap vehicles lying about.

If I start cutting the branches on that side, they are going to fall right on the car.

I’ve been wondering if we’d be able to pop it in neutral and push it out of the way.  If we manage it, though (I have no idea if we’ll even try, yet), it would need to be pushed back again.  We’ll have to decide soon, since I would like to have those trees cut back before the electrician needs to work in the area.

It’s unfortunate the car wasn’t parked in one of the sides of the garage, or even one of the sheds that used to shelter a tractor.  Mind you, that shed has a roof like a sieve, now, and I’d really like to have it torn down, eventually.

20180619.cleared.power.pole.trees

This is the pile of what I’ve cleared away so far.  They are not broken down much at all, to it’s really mostly air.  Still, there are some very large sections of tree in there!

I am beginning to foresee a potential problem with having piles of cut and pruned tree pieces all over the place.

The Re-Farmer