We're still dropping Eastern White pines out of the new meadow/pasture. I've been telling anyone that'll listen to me that I need more SPACE for animals. With almost 25 wooded acres, you need more than a drylot paddock for animals. So my friend has been dropping the trees in the area I want. It took me about 4 years to talk him into it. These trees are about 60' tall and weren't thinned properly when they were small. So they're "Q-tips" of trees. Like lodge-pole pines, really. Only just a little green branches & needles at the top since they had to grow so tall and fast. On the good side, these are wonderful for raised bed borders and some are big enough for dimensional lumber off the saw mill my friend owns. He's using an 8N Ford (his also) to push them over. He also has a Bobcat that we're doing the same way. He makes the undercut, I get on the equipment and push with it while he makes the final back cut. Dangerous? Um, YEAH. Gorgeous meadow/pasture eventually? Um, YEAH. And we're leaving all the hard maples. My dream is to have a small maple sugar camp for Agri-tourism in the few weeks of the Spring when sap is running. Do I know what I'm doing? Um, YEAH.
some really, really BIG logs? Um, YEAH. Some of these are about 20" across at the butt. Each log is about 60' tall. A LOT of logs! Great for building raised beds and such. HORRIBLE for fence posts. Eastern White pine is a soft wood and tends to rot when it touches the ground. Yes, telephone poles are pine. But they're treated. This is raw pine.
LOTS of logs! I feel like I live in Alaska or Maine with all the pine logs in these piles. This is only ONE pile. There are 4 others. Two of which are big logs that can go on the sawmill for dimensional lumber.
This meadow/pasture will only be about two acres when we're done. The hard maple trees are not in this picture, really, but are large enough to tap and will be very lovely when the pines are away from them and they've got air and space to grow.
Tasha the Livestock Guardian Dog...
Tasha came to me from a friend who bought her for her property. Tasha was a puppy and ran the calves and sheep there and killed all the cats. Then she went to my friend's daughter's house where she ran the Corgis to distraction. After my beloved Jules was killed on the road, my friend gifted her to me. I adore her. LGD's are the strangest dogs I've ever worked with. I'm used to dogs that are strong-willed and try to bite or dominate me. This? No. They try to out-think you. YOU say you want three cats? THEY say, Ok, and then "remove" the cats when you aren't looking. I love her. As a LGD? She works well. But I want her socialized to me. I think it'll take another 6 months or so before she decides she belongs ONLY to this property. Currently she thinks all property on either side of the busy road belongs to her. Yes, she's a brindle. I love brindles. Unfortunately, with her coloration she looks wolf or coyote-like. So I put a bright orange collar on her.
The pines we're working on cutting down are over her shoulder to the left and behind her in this picture (below). There are approximately 10+ more acres of mature pines, so don't worry. We've left some...
The pines we're working on cutting down are over her shoulder to the left and behind her in this picture (below). There are approximately 10+ more acres of mature pines, so don't worry. We've left some...
Ok. ok. BoJangles the Border Collie X likes to sit on round bales too. She's on top of a tarp covering the round bales. She taught Tasha how to jump up on them. She's a clown.
Ruby Jayne's getting too old to jump up on the bales. Yes, this was early early Spring 2014
This was the day, early this Spring, that Tasha decided to kill baby chicks. We had to have a talk. And I went and got a LIVE baby chick to let her know I was not amused and that this chick was to stay alive... As you can see? Tasha is not very impressed with my goofy instructions (the chick is between her front legs!). We got 40 Americana chicks and then I split them with the neighbor. Now the chicks are full grown and Tasha doesn't see them as hors d'oeuvre any longer... although, to be fair, she didn't really EAT them as much as she just play-killed them. Not today, Tasha. Not today...
My friend, Heather, came out to help numerous times... At one point this early Spring I was bottle feeding 7 babies. The two Nubian babies had to be pulled from their dam as they were chewing (yes.) their momma's teats raw. The ram-lamb (the black-headed animal) was an orphan from another friend's farm and then the two Oberhasli kids were orphaned as I had to euthanize their paralyzed momma. Their triplet didn't survive. Ruby is invaluable as she likes to clean babies - fore and aft. Then another neighbor had a kid that had goat polio and wasn't going to survive. So her sister came with her. So. A ram-lamb, two Oberhasli, two Nubians, and two Myotonics. SEVEN. We had to bottle in shifts as their sizes were very different. A Lambar bucket wouldn't work very well...
EARLY Spring pruning... This was a Granny Smith apple that was a Standard. And overgrown into the pass-thru driveway to the barn. So, I stubbed it. Severely. It'll be a problem now since it'll want to send out shoots everywhere (and it has). Heather and I both worked on it. She was a bit more delicate than I. I went and got the Husqvarna chainsaw and STUBBED it. It was about 25' tall or more with very small apples. I took it to about 12' tall. And just major branches. It'll be a nightmare to tame, but I'll keep on it.
(I'm trying to get caught up to July, can you tell?) I LOVE early Spring and fiddleheads... This is a leatherleaf fern. Here in Indiana we have several native ferns that endure year round. This last winter was extremely brutal, but the ferns still send up their glorious fronds in these lovely fiddle-heads. I love seeing them...
Anemones. Purple, pink, mauve and "white"... I love these little wildflowers... They grow mainly on the bluff facing East/North... Lovely things...
Then, disaster struck with Bug the tractor. I went to start him and heard a clatter and bang and breaking metal. I thought I threw a rod. No. What it was? The ring gear and starter gear. Oh, no problem? NO. PROBLEM. JohnO told me to get the parts, he broke the tractor in two and fixed it! I would have loved to turned wrenches to fully understand what goes where, but JohnO makes it look so simple. I'm sure I'd never been able to do this by myself. The tractor was in two pieces. Bizarre. The new ring gear has to be heated to 350F and dropped quickly onto the corresponding piece so it will mate tightly to the other part. JohnO heated it in his oven. Yeah. The old ring gear had to be cut off. I'm glad he has the knowledge and the understanding or this would have been a very costly repair.
I was very very sad to see I'd lost my entire hive last winter. They starved and froze. Or froze and starved. Either way. Devastating. However, a local guy was selling package bees on Craigslist and I ordered a package. Delivered from Georgia in one day. This time I situated the hive behind the house where it is protected a bit more and further away from the field across the road. I'd not worked with package bees for a few years so was a bit nervous, but these honeybees are very quiet and it went well. I'm hopeful and the hive seems very robust.
Please. If you plant pines, thin them. They shouldn't be like this. Yes, it's pretty but they really shouldn't look like this... Even if I thin them now, pines don't have latent buds down their trunk and they'll never branch out lower. Ever. *sigh*
(I have to go check the ricotta I'm cooking... brb)
(I have to go check the ricotta I'm cooking... brb)
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