In loving memory of Kenis D. Keathley 6/4/81 - 3/27/22 Loving father, husband, brother, friend and firewood hoarder Rest in peace, Dexterday

Spring Clean

Discussion in 'The Wood Pile' started by jo191145, Apr 30, 2025.

  1. jo191145

    jo191145

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    Had a pine tree that annoyed me long enough. Decided to sweep the trails near my house. Even swept the water out of some of the smaller puddles. Dragged it about half a mile back, off the trail about 100 feet and chopped the branches off. Should make some nice rabbit cover.

    IMG_3629.jpeg

    Cleaned up a dead maple and ash in the field next to my sisters house. She’s out of the country so now’s a good time, less rules and suggestions ;) No pics but I brought them down to my super secret hidden wood dump. While there I grabbed this leftover piece of oak I never bothered going back to get. There’s a nice downed oak behind this. If I ever decide to go get it this would need to be moved first so,,,,,, made sense to grab it now.
    IMG_3630.jpeg

    The eight fresh cut dead oak sticks under the tire are just me clearing a trail on the far edge of the property. We never fire wooded that area and there’s some nice dead oaks back there. These were all laying on the ground in the way of my access. Clean it up.
     
  2. Eric Wanderweg

    Eric Wanderweg

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    Cool to see you and the resurrected log arch back in action. Nice to be able to do a biomass exchange with the local forest too :thumbs:
     
  3. jo191145

    jo191145

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    I think the state should give me a dime everytime I return a tree to its natural habitat, sort of like returning a beer can :)
     
  4. buZZsaw BRAD

    buZZsaw BRAD

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    How nice it is to have woods on/bordering your properties. Great to be able to "return it to the Earth" as my late mother used to say.
     
  5. jo191145

    jo191145

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    Saves a lot of work too. Our town dump takes no logs, only branches. Could burn the stuff but you know how much open fires are appreciated in Ct.
     
  6. jo191145

    jo191145

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    Today I cleaned a small opening in a bulldozed wall that opens onto just a small stretch of property. Another one of those never been down here woodin places. My mother had some trees cut near the neighbors house they were worried about. Tree guys left the lengths in between the two stone walls. Tough to get at. I’m not a cut and carry type guy, ain’t happening :)
    Moved a bunch of rocks like this, took that rotten ash log and some of the sugar maple to the wood dump. A good portion of that sugar sapling I cut into one foot pieces and filled the holes left by the rocks. Got one big rock left still in my way. Not really worth the work for the wood available but I said I would do it,,,,,,

    IMG_3633.jpeg IMG_3634.jpeg
     
  7. jo191145

    jo191145

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    Repaired the box wedge that I broke. Two new sides that add strength and help funnel wood straight over the Grizzly bars. Split a little locust this morning. It’s all a work in progress :)

    IMG_3637.jpeg IMG_3640.jpeg
     
  8. buZZsaw BRAD

    buZZsaw BRAD

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    :drool:
     
  9. Canadian border VT

    Canadian border VT

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    I can appreciate jo191145 I have a gully and house site is surrounded by woods. In gully, I have 500 gallons propane tank left on property, was buried we found it, 20 yards broken concrete, and 20 years of brush and splitter debris, gets covered by bon fire left overs.. in 0ver 20 years filled 15 feet of gully.

    edited to add :drool: over your stacking methods
     
  10. jo191145

    jo191145

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    The stacking is also a work in progress. Now if nothing else that 500 gallon propane tank would make a nice barbecue grill ;) Or even a raised burn pit.
     
  11. buZZsaw BRAD

    buZZsaw BRAD

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    You'd be the bomb! :D
     
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  12. jo191145

    jo191145

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    Think I’d cut it in half so it couldn’t build pressure but yeah, the bomb. :)
     
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  13. Canadian border VT

    Canadian border VT

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    My outside pit is the about size small 2 car garage

    I can still pull it the tank, out with 20,000 pound excavator, I can see one of metal loops on the end. I don’t weld never needed to, neighbors FIL best welder in state lives mile down road and my 100 amp service never would have been enough. If anyone needs tank let me know!

    I bought more house land then I could afford out of foreclosure 25 years ago. Something always blows up and changes plans.. Life what happens when I make plans..

    My beautiful bride convinced me 16 years ago to put a 20,000 gallons above ground pool on a flat spot that we later discovered was D-box for sewer.. sooo all degrade able material went to the gully

    then 3 years later had electric meter sockets catch fire 30 days without power.. which really was a blessing as I met more friends
     
  14. Dok440

    Dok440

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    My son saw the picture of the wood arch hooked to the quad with the big pine and said "Whoa!" I can see the gears spinning. This may cost me.
     
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  15. jo191145

    jo191145

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    Im a little jealous of your burn pit. Here in Ct we have an overabundance of Karen’s. I light a small fire 150 yards from the road and watch the traffic stop and the phones come out to snap pictures and call 911 to report an open burn. I wait for the perfect days to burn. Light wind not moving in the direction of the road. No smoke in the road there’s much less attention from passing motorists. Needs to be damp/ wet out, no dry conditions. That’s for my peace of mind and also the people driving by. When it’s dry in Ct they advertise all over anyone with an open fire is looking for trouble and the fire Nazis are on full alert just looking for someone to dare to strike a match.
     
  16. jo191145

    jo191145

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    If you somewhat reasonably flat land to deal with it’s a nice way to move heavy logs. No more bucking and chucking/stacking into a wagon. A chore my spine despised. Ideally I’d bring them straight from the woods to the splitter, one shot drop em and buck em. The small stash’s I have are just those logs that pop up unannounced and get put in storage. I’m processing all Black Locust at the moment so unless it’s BL it gets put aside. Sometimes it’s too wet to access the processing area but I can still go in the woods and bring them closer to home.

    A small pictorial to give you a feel for the process. It may not be a huge time saver but it’s definitely a huge labor saver.

    With the 4500# winch there’s no need to back over the log. Just set the brake on the atv and pull it in.
    IMG_3474.jpeg IMG_3476.jpeg


    With smaller logs like these you can haul 2-3 at a time. Not always pretty but as long as they go home I’m good with it LOL


    IMG_3480.jpeg IMG_3481.jpeg
     
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  17. Woodtroll

    Woodtroll

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    We have a beagle that, like yours, likes to be involved in what's going on and is always climbing on and under things to look for new smells. We laugh at her and call her our QA inspector.
     
  18. jo191145

    jo191145

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    I blame it all on my abnormal cat. When I got this puppy and took him for walks the cat decided to join in. Mostly walked around the field lines and the cat would follow along on top of the stonewalls, woodpiles, boulders to keep out of reach of the dog. Wasn’t long before the dog started walking around the field on top of everything to follow the cat. Since then she loves climbing heights for a better view of the world.

    IMG_3568.jpeg
     
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  19. buZZsaw BRAD

    buZZsaw BRAD

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    Reminds me of Sandhillbilly beagle. Seems he's always perched up high in the pics he posts.
     
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  20. Woodtroll

    Woodtroll

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    I do think they like to be up high to see - I guess if I was only a foot tall I’d climb up for a far look when I could, too. On the rare times I’m sitting on a chair on the porch, Maggie will often come and hop up on my lap, and sit on my legs and just look around.

    She and the last beagle pup we had, 16 years ago, would both run squirrels out along the top rail of our old split rail fence when they were very young. They both quit doing that by 8-10 months old or so. Maybe they lost some agility as they gained weight, or maybe they just decided it wasn’t really necessary. :)