With autumn waning, a tropical storm coming up the gulf and merging with a low front from the west, we are due for a torrential blow. 2 inch of rain predicted which will blow what little leaves we have left off the trees. So... I picked my way from the bottom *the gravel pit by the blue truck in the photo) and worked my way to the top of the hill, picking stumps as I went. By then I was out of fuel so I went back down. I still got a few acres to go, but took a few pictures from the top nonetheless. Its going to be a rough pasture even when its done, but at least the project is started.
How long you been picking at that new field? Gotta be 100 ac or so. I'd like to clear about 40 or so ac. in an area that was cut over real hard about 10 years ago. I'm thinking about renting an excavator with a mulching head. That's a major project you got going there
No it is only 18 acres. I started last Friday (a week ago today), but did not really get a handle on it until Monday or Tuesday. You really can't see it in the photos, but the ground is teeming with outcroppings of ledge. It looks like a nice smooth slope down to the gravel pit, but it is anything but. About once an hour the hillside is too steep to climb by tracks alone so I have to pull myself up by hooking the teeth of the bucket onto some ledge. I didn't run the excavator out of fuel, I just prefer to work uphill because that way you are pulling the stump down instead of dragging your excavator down hill. On this ground, with the tracks sitting on ledge, there is not much friction holding you too the earth. You also feel like you are going to flop the silly thing over, but I really doubt you would, but working down hill sure feels that way. So I worked my way uphill, but as I got to the top I was low on fuel so I just took some pictures before the leaves were gone and went and filled up. No; you only run a diesel out of fuel ONCE! My quota was filled years ago in that regard! The goal here is to convert as much of it into pasture as possible so I am banking the ledges (10 foot drop offs of the ledge on the South-West edges) with stumps with the hopes that they will rot down and provide soil. The soil here is just too thin to bury stumps, and stump grinding was not in the budget at $645 per hour! After this is done I'll go back over it with a bulldozer to smooth everything out and try and spread topsoil of what ledge rock I can so grass will grow. Operating a bulldozer up here is what will be interesting!
I'm thinking that I'll go for a week with this machine Excavator - EX 200 - 46,300 lb - w/ Mulcher - Eagle Rental - Commercial, Industrial, Residential Equipment Rentals - Waterville, ME 04901 My fragile (thin) topsoil would get destroyed grubbing out the stumps with the more traditional excavator method, then there's the never ending burn piles. Most everything is young growth, 4" and under. The chip's should help with the soil eventually along with all the manure I can get. I'm sure I don't need to tell you to be careful on that ledge with tracked machines.
Yeah that is who I always rent from too. They are great guys to work with and the owner is a church-goer too. They are bringing out their 700 John Deere bulldozer on Monday and so I will use that while another guy runs the excavator. I wish they had their 850 John Deere dozer still. Its a big jump from the 700 JD to 850 JD bulldozer, but run what they have I guess. Its still bigger than my tinker-toy 350D! Man have I stove their excavator all to pieces. I was on ledge rock and bent a track pad, busted out the front window, ripped off the engine compartment door when I came down off ledge rock too close to a tree, and broke the ears off the bucket banging off ledge rock all day for the past ten days!! Its a good thing we always budget 30% higher then the machine cost JUST IN CASE things get returned a bit tweaked lets say. Yikes. I hope Gus has better luck then I have. I really try to be careful with equipment, but while the picture shows a gentle slope, its really steep.
Acreage is always misleading. I know of a forester who admits walking through the woods he can accurately estimate acreage, but to gauge the size of a field, he admits he is always way off. Me, I am the opposite, as a farmer I am pretty good at sizing up a field and estimating the acreage accurately, but am often way off when it comes to estimating acreage in a forest. As for the acreage amounts itself, I used to say how many acres I farm, but no longer do so because it is so misleading. On a few occasions on here I have stated that my own farm consists of "several hundred acres"...a general term...only because I was trying to make the point that I did not have any oak (one post for instance). Now if I owned just an acre, that would not be saying much and be out of context, but to own several hundred acres and still have no oaks says something different entirely, so sometimes I need to state roughly how many acres I have only to keep things in context. Now is it bigger than most farms here? Not really. Most farms here average between 400-600 acres, though my neighbor has a sizable one at 3200 acres. Compared to his, mine is a small farm, but compared to some 2 acre farms, its quite big. Now years ago when we were into big dairy I thought anything under 100 acres was not even a farm at all, but I have reversed my ignorance on that. A lot of food can be grown on a few acres of land and I recognize that now. I am a sheep farm where I need a bit more land to produce lamb, so naturally my acreage requirements are going to be more. As long as both farms are contributing to the National Food Chain, both are vital to the United States. Firewood production is the same way. Here in Maine, an acre of land can produce 1 cord per acre per year sustainably. I have a friend that has 5 acres of land, yet burns only 4 cord of wood per year and has never run out of wood. Granted he burns both soft and hard wood, and takes wood right down to the smallest branch, but he's heating his home with what he has. That is admirable no matter how many acres a person has. My mantra has always been, "Do as much as you can for yourself", no matter if its food, firewood, or even lumber or stone products to build your house. keep on keeping on Kimberly, you have my deepest respect no matter how big your place is...and if you were closer...yes I would let you freely come in and take firewood off my land should your place not have enough.
Lamb eh? The best garden I ever had was grown in sheep chit! The sweet corn was as tall as "cow" corn.
Oh yeah sheep manure is the best. It is the equivalent of hen dressing and four times higher then horse manure and twice as high as cow manure in nitrogen. And...it comes in convenient pellet form!
