Finally cool enough

It’s finally cool enough to get out and do some cutting. I’ve cut a little so far but it’s only been sniping at the edges of my woods. Now it’s cool enough to get deeper in without too much concern for ticks or copperheads. I walked around late summer and marked some trees I wanted to take down. Late summer is a good time for that because you can still pick out the trees that were stressed and died while others still have green leaves. I mark mine with red paint and I mark in different spots around the trunk to line up with certain lines of sight from the trail. This one is a nice white oak that was about 16” DBH.


I cleared out a target area to drop it.


I got it to go mostly where I wanted but it got tangled in some other tree tops and rolled slightly to the left of where I was aiming.


I went to work limbing it up and dragging the brush away for chipping up later. I bucked up the branch wood and separated firewood from fire pit wood.



I left 3 pieces of the trunk at 80” lengths so that I can move them with the grapple and buck them to length when it gets to be splitting time. The older I get, that seems to be easier for me instead of bucking them to 20” lengths and then wrestling them into a cart or into the tractor bucket for moving.


Now it’s on to the next one!

 

I can see having that grapple would make a difference. Nice job.

 

That looks good. Man-points for dropping it pretty much where you want it.
How much do you typically burn in a season?
Sca

 

Thanks. I only burn about 2 cords per year so it’s not too hard to keep up with, now that I’m 3 yrs ahead. I don’t know how some of the folks on here keep up with 15+ cords a year. My hats off to them. They are tougher than me!

 

We roast 6 ish cord/yr. Like you stated, once one gets a stock of a couple years, keeping up is much easier. Im leaning to going nuts always, then ease back a bit as I'm forced to by age or decrepitness. Just gotta find room for multiple years worth!
2 cord is nice to keep up with, even then, buying all or part of that when you need to won't be too painful.
Happy Thanksgiving Brad M.
Sca

 

Good job getting it on the ground safely. Yes the cooler weather is a welcomed relief for anything firewooding.

 

For sure, but the 2' of snow slowed things up for a few days. Nice work on the Oak Brad M !

 

Well at least you dont live in Buffalo!

Near record cold here Sunday night. Lows in upper teens. Pond near my storage had ice on it!

 

I’ll take burning 20+ cords a year and living in Alaska over what those folks dealing with lake effect dropping 4+ feet per storm. However I would like a 4+ foot base for some snow machining.