The bugs weren't too bad today so I hauled out the red maple I managed to cut up and get out. That might be it on the blow down maples in the swamp between the bugs and the ferns coming along. Supposed to be fairly cold Saturday so I just might get another tank or two of gas in the saw of cutting in.
Oh yeah, the pine pile is getting bigger too. These have all sat just about long enough to not be terribly sticky any more.
It's been good working weather this week, glad you've been able to take advantage of it. The bugs haven't been bad, maybe there's been enough of a breeze. I've been spraying myself anyway, because of ticks. That sure is a lot of maple!
Red maple may not be the greatest firewood in the world but it beats pine and poplar. It's free. Not the easiest to get to. I need some cables and blocks and pulleys. That's maple between the trees stacked too. I have two pair of pants I keep soaked with permethrin for the darned ticks. Even in the Winter they can be out. Just keep plugging away at it.
Not Winter Northeaster clean up but I had to clean up the trail to get to this project from last Fall. A white oak that split and fell into the swamp. I had to haul the 1/4 to 1/3 cord of white oak 3/10 mile up the hill to my splitting area because I had stacked it all too close and I needed to pull the tree trunk away from the edge of the swamp because every round I was cutting off was rolling down hill into the swamp. They were getting too heavy to roll back up out of the swamp. Of course the stack was in my way to do this. Needed moving any way. Couldn't pick up the end with the backhoe until I cut a few more rounds off. Had to yank on it with a chain on the bucket and it was lifting the tail end. I was hoping the trunk end would rip off by now but it hasn't. This was it for today, as it was time for supper. Hopefully can cut some more rounds off tomorrow. The other half of the tree and 6 feet of trunk should come down as it will just rot but it will have to wait as I have just put a small dent in the Winter damage cleanup so far. There's two dead standing white oaks and a dead standing red oak right by here too. Gotta get it before it rots.
It doesn't look so big from that angle either but the rounds in the tractor bucket are being cut from it. White oak is fairly heavy. Each round is now big enough to be almost a half a day of heat. A bucket full is two or three days of heat. I spend an hour or two every afternoon when I can at getting it into the back yard to process it into firewood. When it rains it pours, three years ago I was cutting on someone else's property and considering another bigger log load because there was nothing to cut here except live trees.
Sounds like you have a substantial woodlot that will keep you well supplied, if as you say, you can get it before it rots. Put in the labor and you'll have a clean woods and many years worth of heat.
Haul short logs up the hill. The last of it. Trail is a tad narrow in places. Finis. Except for SSS split/stack/see what we gots I think the next project is dead standing oaks before it gets too hot.
