Burning A Big Old Hollow White Oak

 Back in 2017 we had this tree taken down with a backhoe because it was hollow and leaned severely. We worked up the easy parts for firewood and the big old hulk was just lying on the north side of they yard looking ugly. We will be cleaning up the remains for several days and then till and seed this spot. 

A Couple Of Simple Drops

 Here are a couple of simple pole sized trees to drop. If you thin your timber you will be cutting many trees of this size. They are great to work up into firewood, and just need to pass through your splitter one time. Evaluate where the tree wants to go by its lean and weight, and aim it that direction with your open face. Bore it to make the back of your hinge, and then cut out through the backstrap. Remember to escape from the stump as soon as you finish your release cut.

Fun With Fire!

 Susan and I burned off the dam on our pond today. We have to burn it every few years to discourage trees from growing on it, and it went quite well today, with a southwest wind of 10 to 15 miles per hour to help it burn and to move the smoke. It wasn't quite as hot as we would like, but we can use herbicide to kill off the trees that did not get burned. We don't get up and go to work; we are surrounded by it!

Barn Door, Horses

 It's always something. We had an "event" last week. We had trespassing fishermen, dealt with that, then found later in the day that we had been burglarized. Then we were burglarized again the same day. Were the fishermen the burglars? No proof, but those are mighty big coincidences. Entry was via a clunker pickup truck that came through the road ditch into our property, so now we are putting up fencing to make that harder to do again. Oh Well, or words to that effect.  The truck belongs to the girlfriend of one of those guys. Neither one has a driver's license. One said they came to fish at 2:00, the other said they came at 4:00. Looking at the entry, they had come in twice and left once, so they possibly hauled off loot before they fished. We don't know.  After law enforcement arrived, the fishermen were interviewed, charged with fishing without permission, fishing without a license, and both received a warning for trespass. We discovered the burglary after law enforcement and the fishermen were gone. 

We needed to block off the ditch where entry was made, so we went out Saturday afternoon to buy fencing supplies, and on our return we interrupted the burglars while they were piling items from the barns to steal. We sorted through those things and took aluminum and copper to a scrap yard, netting 58 bucks. We continued to find more evidence of thieving as we tightened up through the week. It's all very frustrating.