At Home In The Woods

[Obed]

Just beautiful Obed....I am surprised to see no snow...I thought I heard on the news this AM that Gatlinberg...Tenn..the Smokey's got 22" of Snow....

No snow here yet. We are lower in altitude than most of the Smokeys. We have been heating with the fireplace all week though. I split a couple pallets of wood this past Saturday. I'm getting ready to break out the chainsaws and get to work. I have enough wood cut and split to heat the house through mid-December. I seems like I always feel behind.
Obed

 

[Obed]

Those are some great pictures....Be careful not to cut the red ones by accident The place has a maturing look about it, shows all you and your wife`s hard work.......Tony

Tony,
That's a good point. I love color of the red leaves. We may eventually clean out some of the small trees and saplings in front of the house. However, many of the small ones may have red leaves.
Obed

 

[brin]

No snow here yet. We are lower in altitude than most of the Smokeys. We have been heating with the fireplace all week though. I split a couple pallets of wood this past Saturday. I'm getting ready to break out the chainsaws and get to work. I have enough wood cut and split to heat the house through mid-December. I seems like I always feel behind.
Obed

Obed, if it makes you feel better....We built our house and moved in 8 yrs. ago yesterday and I still don't feel like I have finished all I want to do...Sure the house is finished., very much like your house by the way, but the little things outside like manicuring the woods and hiking trails and the lawn is not up to par as far as I am concerned...It aggravates me sometimes..Just seems like we never can sit back and say...." There we are finished " I need to cut wood too and I have to go to our farm and cut some wood there too and then haul it back...see what I mean...?

 

[tony Cecil]

I wouldn`t touch the view from your porch...It is beautiful, and `mother nature` can`t be improved upon.......Keep these pictures of the view handy and refer to them any time you get the urge to `purge` ... Some people cut all the under brush , and many times it is the sourwood, maples of various colors, and other really beautiful shrubs that just look plain until this time of year..

Another mistake I have made, is purchasing `field` grown nursery trees, and planting them in different locations that are different than where they were grown.....Thirty years later they are still out of synch with everything else and don`t even have a good fall color.....Tony

 

[dstig1]

Obed, You've come a long way. It takes a lot of time to get really settled. You are really in very good shape. Next year, you should have your firewood well in hand, as you are much better off this year than last. Then you will get a couple years ahead of your need and be in really good shape. That kind of cushion is nice.

On the leaves - a color mix is also very important. We have a TON of oak up here. It all goes brown. The basswood and poplar goes yellow, but it is dull yellow. Maples go bright yellow to red and that is nice to have to blend in. The mix really helps the look. That's all I'm sayin'

 

[Obed]

We don't plan on cutting any of the stuff behind the house other than any trees the excavator contractor damaged. Although it won't be anytime soon, my wife has indicated the desire to clear some of the undergrowth in the natural area in front of the house. It might be nice to get a better view of the house when approaching the house down the driveway. The house is quite obscured when the leaves are on the trees. Right now, the natural area in front of the house has briars, dead stuff, etc. and just looks unkempt. I'd hate to lose the red leaves though.

 

[Obed]

It's nice to start cutting firewood again. I prefer not to do chainsaw work in the warm/hot weather. However, I'm quite comfortable cutting firewood when the temps are in the 40's.

I was nervous that the wood splitter might not start but it had no problems. Fortunately, I had run it out of gas the last time I used it 8 months earlier. On the lawnmower, I have started turning the gas valve off before driving the mower into the garage. When the mower gets in the garage, I now let it run until the gas in the carborator is all used up. Fortunately, I have a nearby source for non-ethanol gas which is a HUGE blessing for our small engines. I dread the thoughts of that gas station no longer carrying the non-ethanol gas.

I have that wrapping the pallets with chicken wire works great. It's simple and cheap and makes moving firewood around a breeze.

 

[Obed]

I finally cleaned out these tall weeds growing in front of the house by the culvert. They have bugged me all summer. It only took 10 minutes with a hand sling to deal with them but it always seemed like other things took priority.

When I started cutting down the weeds, my little girl came by and told me, "You're breaking my house." Apparently, those weeds were a make-believe house of hers. I kind of hated to continue removing them. However, I explained to her that the weeds were ugly and had to go, then finished "breaking" her house.

In the meantime, she picked up a rake and "helped" me rake.

 

[Obed]

Since I already have the backhoe attached to the tractor for the shrubbery digging around the house, I've been keeping my eyes open for other backhoe tasks. Up the hill from the house, the path through the woods makes a "Y". At the junction of the three paths, there were 3 small trees that made the intersection tighter than I liked so I removed the trees. Two of the trees came out of the ground fairly easily. However, one of the trees had a stubborn tap root that went straight down. It took a little more work to get that tree out of the ground.

The backhoe attachment has been very handy for our house and homesteading project. However, it is an expensive tool and could be tough to justify from a financial standpoint. When I saw the tractor for sale used, it just happened to have a backhoe attached to it so that's why I have a backhoe. I am glad I have it because there are some tasks that would be tough to do or impractical to do without it. It is very useful when you want to take remove a tree without leaving a stump. Removing these 3 small trees without leaving stumps in the path would have been a significant amount of work without the backhoe. In fact, if I didn't have the backhoe, I would have cut down the trees and left the stumps to have to drive around and try not to damage a tire everytime I went through that part of the path. With the backhoe, the task was trivial. But, if I could only have a box blade or a backhoe, I would choose the box blade in a heartbeat.

 

[brin]

Obed, You may well know but on your trees with red leaves...some of them may well be sassafras trees..If you are not familiar with them, they smell like root beer...they make great tea and are just fun to smell...so if you are clearing little red trees be sure to smell them first...you might choose to leave them and enjoy the medicinal tea or make your own root beer...the roots are especially aromatic....

 

[patrick_g]

Yup, backhoes are expensive to own. An alternative to removing tree stumps with a backhoe (and not using explosives) is to use the FEL to dig at least half way around the offending tree and cut the trunk off below grade level. Rounup if there is regrowth. Alternatively, if cut off above ground and treated with stump destroying chemicals the stump will soon be a non problem. The main chemical is salt peter (potassium nitrate) available as stump chemical at Walmart etc.

To a man whose only tool is a hammer every job looks like a nail.

Of course, if you already have a backhoe it is more fun than the other methods.

Pat

 

[RadarTech]

Yup, backhoes are expensive to own. An alternative to removing tree stumps with a backhoe (and not using explosives) is to use the FEL to dig at least half way around the offending tree and cut the trunk off below grade level. Rounup if there is regrowth. Alternatively, if cut off above ground and treated with stump destroying chemicals the stump will soon be a non problem. The main chemical is salt peter (potassium nitrate) available as stump chemical at Walmart etc.

To a man whose only tool is a hammer every job looks like a nail.

Of course, if you already have a backhoe it is more fun than the other methods.

Pat

Salt peter? That is an interesting way to get rid of a woody......

Pun intended...... If you don't understand, then you never were in the Military......LOL

RT

 

[brin]

Salt peter? That is an interesting way to get rid of a woody......

Pun intended...... If you don't understand, then you never were in the Military......LOL

RT

Do you really think they gave us that in Basic training...I mean, ya never know...the military has experimented with troops for all of time....

 

[patrick_g]

Salt peter? That is an interesting way to get rid of a woody......

Pun intended...... If you don't understand, then you never were in the Military......LOL

RT

I usually say that I was never in the military... just the Air Force! Still we shared the same "old wive's tales."

By the way... do ya know the difference between the Air Force and the Boy Scouts?

The Boy Scouts are required to have adult leaders.

Pat

 

[patrick_g]

Salt peter? That is an interesting way to get rid of a woody......

Pun intended...... If you don't understand, then you never were in the Military......LOL

RT

I usually say that I was never in the military... just the Air Force! Still we shared the same "old wive's tales."

By the way... do ya know the difference between the Air Force and the Boy Scouts?

The Boy Scouts are required to have adult leaders.

Pat

 

[Obed]

It's kind of sad. After we finished building the back porch, I was determined to spend some time on it. The combination of cool temps and a stiff breeze caused me to dress for the occasion. Underneath my coat, in the picture I am wearing a full-body snowmobile suit. I was quite comfortable and enjoyed the entire afternoon parked on my back porch. If you look closely, you can see TBN on the laptop screen.

 

[brin]

It's kind of sad. After we finished building the back porch, I was determined to spend some time on it. The combination of cool temps and a stiff breeze caused me to dress for the occasion. Underneath my coat, in the picture I am wearing a full-body snowmobile suit. I was quite comfortable and enjoyed the entire afternoon parked on my back porch. If you look closely, you can see TBN on the laptop screen.

View attachment 287688

Now that is determination Obed...you are determined to enjoy that back porch...LOL...just wait until you get your screens in and spring and summer comes...you will spend a lot of memorable time out there...we do and we have a similar house and porch to yours....enjoy it...

 

[ENG18LT]

Obed, what did you do to get power to the house? I just got sticker shock from the power company. We need to bring PRIMARY line underground to a transformer, then secondary underground to a meter pedestal. Power company wants 8k and they don't provide the underground wire, I have to buy and install in 4" schd 40 pvc, set the transformer pad, and set meter pedestal on my own, above the 8K to the power company. Basically the $8k gets the power across the road, sets the actual transformer and makes the connection. UGH.

 

[Obed]

Obed, what did you do to get power to the house? I just got sticker shock from the power company. We need to bring PRIMARY line underground to a transformer, then secondary underground to a meter pedestal. Power company wants 8k and they don't provide the underground wire, I have to buy and install in 4" schd 40 pvc, set the transformer pad, and set meter pedestal on my own, above the 8K to the power company. Basically the $8k gets the power across the road, sets the actual transformer and makes the connection. UGH.

ENG18LT,
Our transformer is sitting on the ground 900 feet from the street. High voltage wire was run inside of conduit from the street to the transformer inside of conduit 4 ft underground. Beside the transformer is our meter pedestal. The pedestal is 100 feet from the house. We ran two 220V lines, each line in its own conduit, from the pedestal to the two breaker boxes in the basement.

The power company provided the wire, conduit and transformer and pulled the wire from the street to the transformer. We dug the trench (we paid our excavating contractor to dig the trench). We paid the power company $5K + our power bill can be no lower than $110/mo for 5 years. If we use zero KW in a month, our bill is still $110. We probably use about $80 worth of KW each month on average so we are paying an extra $30/mo for 5 years to pay for our long power line. The power company did not provide any installation service or materials downstream of the transformer. We had to provide all materials and labor downstream of the transformer with the exception of the power company provided meter that we install in our electrical pedestal.

From your description, I'm not sure how far the transformer will be from your house. You will want that transformer to be as close to your house as possible so you can minimize the length of the expensive 220V lines between the transformer and you house. High voltage primary wire can be smaller than lower voltage lines so you will want the 220V lines to the house be as short as possible.

I hope I answered your question. There is a significant cost associated with being a long way from the street. That's why many farm houses are located very close to the road.

Obed

 

[creekbend]

Salt peter? That is an interesting way to get rid of a woody......

Pun intended...... If you don't understand, then you never were in the Military......LOL

RT

When I was employed by a LEO in the 70's, I had heard rumors in regards to salt peter and decided to do some research. I found documented cases where salt peter was indeed used and given to inmates in Tennessee State Prisons.