bee_pipes
03-08-2007, 02:26 AM
Thank-goodness for Tennessee's perverse weather. Like anywhere else there are freak nice days in the winter that make you glad to be alive. But with Tennessee comes an early spring - March is good enough. You'd still want a green house for seedlings, frost is still possible, but sunny days in the 50's and 60's are excellent for working outside. The underbrush has not started growing yet, so you can see how sparse the woods actually is, the snakes are still sleeping, and ticks are not yet a problem. Still, though, this is about as far north as I ever want to live again...
If you right click on the image and select "View Image" you can see a larger version.
I got out and started working on the hilltop as shown on the map:
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o120/bee_pipes/RE_Site_Plan.jpg
The red line on the outside is the fence. One previous owner got the idea in his head he was going to raise gazelles (?!?) and put a fence in around the property. It's kind of rundown and trees have fallen on it - the dogs seem to be able to find breaks in the fence every time I fix one... I walked out the fence line, road and trails with a GPS, then punched the waypoints into a program called All Toppo Maps with a map set for Tennessee. The program is just a driver for a set of graphics files - copies of USGS topographic maps.
The various colored lines are the driveway (dark purple), the road (thick red) and trails running along ridges and hollows. The site is on a small knob that is pretty much clear of trees and has the road opening in front of it. It acts like a natural funnel, running wind from the south to the site.
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o120/bee_pipes/ABefore.jpg
This is the hill top before brush hogging. There is an ATV and DR brush mower in the picture, almost invisible.
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o120/bee_pipes/BAfterDay1.jpg
I tried to get in the same spot to shoot an after picture. This is the same site after about two hours of mowing. The ATV and DR were moved slightly to get the brush around and under them. Some of the trees will have to be removed, some just topped. I was pondering some sort of arrangement where I could use a short board, protractor, line and fishing sinker to get the angle from the ground to the top of the tree to calculate the height, from a known distance from the tree, to see who needs to be removed and who needs to be topped.
The land was timbered out a few years ago by the last owner, so most of the trees are small. I'm trying to leave the cedars where possible, they make good poles for buildings. There are a few oaks and yellow poplar worth cutting, some needing to be fished out of the eastern hollow, to use for lumber in building the battery shed. We have a Norwood sawmill, so can make our own lumber. Couldn't afford all the building otherwise.
The road is washed out pretty bad, the gullies and hills make it impossible to safely use a tractor. That bull ATV is our tractor and used to skid logs back to the mill. We may move the mill to the hill top to make it closer to the trees and have the lumber handy to the battery shed while constructing. The air is better for drying lumber on the hilltop - much less humidity than in the hollow where we live. My wife likes the ridge top too - we may put a cabin up there and move to it someday.
In addition to clearing the hill top, we have added three trails - two to reach the road quickly from the house (one of them will be the buried cable run), and another to reach the back hill from the north end of the hollow.
Regards,
Pat
If you right click on the image and select "View Image" you can see a larger version.
I got out and started working on the hilltop as shown on the map:
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o120/bee_pipes/RE_Site_Plan.jpg
The red line on the outside is the fence. One previous owner got the idea in his head he was going to raise gazelles (?!?) and put a fence in around the property. It's kind of rundown and trees have fallen on it - the dogs seem to be able to find breaks in the fence every time I fix one... I walked out the fence line, road and trails with a GPS, then punched the waypoints into a program called All Toppo Maps with a map set for Tennessee. The program is just a driver for a set of graphics files - copies of USGS topographic maps.
The various colored lines are the driveway (dark purple), the road (thick red) and trails running along ridges and hollows. The site is on a small knob that is pretty much clear of trees and has the road opening in front of it. It acts like a natural funnel, running wind from the south to the site.
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o120/bee_pipes/ABefore.jpg
This is the hill top before brush hogging. There is an ATV and DR brush mower in the picture, almost invisible.
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o120/bee_pipes/BAfterDay1.jpg
I tried to get in the same spot to shoot an after picture. This is the same site after about two hours of mowing. The ATV and DR were moved slightly to get the brush around and under them. Some of the trees will have to be removed, some just topped. I was pondering some sort of arrangement where I could use a short board, protractor, line and fishing sinker to get the angle from the ground to the top of the tree to calculate the height, from a known distance from the tree, to see who needs to be removed and who needs to be topped.
The land was timbered out a few years ago by the last owner, so most of the trees are small. I'm trying to leave the cedars where possible, they make good poles for buildings. There are a few oaks and yellow poplar worth cutting, some needing to be fished out of the eastern hollow, to use for lumber in building the battery shed. We have a Norwood sawmill, so can make our own lumber. Couldn't afford all the building otherwise.
The road is washed out pretty bad, the gullies and hills make it impossible to safely use a tractor. That bull ATV is our tractor and used to skid logs back to the mill. We may move the mill to the hill top to make it closer to the trees and have the lumber handy to the battery shed while constructing. The air is better for drying lumber on the hilltop - much less humidity than in the hollow where we live. My wife likes the ridge top too - we may put a cabin up there and move to it someday.
In addition to clearing the hill top, we have added three trails - two to reach the road quickly from the house (one of them will be the buried cable run), and another to reach the back hill from the north end of the hollow.
Regards,
Pat