New Wooded Lot

[MrSchaeferPants]

Hello everyone, been reading here for a couple years. We purchased a 10 acre wooded lot back in October, it was once logged by weyerhaeuser, now plots of land are being sold by the owner. I could use a lot of advice on the management of the trees here. We currently have a single wide about 80ft off the road, but plan on building a house in years to come another 1-2 hundred feet back, ultimately I only want the area around the house somewhat cleared, small yard in the front, and for the most part a 'wooded garden' type yard in the back. The rest of the lot will remain as is with some underbrush management here and there. So now to my long list of questions lol.

Ultimately I really want to keep as many trees, of all kind as I can, we desperately need shade with 110 degree summers. The majority of trees on the property are young, I have a handful on the entire lot that of any real size, but in the areas near the house I need to thin some, and remove certain ones that may cause problems later on. MANY have the split trunks, or multiple ones have grown together. They're small enough I can easily cut, pull, and prune them myself, as I have been doing. I read as much as I can about how and when to prune, but as to what they are, and what I should do so I don't have a problem 20 years from now, I'm not sure.

Front yard, I'm guessing here, Loblolly pine? We're in Mountain Pine, Arkansas, 7B. The same pines are across the road, that's Ouachita national park. All these same pines are planted randomly on the property, roughly 10 years old give or take. I've removed about 10 from the front yard that were too close to one another. Ice storm we had this winter broke a few branches here and there on these smaller pines.

Situations like this, the two funky bent trees is larger, have a bigger crown and give some shade, but I would rather have the single trunk, even though now it's smaller. Should I go for just keeping all the trees with one solid single trunk, and cut my losses with the slightly older trees that are malformed?

Aside from the pines, I have a lot of these two trees, no idea what they are. It's my first spring, so I'm just now seeing what the leaves even look like.

These are all over the place, they have tiny buds right now, the leaves stay on all winter, and are just now slowly falling off.

This is the other kind that are abundant here

 

[MrSchaeferPants]

This is where I would like to put the house later it's at the begenning of a slope. I've been clearing underbrush and vines... by hand :msp_scared: long proccess, but I have more time than money.

Here's what I've managed to do so far, all of it pretty much looked like the above picture. This will eventually be our 'back yard' area. I'm leaving all of the trees until I come up with a plan, and I'll slowly thin them out. I'm going for shade, so those pines will eventually go since even the much older ones across the road don't provide that much shade. The yard area will be similar to as it sits now, some terracing to control errosion, wooded shade native species planting, some paths leading down. The area at the very bottom will be a firepit type area and stay cleared, minus perhaps some ornamental trees along the border.

So am I limited to 10 pics per this entire thread, or just 8 per post. Wouldn't let me do another set of 8? Crap, more specific questions with pics. But anyway, if you can see that last picture, the majority of the trees are clumped in twos, threes, etc. Dunno if I should clear them out, or what.

EDIT: And after looking at the pic posted, can't see the trees I'm talking about, those are all the single trunk ones I can choose to keep.

 

[MrSchaeferPants]

This one tree is one of the large trees I have, it seems solid, though it is leaning a bit downhill. Think it will be ok? I would love to keep it as it's one of the few trees shading the area, or will when the leaves fully form. It'll be 20-30 ft from where we will put the house. I'll assume if it did fall, it'd fall downhill away from the house.

These two sets of trees, clumped with three trunks provide a great deal as shade as well right now, but they've grown so funky. I only plan to do some pruning as needed, it's far from damaging anything other than other trees if it falls. My questions relate to this, I don't want to keep the trees around the yard that are clumped like this. Because I don't want them to end up like these.

Here are a few pics of the backyard area, with the majority of any decent size trees, all clumping, multiple trunks. What do I do, remove them all? Deal with the remaining being small, young trees?

My only other decent size tree in that area, single trunk. It's the same as the picture above with the close up of the leaf.

And here is the one grand tree on my whole property, marks the end of my property line on the south, it's the same type as well. The one in the center, far away.

I just don't know what to do, I know the V shape and multiple trunks are weaker, and I don't want them. But the rest of the trees are very small, not in the right places. I'm going to attempt to transplant some of the small ones in the fall/winter (as I've read that's a good time) to test my luck and put them where I need them.

I've searched around for an arborist in my area. I don't need any professional work done, I would just like for someone to come out, and walk around with me and give me advice, pay them for their time and knowledge. I just gotta find one.

Thanks for any and all advice, I sure need it! I'm young'ish, hope to see this place what my vision is like with the trees by the time I'm old and can't do any of the work anymore and can sit on a deck and enjoy it.

Sorry for the jumbled post, getting used to the quantity of pics per post, and what the forum allows.

 

[MrSchaeferPants]

Looks like a nice lot


Are you planning to plant anything to cut yourself for your own use ie firewood?


Key thing for me that you said is your going to make a plan.


I wish you the best of luck with your project. I'm not really qualified to give ya advice as to planting pruning etc. We have our own places set up but for kinda different purposes (both in the US and UK) It is alot of work that for sure but you will get the satisfaction of getting things as you want em.


The only other thing I'd add is (I get the heat and shade bit) is trees near house can cause probs even interfering with drains etc and rarely do they fall where ya think they will


hope all goes well

My main heat will be a wood stove. I have plenty fallen, dying and other stuff for now. I could probably have 10 cords easy if I tried. Plus across the road, in the ditch, are about 100 trees growing from saplings to 6-8" diameter at the base, as those get older they'll have to go as well so they don't hit the power lines, prolly another 1-2 cords there right now. And this goes the entire length of the road, sure all the owners out here would love for me to clear them, free wood :msp_biggrin:

Yeah it's a rough plan, for the distance between house and trees. Only piping will be from the well to the house, and 4" waste water to septic. I won't have them too close, that one I said is 20-30ft, is probably closer to 50-60 from where I intend to put the house, and this will be a few years down the road. I just want to get the layout, clearing started. I may buy a few trees, fairly small in containers, and keep putting them in larger and larger buckets until the house is done, so I don't have to spend 100-400 for some large trees... just hope I have a backhoe or something to help when the time comes :msp_rolleyes: For the construction, I'm sure the 5-6 trees in my current backyard/future front yard will have to get cleared.