Scrounging Firewood (and other stuff)
- Thread starter mainewoods
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My hat is off to all of you that work to clear those trails. That is an awesome way to serve the community.
Me and the crew really enjoy it, itās rewarding work. We cut through a brushy hillside, and make the return trip on a trail.
I do have a set of forks that I normally use. I was in a rush to get in the woods and forgot to switch over after pushing snow the day before. I'd really like to get a grapple of some sort. It would be helpful to clean up brush and make brush piles for the critters.
I grew up using these in the Adirondacks in New York. They were ideal for trail clearing and maintenance. Not sure where my father got them, but they were much better and safer than machetes or anything else. And they had very sharp hardened-steel replacable blades that could be re-sharpened. We called them "Brush-hooks". The length of the handle was ideal as it could be used one-handed for light growth, and it had a long "reach", or 2 handed for heavier wood.
We actually introduced a couple of the local Forest Rangers to them as well. My dad had picked up a box of extra blades (probably 50-100 of them) and every now and again they would stop by for a new blade...
I have use a similar expansion cement called Trollkraft in Norway (translates to troll-power) https://www.heydi.no/prod/1267/no/heydi-trollkraft .
I was working with granite (bedrock) and needed to enlarge a elbow in the bedrock to put in a foundation for an extension to our cabin kitchen (not freestanding stone or a corner that you want to reduce).
Approx 60 1.5" holes approx 24" deep and about 4-5" from each other was required. That is far outside any battery operated equipment. And it took almost 3 weeks for the granite to crack/crumble.
However, for your trailwork, if you just want to make big stones into smaller stones, and you have lots of time to do it, you might consider drilling a line of holes, filling most of them with expansion cement, and leaving the stone for a couple of weeks, and use the wedges/feathers to force it when you come back in a couple of weeks if it hasn't already cracked.
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James Miller
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Cleaned up the wood I cut the other day. Now I have room for the brush from the stuff on the right as I get it cut up.
I got a couple buckets of snob wood and a bunch of oak.
I got a couple buckets of snob wood and a bunch of oak.
Scrounge: I've been chasing this one for a while. Big grove of overgrown, oveerage, willow where a lot of it has been killed by agricultural overspray. That will take a few years to cleanup if it is workable. Owner says it is in a swamp but here those tend to dry up in the summer. I had put in a call to him several days ago. He called yesterday and gave peermission but added that he also has an old farmstead with trees up a basically deserted dirt road. I won't ever be able to scout that for at least a month until thinks dry up. In these parts dirt road = sticky gumbo in the spring time. I may luck out and get some quality firewood out of there. I don't need it as I have around 12 years in my current stash and I doubt I'll be around that long. 87 in a few weeks.
Out the door to the wood pile tomorrow. Wx drying up (been off, on rain for a couple weeks). I have a coupld good size piles of limbwood to put through my multisection sawbuck. Fueled up and warmed up teh MS363 yesterday. He sounds eager. To my surprise I found a freshly sharpened chain on it when I pulled it off the shelf. I have never before sharped a chain when I put a saw away for the season.
Out the door to the wood pile tomorrow. Wx drying up (been off, on rain for a couple weeks). I have a coupld good size piles of limbwood to put through my multisection sawbuck. Fueled up and warmed up teh MS363 yesterday. He sounds eager. To my surprise I found a freshly sharpened chain on it when I pulled it off the shelf. I have never before sharped a chain when I put a saw away for the season.
Turnkey,b have you read Lars mittings Norwegian Wood? The book starts by describing the importance of firewood there, and how for men it's a job the pride, providing warmth for their families... And how older guys often compete to leave behind several years worth of wood...I kind of status symbol. You must be the king of Norway, congratulations!
About a third of it had already been cut, and we just threw it in. Unfortunately it covers a lot of our fresh cut stuff. The bigger pieces are whatās left after a guy with a small saw gets done, I took two more rounds off of two different trunks. Itās blue oak, as far as I know anyway. Also I was shown more trees I can cut on future trips, some standing.
Wow! Thanks for sharing that.
.
Dropped a 7-8" Black Locust that needed to come down before the elm, sized up 4 logs and cut them for dunnage for the first pile of logs, then set them out back and moved the logs(about 3.5 cord). Bucked the rest of it up for firewood and I'll split those and add them to the split/for sale pile. I set aside a few sticks of cherry and walnut that were in the pile as I don't want them to rot, then bucked a couple buckets worth and put one bucket in the woodshed to replace some of what I robbed out of next yrs stash, still need to replace about 1/2-2/3 cord. Still have a couple more buckets to cut and split out of the cherry/walnut and a couple smaller BL sticks, then I can start moving the other log pile. I also split up more off the round pile.
I'm trying to get all the rounds split down to the frozen ones so they can thaw over the weekend since we have warmer weather coming.
I'll probably drop the elm tomorrow and just cut it into log length to clean it up, while the ground is still frozen in the morning, and have a nice fire for the brush if the weather allows(nice to do it when it's 100% overcast so no-one freaks out about the smoke). I'll only drop two of the three stems most likely, but if I'm feeling frisky I may do the third, we'll see.
If the boy is available I'll get a video dropping the tree, and I'll take another picture then of the round/split pile as it is now or tomorrow if I do more.
I'm trying to get all the rounds split down to the frozen ones so they can thaw over the weekend since we have warmer weather coming.
I'll probably drop the elm tomorrow and just cut it into log length to clean it up, while the ground is still frozen in the morning, and have a nice fire for the brush if the weather allows(nice to do it when it's 100% overcast so no-one freaks out about the smoke). I'll only drop two of the three stems most likely, but if I'm feeling frisky I may do the third, we'll see.
If the boy is available I'll get a video dropping the tree, and I'll take another picture then of the round/split pile as it is now or tomorrow if I do more.
Lol! I didnāt notice that, it jumped in when I wasnāt looking.
Oops, I first read that as 7 foot 8 inches.
Biggest locust I've seen was about 3.4-4'.
Iirc this is the biggest one I've dropped, 28" bar with small dogs.
Didn't think I was going to get a load in today, but I walked around the back of one of the mountains of logs and there was some more found money!
I was afraid that I would have to go in front of @Brufab and the entire AS Scrounger Tribunal and beg for mercy for missing a day. Still not sure I'll get one tomorrow.
I was afraid that I would have to go in front of @Brufab and the entire AS Scrounger Tribunal and beg for mercy for missing a day. Still not sure I'll get one tomorrow.
Did a little of my own today!
While drinking morning coffee I heard a "good size tree" go down. Walked our 9 acres and looked around at the neighbors a bit but didn't see anything. Later I heard a chain saw one neighbor away, walked over, and an oak snag fell and took two other trees with it, blocking his driveway. I asked if I could help and ran a tank of of gas through the 044.
Problem solved. One tree was probably a basswood.
Problem solved. One tree was probably a basswood.
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