29 - 30 June 2013
Down to Old Saybrook,
CT for Chree’s Aunt Pat’s 90th birthday party and family
reunion. Four hours each way. In another example of perfect timing, Perry
called just as we were arriving at the party to request help in loading some
furniture into his truck… here in VT.
28 June 2013
Some rain last night and gusty winds at breakfast time, but nowhere near the monsoon that NOAA was bleating about. So Chree and I had a great workout this morning moving 3,850 pounds of hemlock boards into the woodshed and putting them into a neatly ricked stack. Well over half the boards are 12″ wide… and currently weigh a plump 35 pounds apiece! Calculated that the pile actually contains well over 850 board feet of lumber, which, by the time it finishes drying, will lose over 1,600 pounds of water. While it does so, the woodshed will be smelling absolutely heavenly! When all was done, Chree and I took the surveying gear down to the waterfront to stake the 6 foot riparian buffer that we want to leave between the lakeshore and the excavated area that the dock building will occupy. Then, while Chree was doing teacher summer homework at the Brandon Free Library after lunch, I used the backhoe to start leveling out the path that the electrical conduit will follow between the top and bottom of the walkway. Had to dig almost to China to get out two stumps that were in the way. When Chree returned, we tried to take the Ranger down my new “road” in order to pick up brush. (At this point, read the blog for 4 August 2012, the tale of last time we tried to take the Ranger down this way to pick up brush.) You guessed it! At almost the same spot that the Ranger got hung up on a rock last year, we (I have a mouse in my pocket) hung it up on another rock this afternoon. Unlike last time, however, now we have a tractor. Hooked a logging chain to the towing ball on the stern of the Ranger, ran the other end to the backhoe, gave a hydraulically-assisted gentle pull, and presto change-o, the Ranger was free of its precarious perch. No harm, no foul!
27 June 2013
Toby Rheaume called at 7:30 to say he was on his way over to pick up the hemlock saw logs… just about the time I realized that the heaviest log (that would have to be loaded first into his dump trailer) was buried on the bottom of the stack. Got the stack resorted just as he arrived. Loading the logs was not without its moments… the Kubota was being asked to operate at the very limits of its (and its operator’s) capabilities. After Toby headed out, Chree and I set to work clearing out one side of the woodshed to create space for ricking the hemlock for drying. Then we cleaned up the limbs from the red oak and spruce felled yesterday and bucked the trunks into 8-foot lengths. The unsold Ranger is proving to be a blessing in disguise… taking abuse that otherwise would cause rapid depreciation in the Tacoma’s value. The burn pile is, once again, huge… with more brush to be added before ignition and lift-off. That done, we sorted through the dead ¾″ plywood previously used for cement forms until we found enough “okay” pieces that could be sawed into ricks for the hemlock. Rick sawing accomplished, was doing a few small chores right after lunch when Toby returned with 700+ board feet of freshly sawn hemlock. Had him dump his load beside the
26 June 2013
In between periods of rain this morning we got the rest of the two hemlocks bucked into lengths for sawing, then skidded out of the woods. Have ended up with nine saw logs ranging in diameter from 9 to 19 inches, which should produce 620 board feet of lumber… just slightly less than I figure we’ll need for interior paneling in the waterfront building. Then we took down a 9″ spruce that would have shaded the Sun Room… and was in the way of the trench that needs to be dug for an electrical line running from one end of the walkway to the other. Since we still have Toby’s snatch block and steel cable, used them to take down a 12″ red oak that was, again, right next to where the Sun Room will be and which had a severe lean towards the walkway. As before, Chree did a great job pulling with the Kubota, causing the oak to land right where we wanted it. That tree down, the rain started again in earnest, so we changed clothes and spent a delightful afternoon and some money at the Marble Museum (and Gift Shop) in Proctor. Lake water temperature is 76°.
25 June 2013
Tackled the two big
hemlocks next to the woodshed today. First
one lost its top last winter and the other died this summer. First tree was 26″ thru the butt, which is a
bit of a challenge for a chainsaw with a 16″ bar. Down and bucked, that tree created three 8′6″
logs with 345 board feet of lumber in them… and a really nice chopping block
for over by the campfire. I calculated
the weight of the butt end log as 840 pounds, which the Kubota just barely lifted
off the ground. Then came the real
challenge. Used our 28′ aluminum
extension ladder to hook Toby Rheaume’s steel cable high up in the second tree. Chree didn’t get a picture of that evolution
‘cause the camera was in the RV and she wanted to stay close by in case she had
to call 9∙1∙1. Led the other end of the
cable through Toby’s snatch block (chained to the base of a sturdy beech tree) thence
to the rear end of the Kubota. The concept
was that, as I finished cutting the tree, Chree would pull it down with the
tractor in the direction we wanted it to go.
Only two small problems: Chree had never done such a maneuver before and
she couldn’t see me from where the tractor was positioned for the pull. Can you spell “recipe for disaster”? Next question: Do you know what a “sound
shot” is in deer hunting? Same concept:
when Chree heard me rev up the chainsaw to start the final cut, away she went
on her steed of orange. The end
result? The tree came down within an
inch of where we wanted it, with minimal damage to the surrounding flora and no
damage to the fauna (we being counted among the latter). Would have had that tree pulled out and
bucked this afternoon but we had to make a full-speed run over the Lynne &
Perry’s after lunch for our laundry, arriving (this time) five minutes before
the thunderstorm… which then persisted on hanging around for the rest of day.
24 June 2013
Over to Lynne &
Perry’s first thing in the morning to get drinking water and do a couple of laundry
loads, which we hung out to dry while we went up to Shelburne to take Alverta
to lunch. Raced through a thunderstorm on the way back south and got back to
the laundry… five minutes too late.
Looks like it’ll get a double rinse this afternoon. Did get back to Fern Lake in time to close up
the RV before the storm hit there.
23 June 2013
While Chree was off
getting more Gifford’s at the Middlebury Hannaford, I put the cut off live
wires from Kate’s circuit breakers 17 & 27 into a weather-tight electrical
box, covered with the pressure treated wood box made earlier, and buried so
that the top of box is just at the earth’s surface. Then I made a little bridge to fill the gap
between the wooden walkway and the deck where the dock shack used to be. Then we cut up and hauled away the last bit
of the former stairway, supervised again by the resident garter snake. After lunch I changed out the backhoe and
front bucket for the three point log skidding hitch and pallet forks. While Chree was bringing the tractor down to
the waterfront, I cut off an 8” spruce that I needed to drop where the dock
shack used to be in order to miss a 4” maple that we wanted to keep. As the spruce went down it grabbed the maple
anyway, which I didn’t see happening as I was admiring the precision with which
I had aimed the spruce. The maple knocked
me to the ground just in time for the butt end of the spruce to hit me in the
chest. Ouch! By the time Chree
arrived I was back upright, if a tad the worse for wear. Fifteen minutes later, after I had limbed,
bucked, and hooked up the trees for skidding, I realized that I was no longer
wearing my glasses. We looked high and
low and couldn’t find them, so hauled everything away in advance of an
approaching thunderstorm. After all was
secured for rain, I went back down the hill to continue searching. Finally found the glasses when I stepped on
them. That’s the good news. The bad news is that we couldn’t find them
because they had been driven into the ground when the tractor backed up over
them. Fortunately, some adroit use of
needle nose pliers, brute strength, and a little duct tape soon had them back
to wearable. After that, Chree made me
lie in bed and drink a concoction of quinine water, lime juice, and distilled
juniper berries to ease the pain. She
said I was acting like someone with a head injury…
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