Heading out!

[Steve NW WI]

It's 8 am or so here, 40° outside, and the sun is shining.

I've got 3 saws sharp and ready, 2 gallons of saw mix, a bunch of bar oil, fuel in the splitter tractor, and fresh batteries in the radio headphones.

Got my morning fix of caffiene, and have 2 gallons of cheapo Kwik Trip gatorade in the cooler, a full battery in the camera, and my trusty Dolmar hat on.

The itinerary as I have it planned so far:

Finish splitting and stacking what's on the trailer.

Run the M down to the corner store for a full tank of fuel (I hate the new gas cans, and only have one old one left) and a sandwich or two for me from the deli.

Head to the woods for a while and cut up a couple blowdowns.

Off to my buddy's to pick up the woodhauler after some long overdue maintenance.

Over to little brothers' place as long as I'm over that way and pick up some of the poplar I've got laying there.

Split up the poplar on the truck.

Haul in some wood to the basement.

Call it a day, crack a cold one and start a pot of chili for the potluck at the local for the Packer-Viking game tomorrow.


What could possibly go wrong with a plan like this one? Stay tuned!

 

[Beefie]

Sounds like a good plan Earl, We will be waiting for pics.


Beefie

 

[Gologit]

It's 8 am or so here, 40° outside, and the sun is shining.

I've got 3 saws sharp and ready, 2 gallons of saw mix, a bunch of bar oil, fuel in the splitter tractor, and fresh batteries in the radio headphones.

Got my morning fix of caffiene, and have 2 gallons of cheapo Kwik Trip gatorade in the cooler, a full battery in the camera, and my trusty Dolmar hat on.

The itinerary as I have it planned so far:

Finish splitting and stacking what's on the trailer.

Run the M down to the corner store for a full tank of fuel (I hate the new gas cans, and only have one old one left) and a sandwich or two for me from the deli.

Head to the woods for a while and cut up a couple blowdowns.

Off to my buddy's to pick up the woodhauler after some long overdue maintenance.

Over to little brothers' place as long as I'm over that way and pick up some of the poplar I've got laying there.

Split up the poplar on the truck.

Haul in some wood to the basement.

Call it a day, crack a cold one and start a pot of chili for the potluck at the local for the Packer-Viking game tomorrow.


What could possibly go wrong with a plan like this one? Stay tuned!

opcorn:opcorn: What could possibly go wrong? LOLOL...you already know the answer to that one. Anything. Everything. The chili sounds good.

 

[Garmins dad]

The chili sounds like the only sure thing.. :hmm3grin2orange: Be safe out there.. those trees can ruin your day..

 

[Blazin]

 

[albhb3]

Only one problem you might as well spend sunday woodn away that pack are gonna blow out the viqueens in the first half

 

[Steve NW WI]

Midday update:

Trailer is empty, wood is stacked. $74.00 worth of gas in the Farmall. Had to run a couple errands this morning I'd forgotten about, and took a break to help the neighbor move his combine to another farm. Also, no word on if the truck is finished yet.

Otherwise, going well by my standards. A few more bites of sandwich and I'm headed for the woods to see what I can wreck there.

 

[Steve NW WI]

The afternoon went kinda like the morning, not near the progress I planned on, but got some stuff done none the less, and I enjoyed the time out in the woods. The dog did as well, and she was kinda upset that I had a chainsaw instead of a shotgun when she kicked a rooster pheasant out of the edge of the cornfield for me. We'll take care of him at a later date.

At any rate, it's time for the day in pictures. Here's what I walked out the front door to this morning, still a little frost on the ground and the hood of the M:

I split three tailgate loads like this one today, this was the last one, and I had to get my fat butt back to the front of the trailer to keep it from tipping down when I brought the last round back. She's got a lot of tongue weight, but that much white oak on the back end wipes that out:

A couple shots of the woodpile after I was done, just over a cord and a half there, half a cord of red oak and a cord of white off of this load. First pic is of the pile as it was before I started today:

After pic, sun was on the other side from the last pic, but all I split this morning got put in the back (front in this picture) row:

Another shot:

There was a good bit of punky wood on this one. I split off most of it, and wound up with a bunch of splitter trash and chunks for the bonfire. I'll get em policed up next time I start the loader tractor:

More to come in a minute. Stay tuned!

 

[bluestem]

You suppose Steve's still out cutting wood. Hopefully one of them pretty little wood fairy's didn't lure him off... I like his input around here!

Sent from my Droid

 

[bluestem]

Ah hah!!! Speak of the devil! Good to see you weren't carried off Steve.

Sent from my Droid

 

[Steve NW WI]

Ah hah!!! Speak of the devil! Good to see you weren't carried off Steve.

Sent from my Droid

Yup, I'm here. Chili is simmering in the slow cooker, getting ready for tomorrow, watching the Badger game on TV, much closer than I care for.

Anyhoo, back to the pics. It was a good day for a tractor drive. It's about a mile and a half to the country store, if it ain't too frickin cold, I just drive the tractor down there and fill up.

Road trip:

I got the call saying the truck wouldn't be ready today due to a lack of parts, so I just headed out back to see what I should cut on for a while. I found a big birch that went down over the summer, they become first priority for me when they go down. They're nice wood, but if they're on the ground any amount of time, they rot fast. They keep pretty well if split and stacked though. This one is about 18" on the ground, the base is about 12' tall and 24"+ DBH:

I ain't touchin it just yet though, the mother of all widowmakers is hangin there waiting to bonk me a good one, about 12" diameter birch branch hanging in a 5-6" ironwood. There's no easy way to get the tractor there to pull it out until the corn is off, so it's not happening today:

Of course this bugged me greatly, so I looked around and found a spot I can get in with some cutting of some small ironwoods. I really should have a year around access to this part of the woods anyhow, and there was a maple top back further I could cut my way to as well. Here's the entry, just to the left of the little birch. Lots of prickly ash there, but I'll fix that next time out with the Tanaka brushcutter:

After an hour or so of cutting and dragging brush, I had a nice little trail and about a half dozen piles like this one to pick up later. I'll cut some really small ironwood, as its G-O-O-D wood to have when it's -30 and the wind is howling. I put a tank of gas through the 5100 on this stuff, it doesn't get used near as much as my 7300 and 420 do, so I let it have some happy time:

Due to the lack of a truck, I never got to my brother's today, I'll likely make a trip over before work one day this week.

After I got my trail in, I tried to call for backup in case something went to heck pulling the widowmaker down, and instead wound up at a bonfire burning up the brush from the spruce I cut for my friend last weekend. Oh well, I got something done today, and nothing broke. The Badgers just lost, but it's time to test the chili, and see if it tastes better with beer!

 

[lfnh]

Looks like a good day for you. and nothing broke.
Good pics and write up.
Thnaks for sharing.

 

[hydro2]

Great pics. I was cutting today too. What a great day.

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