Great soup

What could be better than homemade tomato and pepper soup with home grown ingredients?

Processing black cherry log

Work continues on a large black cherry log taken down about a month ago.  The tree had been dying back for a while.  It's only about 250 feet from the house, so this is a relatively easy batch of firewood.  Here are two photos, the first of which shows the log after some initial cutting.  The second pic displays the outcome of about 25 minutes of splitting the bigger pieces.  After going up the hill, some of the log will still need to be split.  Then, the final two steps are cutting each piece in half, then stacking as part of the 2020-2021 heating season.

Berries looking great

Raspberries are at their peak a bit late, but they are looking wonderful.  Some blackberries also coming in, with a bumper crop expected.  The land and woods just never keep from giving around here.

This batch was picked in 45 minutes this morning, without being more than 100 feet from the house.

Four bags of birch bark

Very pleasant weather has prevailed since a heat wave broke over the weekend.  Birch bark was brought up the hill in the day's pleasing sunshine.  An old dead double trunk was the source for the bark today.  The new bags of the wonderful fire starter will dry out in the strong sunshine after being taken up the hill.

Work never done

Lots happening before the big warm up this weekend.  It's a beautiful morning today, and the high temp won't get too bad -- yet.

With the neighbors on vacation, there's plenty to do in the garden lately.  Three bushels of peas!

Scouting future wood work continues.  This might be the most interesting broken tree ever, a red maple.  It will be a chore to process safely, but this future firewood will eventually be near the house.

Weeding and wood moving

Happy Independence Day! Temps have been rising this week, but humidity hasn't been terrible yet.  Mornings remain cool, so work such as weeding the neighbor's garden and moving some wood closer to the house have progressed very well.  Here are five pictures.  First, three from the garden down the hill . . .

And then two of wood moved closer to the house.  The big pile the moose was fascinated by four weeks ago has become much larger.

Here are 50 split pieces from the diagonal paper birch downed last week.  Lots more from that tree will be up in the next few days.

Plenty of summer work

Shade creates some nice spots to work during the summer.  A diagonal paper birch was dropped recently, with pieces lined up for splitting near the house.  Even during a hot, sunny day, the splitting work would be bearable.  Some of this was split this morning in relatively cool temps.

Trail trimming and forest management, other work that can be done in some shade, is again on the agenda for later this month.  Stay tuned!!