Birches never boring

 Wherever you are on Hardwood Hermitage, birches never get boring.

Venison chili and cornbread

Thanks to our neighbor, fresh venison went into the crockpot this a.m. Chili for supper! With some excellent cornbread, too.

Never in a hurry

When you have a good shot at living 300 years, you're never in a hurry.  Red oaks always leaf out late, sometimes not until Memorial Day weekend.  They are also slow to change color in the autumn. Most other trees have no leaves left, but red oaks hold out for a while.  Here are some pictures from yesterday and today, two days of glorious sunshine and pleasingly cool fall temps. The last photo shows an oak behind some lovely paper birches still retaining some leaves.

Star of the foliage season

This sugar maple might be the biggest star of Hardwood Hermitage's foliage season.  Today's sun makes the giant tree especially radiant.

Latest wood pictures

All ready for a quite winter in two separate storage locations, recently processed wood looks great. Two years will pass before this lovely biomass goes into the stove.

A great morning for work

The latest cutting and splitting project started over the weekend with the bowsaw drop of a red maple with some dieback in the crown. The little saw cut a path through a small softwood grove, then made the V on the east side of the trunk.  About 25 minutes of bowsaw cutting then dropped the tree.

This a.m. cutting of the trunk proceeded well using both saws. Then, some of the unsplit wood moved down the hill by the house, with bigger pieces staying at the cutting site for some splitting first.

Best month in forest

No month beats October for forest beauty.