Timber Reclaimed & Fully Purposed

Last Fall I hired my friend and longtime professional dirt man, Alan Lawrence, to finish clearing a few acres on our place in an effort to improve the wildlife habitat as well as the view in back of the cabin. Before Alan began work, he asked what I wanted done with the trees. I had given thought to cutting the trees into log sections and saving them for future projects: projects I might never actually start much less finish. Having done this numerous times before-logging trees into sections and saving them for future projects, only to end up using a small portion for my intended purposes and cutting the rest into firewood or in some cases, letting the wood rot to the point it was only good for brush pile burning or fire pit wood-I decided to have Alan just push the trees into brush piles. Brush piles make great habitat and cover for critters and birds of all kinds and in general are good for nature. Alan did as I'd asked.

~Brush-pile in back of the cabin

After a couple days knocking down trees and putting the ground back together, I ended up with 3 areas nicely opened up and 3 pretty good sized brush piles. Alan's dad, Hugh, stopped by and commented that if he'd known I was going to push the trees into piles, he would have liked to purchase the timber from me. Hugh's comments were confirmation that I'd made a mistake by not logging the trees. I decided to reclaim as much of the timber as feasible and soon started the project by spending an afternoon working the the biggest pile first; limbing trees and sawing them to usable lengths. As a result of having sold my dozer a few months earlier, I realized I'd have to use my 45 horse New Holland farm tractor to skid the logs out of the ravine and up the hill. Not the ideal equipment situation, but sometimes you just have to make due with what you have available.  

~One of three newly cleared areas, late October 2013

~Newly cleared area in back of cabin Mid November 2013

For some time I'd been planning to build a lean-to onto the north side of the barn to match the one on the south side. I thought it'd be fun and rewarding to build it from timber harvested exclusively from the property. I told Klietus what I was doing and he volunteered to help, agreeing that it would be a worthy and fun project. As a result, we worked a few hours one afternoon in October and began hauling logs up the relatively steep hill. This past weekend was the first time we'd had a chance to work on pulling out more logs, harvesting another 8 or so. The plan is to reclaim enough timber to complete the project without having to purchase any lumber. Once we have enough logs and they've had time to dry out sufficiently for milling, we'll have some of the logs sawn into 8' lengths with a thickness of 1 1/4" and of varying widths. These boards should do nicely for the lean-to roof. I plan to saw the rafters with my Stihl 361 at a dimension of about 3"x10"x10'. Those will be some fairly substantial solid oak rafters and I'm hoping Klietus won't have any trouble getting them up there all by himself.

~Klietus making an equipment check 

I have to laugh when I think about how many times I told our son Tyler when he was growing up that "You can never have too much equipment." A few years ago I made an adjustment to my old saying and shared it with him. The updated "Ranch Mantra" is: "You can never have too much of the RIGHT equipment."  

~Klietus takes a respite while pondering future log related activities, which I'm confident include the use of his new Jonsered 2250 saw

I figure when Klietus's wife Julie sees this picture of him and for perhaps the first time in their married life realizes she's married to an actual timber-man, it will probably get him at least a few points in the manliness department: I figure he'll owe me a beer for that one!

~Maxie Pad inspects a large timber I sawed out of a recently re-claimed log

A few years ago our daughter Britt gave me a North Face fleece pullover for Christmas. I've worn it so much it's close to needing an update. It's been on numerous outdoor excursions and last Saturday was no exception. I find it's good to have a few favorite pullovers you can layer on when you're bucking timber, hunting Moose, or locked out of the house because you spend too much time in the woods instead of taking your bride to the show or maybe tagging along while she shops at Ann Taylor Loft or Banana Republic.

NOTE: In the interest of full discloser, I've never been Moose hunting, but they say it taste a lot like Squirrel...only different.

~Author posing with the afternoon's log harvest in his favorite fleece pullover by North Face

I'll keep you updated as Kliet and I move forward with the Barn lean-to project. Maybe I'll inspire my "Almost Uncle" Tom to finish his barn. That way, he can start filling it up with stuff he currently doesn't even realize he needs.

~Klietus waters "Maxie Pad" after a long afternoon up and down the hill