That will be a relief when that hazardous tree is gone. That’s the only problem with wooded property - it takes some $$$ to maintain it safely.
We have 15 or so Black Walnut trees in the pasture marked ‘for sale’ by a guy that wants to harvest and buy them. As soon as we had him bid on them, the price for BW dropped like a rock, (in HALF!) so they’re going to grow for another few years until prices go back up. We’re in no hurry. They are not a danger to any cows or any buildings. ;) The pricing had something to do with the Tariffs, though. China suddenly had a bunch of Black Walnut lumber to sell to America before they kicked in. These are trees that Beau planted just by scattering a bucket of nuts down there, 35 years ago. I also had a row of BW trees lining the driveway at my other farm. I sold three of them, closest to the house, for a decent profit before I put the farm on the market. I wasn’t giving away ALL my hard work of 25 years, LOL!
I had a planter like you’re wanting in the front when we took down an old Cottonwood tree. Wave Petunias filled it up nicely. It’s disintegrated by now, but I got a good 5 years out of it. Before it was a planter the stump was a favorite place for that years litter of puppies to play, ‘King of the Mountain.’ :)
I had no idea black walnut was ever in demand. My sister wants me to save some chunks for her husband to use in his smoker. It will be a surprise gift for his birthday coming up in a few months. (And a gift that didn’t cost extra!)
Tree project is finished for the next few days. Progress stopped when the crane with the grappler hook/saw malfunctioned. These trees are so tall that they have to extend to their full reach, which puts a huge load on the weakest point. This is the second rig that was messed up with this project.
The bucket truck is in for regular maintenance and won’t be out until Monday or Tuesday. Today, all I had was fresh herbs. Next time, I will be armed with cookies or some such to offer for a hard day’s work. (I offered water, but they brought their own.)
We are the 4th owner of this house. I have never met the original owners, but they still live in the area, and one neighbor is still in touch with them. I asked her to reach out and see if they want a slice of the hickory tree. They said yes! So they will come by sometime next week to retrieve it.
I’m looking forward to meeting them. The woman is apparently a Master Gardener, and she gave me a great slate to work with. I hope she will like what we’ve done with the property, but you never know.
The only other thing we did was update the kitchen. I like to cook so I needed a gas stove. It was an imperative for me.
Woodland Management: In my case I’m “lucky”: I have some tools my Dad gave me or I inherited, and tiny bit of his knowledge in Forest Management with a lifetime of field experience got passed to me. (Now that I have a small woodlot, I wish I’d spent more time on picking up more of what he knew!)
I’ve already been up 5 hours. Trying to beat the heat, and I can take a siesta in the AC in afternoon! Too much to do...
On a good note, all those pepper plants I separated seem to be doing ok, and none have (in 3+ days) wilted. I’ll back off the watering a bit now, so as not to drown them, and give the roots a few more days to get well established, then move them from the 4” pots to bigger (mostly 8”) pots.
I’m upgrading the cabin lighting in our ‘13 Subaru Outback.
Step 1 was to replace some of the 3175 bulbs with brighter, but lower current, LED 3175’s. But... I’ve found that the brightest of those tend to get too hot and kill (or at least wound into flickering) themselves in the summer. So, up front, with bulbs for both the driver and front passenger, I’ve just gone with the “medium-bright” LED-3175’s for now. Ditto for the dome light over the rear seats. But for the cargo area I’ve shoehorned in a flat LED module I bought a bag of from Amazon a while back. They are GREAT. No more fumbling around in the cargo area at night because the light back there was not even a 3175 type bulb, and, the LED’s draw less current. (I highly recommend NOT running the car’s battery down at a camp site with no electricity!)
Silly Subaru also downgraded the door panel lights in Gen 4 Outbacks - possibly because they stay on even when the overhead lights are switched off, and the door is open or ajar. Nothing ever auto-turns them off if the door is ajar.
Sheesh! So, I’ve yanked those entirely, and will fabricate little panels to take (one per side) small 3- LED modules I have that only draw 1.5 watts. This will in some ways be similar to the front dome light upgrade: It’s only a little more light, but, it’s a lot less current drawn. :-)