Thursday, April 5, 2012

The back 40 and trees

 The first two pictures are of the area of our land that I refer to as "The Back 40". It's not really 40 acres, more like 3! And it is the combined area of Mark's place and mine. As we work it all together and are trying to get the land back into some kind of production, I refer to it as ours.


This is a view of  Mark's land on the back of the place.
And this is mine. Yes there is a lot of weeds and grass here and it needs to be "Bush Hogged". But the "Bush Hog " is down again and I'm not sure when I will be able to get it up and running again. I will be on vacation starting Saturday, What I plan to do is hook up the tiller to the tractor and turn it all under!

But I wanted to show you that there is something that is growing back there! TREES!  I noticed late last summer that trees had started to grow back there and I left them to see if they would survive the winter and  continue to grow this spring. Well, it looks like they did and I see new growth on most of them. There are only a few Pine Trees,


But there are at least 20 Maple trees! They seeded them self's and are spread around the "Back 40". And if they grow as well this year as last, They will be a pretty good size by the end of the growing season!

I hope to some day to be able to fence this area and turn it into pasture. Maybe raise a steer or goats on it?  But that's another thing to add to the "WISH LIST"!
But just getting it turned under right now is the plan and letting the trees grow.
Tom

6 comments:

  1. Looks like there are a lot of possibilities on the back 40. Trees are so important - and how nice that they sowed themselves! Sounds like your vacation is going to be mighty busy.

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    1. Susan,
      You got that right! My son will be coming out to spend a few days and give me a hand with some of the work. But he has Jury Duty the end of the week. So I will only have him here for two days. But I will get all the help out of him I can!
      Tom

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  2. can you look forward to tapping those maples for maple syrup in the future? I don't know if I have ever heard of maple syrup from you area in the country. You do have a lot of possibilities with your land. That is exciting, but certainly takes time.

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    1. Emily,
      I do know of people in this area who do tap maples. I do not know if the ones I have will be good to tap and it will be a few years before I can even think about trying. But I'm real excited that I have them growing here and in an area that Mother Nature can take care of them and I can just watch them grow!
      TOM

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  3. You have beautiful space with so much potential - it looks really restful (from here, I don't have your project list... ha ha) I love that you are letting the self started trees do their thing. I'm doing that with one of the hundred pecans that my pecan tree dropped and the squirrels buried and forgot about. I'm saving one in my front yard to see if it will grow. Logic dictates that it should, but ... time will tell. Fun stuff.

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    1. PG,
      Do the projects ever end? I enjoy being able to work out side again! But there never seems to be enough time to get them all done!
      But that's part of the challange, isn't it?
      TOM

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