Started one of the few post retirement projects that is a “because I want to”, and no other reason. If I never did this one, I don’t think anyone else would care at all.
We have about 40 acres north of the creek that splits our property. The houses, pond, public road, etc. is on the south side. When the sewer line was put down the north side of the creek many years ago, it created a pseudo-road in the creek bottom. We’ve mowed it routinely so it’s still passable on the part we own. The acreage north of the sewer line consists of a mostly flat plateau with 100 year old short leaf pines on the west end (they were logged off then so they’re all about the same age) and a varied mix of hardwoods on the east end. There are several trails in the south side but none other than the sewer line on the north. So about half our acreage has always been accessible only by foot, and even then without any trails at all, so it is rare anyone ever goes there. I’ve always thought that was a bit of a shame although I have no specific reason to access that half of the property. Not trying to build a real road, just a path sufficient for routine use walking, traversing with Mule, and accommodating tractor for maintenance at least when reasonably dry.
Part of the issue has always been getting out of the creek bottom up to the plateau. Viewed from the creek bottom, it’s like an eyebrow window; about even on both ends and about 50’ at its highest point near the middle. By far the most reliable all season creek crossing is in the middle due to topography on the south side making the ends unfriendly to wet weather. Springs emanating from the end of the plateau create wet weather passage issues on the sewer line.
So a couple weeks ago I spent some time scouting for either a viable new wet weather crossing on the east end past the eastern spring or a viable trail out of the creek bottom in between the springs that bracket the current crossing.
Found a spot not far from the current crossing that I could get the Mule or L up, but a large white oak that fell in a windstorm about 5 years ago was blocking it. In the pic below, the new trail is headed up the slope to the left. The dirt area where I side sloped a path into the berm on the sewer line is on the right. Just past view on the side sloped trail, that berm weeps about 75% of the time.
Grapple was very helpful clearing the white oak in three chunks rather than little man sized pieces. That tree had been down 5 years and the root ball still fell most of the way back in the hole. Surprisingly, the wood was still solid enough I may take some or all of it back to the wood yard for firewood now that I have adequate equipment to get it there. The old Ford N and Farmall H we were running when it fell had no chance of getting something that big across the creeks so we left it in favor of lower hanging fruit.
When I got past the tree, the hillside was thick with little sapling like these and mature witch hazel clusters. Not sure if witch hazel is a shrub or a tree but each stalk seems to max out a little over 1” diameter and about 12’ high at most. Had originally planned to use chainsaw and weedeater with blade but still had the bush hog on the tractor so drove it up the slope and bush hogged everything. I could not have gotten the old N up that slope with the bush hog behind it even if the path was already cleared. No problem crawling all over it with the Kubota in 4WD.
Should have taken some pics at the time but I kind of got engrossed in it and didn’t think to take any. This is pretty much what I ended up with for the path out of the creek bottom.
For now this is as far as my new little trail goes. It’s still quite a ways to the edges of the property regardless which way you go as this is near the geographic center of the property. It’s also one of the more sparsely vegetated areas. The more challenging areas lie ahead. But at least now I’ve gotten out of the creek bottom and onto the plateau while it was dry enough to get the tractor over there without tearing up the ground.
Next step is to keep heading north to the northern border with as little collateral damage as practical. I’ll be scouting on foot with surveyor tape in hand to lay it out before continuing.
And yes, I’m sure a high flow CTL with a forestry mulcher would be swell but not going that route unless it’s a lot worse than I suspect. We have a couple miles of trails on other areas and haven’t needed a forestry mulcher yet.
