Tidying up

IMPORTED POST FROM OLD BLOG. ORIGINAL DATE: 02/11/2007

Well, we're all kitted out with a chainsaw and various other new tools, but we don't yet have the felling licence to start coppicing....

So, we decided to deal with the windblown trees that are in the patch we'll be felling, as they are exempt from requiring a licence and are also a bit awkward, so it's good to get them cleared up early on. In theory they could also be a safety hazard to anyone walking in the wood, although in practice the ones we dealt with were all firmly lodged in other trees.

Over two visits this week we've dealt with three patches, and in general they start out looking like this:


and finish up looking like this:


In between there has been some of this:


and the results end up here:


and here, for the small branches:


As we go along, we're selecting sections that will go to our contact making garden furniture, stuff that could be useful for stakes, and stuff for firewood.

Down at the allotment (which we just got this week!) today we found that people there are always after stakes and poles, so we're going to be swapping some for produce - a good bartering system I think!

We've also continued with the preparation of acorns for eating -  the first batch have turned out quite nice, either to nibble on or to cook into a meal with other stuff, so while we were at the wood we put a batch through a few boilings over a wood fire while getting on with other jobs. We also tried drying them by heating them in a dry saucepan. Apart from making initially too hot to handle, this worked extremely well, and they were very easy to shell afterwards.

And in other developments... our second cockatiel, Tom (the one with a white face), is getting much more tame these days, and has begun to explore the lounge more thoroughly, resulting in him and Pete ending up in some strange places:






Mike