Posts Tagged ‘trees’
Mother Oak
We will be driving home today, leaving the comfort of lake-cooled air to barrel straight into the much-ballyhooed heat wave. I look forward to spending time among our big trees in the cool(er) shade beneath their canopies. Last week, I did a survey of many of our largest tree trunks to verify measurements of the circumferences.
The largest reading was 145” around a giant old oak that we already consider the mother tree of those woods.
From that measurement, calculation puts the tree’s age in the 220-230 years range.
If that’s accurate, it means that the tree started growing in that spot around 1800. The first thought this brings to my mind is curiousity over how it escaped being cut for lumber back when that was the primary industry. The second thought is that my ancestors were cutting and milling lumber in the county in the 1850s to 1880s.
I wonder if logs from this land we now own were ever skidded to the Isabelle Creek valley and the mills my ancestors, Stephen Hays and Joseph Sleeper worked near Esdaile.
I’ve been reading about the lumber industry in that era, including lumber baron David Joyce (1825-1904) and his son, William (1860-1909). I’ve reached the point in history when they were establishing Shell Lake, WI as a major hub of production.
It’s added perspective about a town we have driven through for decades on our way to and from our lake place. Shell Lake seems like a nice little family-vacation-on-a-lake spot these days, primarily due to the many RV campers parked along the shore.
Contemplating lumber history has me also feeling added perspective about our mother oak at home that our “Middle Trail” passes beside. My mind jumps to the 1800s when I look at it and contemplate its start. I find myself comparing it to the new saplings we keep discovering in our North Loop field.
Will they survive to still be around in 200 years?
I have a feeling the current heat wave will have me missing our lake today, despite my appreciation for being back among the big trees in our woods. No cutting of lumber is planned on our property any time soon.
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North Loop
I spent a fair amount of time in our north loop field yesterday morning and made an energizing discovery about how many young volunteer trees are thriving there.
For years after we moved here, we mowed down the tall growth in that section to the north of the driveway to control troublesome weeds from going to seed. It seemed like the prudent thing to do. Time has brought a change of heart for me. By not mowing the field anymore, we intend to nurture a future forest. There is still an issue with weeds to be dealt with but balancing that with embracing the appearance of new trees is a challenge we’ve decided to accept.
I was wading through the chest-high growth on a quest to pull vines that were starting to climb the existing pine trees in the area.
Almost immediately, I spotted a young sprout of oak leaves.
After uprooting any vines I could see, my mission shifted to clearing space around all of the young trees I could find.
There were an impressive number of poplar shoots that didn’t need any help in reaching sunlight. I found an elm. There are a variety of long and short needle pine trees showing up.
Of particular interest to me is the appearance of two sprouts of cedar trees, of which there are none anywhere in the surrounding area. I have no idea where these seeds traveled from.
When I finished my impromptu tree survey, I felt inspired for the future of this field. I also felt a mild trepidation over having visibly served up these gorgeous young trees as enticing nibbles for the resident deer herds that frequently bed down in the surrounding tall growth. Since the trees all showed up naturally, I’ve decided to let nature take its course, and if deer munch the tops off of some of these, so be it.
The final project I undertook in the north loop field was to mow a new viewing area where we’ll keep a couple of chairs for taking in the vista looking south from this high spot.
This idea came about from our animal sitter, John Bramble who mentioned that spot was a favorite for pausing to observe the view. He said it would be well-served to have a place to sit. I couldn’t agree more.
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Pickup Sticks
Those of us who love having trees in our yards enjoy an ongoing demonstration of how much branch-shedding is regularly happening. There are always sticks and twigs landing on the ground beneath the canopy. Often there are finger-sized branches down. Occasionally, we find bigger branches in the mix, and every once in a while, a full limb drops.
I admit to subjecting the blades of our mowers to far more sticks and small branches than they deserve due to the sheer volume always hiding in the grass. When I wait too long between mowings, the number of branches gets too big to ignore. We’ve endured several days of on-again, off-again rain that stymied my plans to cut the grass around the house as soon as I wanted. Before I finally got around to the job yesterday, I needed to pick up sticks.
It doesn’t look that bad through a camera lens, but grasping each and every one by hand is an exercise of repetitive motion. Every time I turn around, I seem to find one that got missed. A wiser person might use a rake.
There is a mental reward for taking the time to clean up before mowing: peace of mind from not abusing the mower blades.
Of course, peaceful mowing is blissful mowing. And now the backyard is looking rather sharp (and stick-free) after yesterday’s cut if, I do say so myself.
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Photo Moments
Another fine day in the woods of northern Minnesota. Strong winds, warm temperatures, smoky haze-filled sky, swimming, eating like royalty, and ending the day with the spectacle of the opening ceremony of the 2024 Summer Olympic Games in Paris.
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Budding Signs
We are beginning to see hints of color on the tops of certain trees on the horizon. Many shrubs and bushes at eye level are sprouting tiny new leaves. Looking straight up, signs of life appear at the ends of high branches of tall trees. It won’t be long before we have trees with leaves again.
It’s been a while since we’ve experienced any high-heat days. Recently, our mornings have hovered around the freezing point but I don’t think it has been harsh enough to kill new sprouts. Grasses are going gangbusters and will require mowing soon or some areas will get out of hand.
In yesterday’s glorious sunshine, Asher stopped in the middle of a walk to lie down in the shade and watch the natural world unfolding before us. I decided to sit down with him.
In less than 30 seconds, I spotted a wood tick walking across the front of my shirt. Despite that unwelcome reality, we enjoyed the spectacle of a bird in a tree over our heads that seemed to be practicing every call or song he had ever heard. I never once noticed a repeated sound. Up and down; high and low; trills, chirps, whistles, yodels, slides, chatters, singsong melodies… it seemed to have it all. The “Rich Little” of bird calls.
I guess the budding sights of spring were inspiring that bird to sing in the extreme.
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Impressive Recovery
It’s hard to know for sure how long ago the top of this tree snapped off. One possibility that I find believable is a reported tornado that occurred in 2010, two years before we moved here. We could see plenty of evidence of severe chaotic tree damage when we arrived. In fact, there were so many large trees in various stages of fracture that their shattered remains grabbed attention much more than the wild sprouts of new growth that began to emerge in the aftermath.
The other day, while trying to keep up with Asher as he bushwhacked through our woods in pursuit of whatever critter scent he was detecting, one of those [no longer] new sprouts caught my attention.
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How did this growth succeed in getting that large at that remarkable dangling U-turn off the side of the original trunk? It has me wondering how much bigger it will be able to become.
There is a large opening at the bottom of the main trunk that reveals the center has been hollowed out by homesteading wildlife in the intervening years, as well as decay and fungal growth up above where the storm damage first occurred.
The odds of a long future for this tree don’t look all that promising, but the significance of that limb soaring straight up sure says something about resilience.
I love being able to witness this kind of resilience every time we wander through the woods. Now that I’ve spotted this tree clearly, I’ll be checking on it regularly through the seasons to keep track of its progress. Who knows which of us will outlast the other?
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Big Effort
On a walk through the woods yesterday afternoon we came upon evidence of an industrious effort scattered beneath one of our large trees.
Little pieces of the tree had fallen in a wide array around the tree, leaving the snow peppered with holes. The first reaction was to look up to see where this was all coming from.
The gaping hole high up in the trunk of the tree was easy to spot. We didn’t know the project was still ongoing until Cyndie saw new pieces of wood falling near us.
There was so much wood shrapnel scattered on the ground, our assumption immediately leapt to visions of a large woodpecker, but that wasn’t the case.
There was a little chickadee busily hopping around and tossing down pieces of the tree. I have no idea why it would want to have such a large opening. The tree probably wasn’t very happy about the size of the wound. This has me wondering about the longevity of this tree. I’m not very skilled at deducing the well-being of trees when they have no leaves.
I’ll need to keep an eye on it next spring and summer to see if the end is near. It won’t surprise me much if turns out to be in the process of slowly dying as trees tend to do. We already have a rather significant number of old trees with the largest diameter trunks that are showing evidence of decline.
It’s giving me more incentive to nurture as many of the trees as possible with the next-largest trunks to give them the best chances for prolonging their years of continued growth. Ours is definitely not an “old-growth” forest, but it has a decent number of trees that are old enough to be mother trees.
We want to help allow our trees to be able to help one another as much as possible.
I should probably give them more hugs.
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Lower Branches
There was a time when I neglected to put effort and energy into trimming the lower branches of pine trees, especially ones growing in the natural field on the north side of our driveway. I’ve changed my mind.
My old thinking was that trees out in a forest don’t have people trimming branches. I wanted nature to be able to take its course. My new thinking is that pine trees look better when their growth is managed, and the sooner, the better.
Over the weekend, I was able to give some of our long-neglected pine trees fresh attention and found myself surprised by what I learned. Even though we strive to always pull out vines that start growing up our tees, unseen vines were making their way up most of the trees I trimmed.
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The tool of the hour, day, and weekend was my Stihl GTA 26 cordless chainsaw pruner. Even in cold temperatures, the battery lasted longer than I did. That saw is perfect for this chore.
After seeing how poorly some of the trees have grown, in terms of putting energy into long lower branches instead of strong leaders gaining overall tree height, I made a point to start early on all the young trees I came across.
Why wait?
While I worked, I had Asher tethered to my hip on a 30-foot leash, occasionally enticing him with dropped handfuls of his food bits for him to snuffle through the grass to find. His patience lasted until he spotted someone walking on the road. That led to extreme straining against the leash and annoyingly desperate barking.
After a lunch break, I decided to reward his mostly good behavior of the morning with a chance to play off-leash. He did not make me proud. Sprinting directly from our front door to the neighbor’s woods in pursuit of squirrels, he disrespected every attempt I made to entice him to return.
He nosed around in their woods, extending the distance away from me with each zig-zag. When he got out of sight, I headed off across the cornfield to intercept him but by the time I got there, I spotted his paw prints headed in the direction of the neighbors’ place with the outdoor cat.
Fool me twice… shame on me.
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Field Finds
I’m still feeling excited about the number and variety of new trees sprouting in our north loop field we discovered the other day. Just the fact they are appearing without any help from us is so rewarding.
Two types of long-needle pine and three oak varieties look to be two or maybe three years old.
I am really glad I stopped mowing that field and that this is what has resulted. Granted, we also have a large spread of thistle in one area and poison Ivy in another which were the reason to mow those acres in the past. We may still need to find ways to deal with the problem weeds beyond ignoring them in hopes they’ll go away.
Maybe selective mowing for the thistle, like using the power trimmer. I don’t dare use that on the poison ivy.
Now that we’ve found these young trees, we should probably put energy into protecting them from foraging deer. We know about “bud capping” the leader of pines with a stapled piece of paper. I would prefer that option over trying to fence around the young trees.
We already have been watching three young pines for the last year that sprouted closer to the driveway and debated stapling caps to those. I don’t understand what our hesitation is to doing so beyond a willingness to take a risk. I expect part of it is that, thus far we’ve gotten away with doing nothing. If one of them gets munched, I expect it will spur us into action to protect others.
Not necessarily sound logic, I admit.
There are plenty of tasks awaiting attention that linger unfinished. I was looking at several piles of tree limbs we have stacked in the woods for chipping. Days have turned to months, and now years in which we have gone no further than creating the piles.
Asher really wanted to get into one of those piles yesterday, I assume after a cute chipmunk or rabbit’s nest he could smell. I let the easier task of mowing the labyrinth and part of the front yard get my attention in the afternoon.
I suppose that’s the reason I’m so thrilled with the young trees showing up in the field. We didn’t need to put any effort into making that happen beyond giving nature the time and space to do its thing.
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Eleven Years
In October of 2012, Cyndie and I packed everything we owned and moved from Eden Prairie, MN to the property we named “Wintervale” in Beldenville, WI. I am very lucky to have a record of the process and everything that has happened since preserved in the archived posts of Relative Something.
We spent a little time yesterday looking back at pictures we took eleven years ago and marveled over some of the changes. We found one of me sitting on the Ford New Holland 3415 diesel tractor with the manual open to the “Instrument Panel” information.
There is also a photo of the one and only time Cyndie drove that tractor.
The bucket is filled with debris we were clearing out from the space beneath the barn overhang. The previous owners had stored gates, fence posts, and a bunch of firewood under there. It’s been the primary hangout space for horses ever since.
On a walk yesterday, I tried to take some pictures from a vantage point similar to ones from eleven years ago. It wasn’t easy to find the exact same spot.
October 2012
October 2023
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I tried using the top part of the barn visible in the shots above to line up a reasonable comparison. There’s no longer any sign of the shop garage or the house roof from that hill. It’s nice to see how much the evergreen trees have grown. In the 2012 photo on the left, the willow tree that is visible became fenced inside the small paddock and is now nearly dead.
There was an incredibly warm day in 2012 that inspired us to cook dinner outside over an open fire for visitors, Elysa and Ande.
October 2012
October 2023
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It is easy to see that there are more leaves remaining on the trees in 2023.
October 2012
October 2023
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That spruce has gotten a little taller.
I’m curious how much growth might happen in eleven more years. While walking through the area we call the North Loop –which over the years has been cut for hay, fenced in for grazing horses, and now allowed to grow wild– I was surprised to discover several new pine and oak trees that have naturally sprouted on their own. The existing poplar grove is doing a fair job of expanding its reach and many of the existing pines are growing strong.
We look forward to shepherding this acreage toward becoming its own little forested space on the north side of our driveway for years to come. Based on clear evidence revealed on our walk, the deer are already fond of bedding down there.
Happy 11th Anniversary, Wintervale!
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