Bonfires, Flowers and weird things

We went to the farm yesterday, Sat. March 27 to do some work and spend the night to do more work today. It was a beautiful day on Saturday, we took our time going over to the farm. We stopped in Mckenzie, Tn to eat at the Buffet in town, it has some of the best food.

Once we got to the farm the first thing we did was to hoe around the iris's we had planted last year behind the barn. We were pleasantly surprised about how few of weeds there were. We also had some bulbs to plant in among the iris's. I had also propagated some butterfly bush plants so we planted two of those there.

We had taken a wicker chair and ottoman to the farm to paint it, so I went down to the south pond to start moving one of the brush piles so we could burn it. Lois stayed at the barn and painted the wicker chair and ottoman. When Lois was finished painting she came down to help with the bonfire. On her way down she stopped and took some pictures of flowers we had planted last year.

Tulips

Daffodils

Hydrangea

I wanted to get some of the brush piles we had made down by the south pond burnt. We had a recent rain so the conditions we good to do the burning. We were able to get both piles burnt, we would have gotten more done but the chain saw broke down. I think it is time to purchase a different one as this 0ne has been nothing but trouble. Here are some pictures of the bonfire.

Lois would go up under the grove of oak trees and load up the back of the golf cart with branches and haul them down to the fire.







On one of the trips she said she had found some weird stuff, here is a picture of the weird stuff growing on one of the branches.

Lois also took some pictures of the daffodils growing on the property.

Sunday was such a different day, it was rainy and cold. We didn't do much, I did some maintenance on the golf carts, we downloaded the pictures from the game cameras, which there weren't many pictures. We also planted some apple trees (three) I had started from seed. We'll see how they d0.

Well that is all for this trip, hope you enjoy.

Daffodils and tree planting

Went to the farm last Thursday March 11th to check on things, plant a few trees and fish. The daffodils have started blooming making you know that spring is just around the corner.

I had some trees to plant, several maples, several oaks, a dogwood and a holly tree. The maples I planted around the south pond, I think in the fall the colors will really stand out reflecting off the pond.

Took a couple of pictures of the ivy that was planted last fall, it is still alive and looks to be doing well.

I then downloaded the game cameras, should have changed the batteries on the one I put at the south pond. I knew they were low, there wasn't the first picture on it. The other camera in the new location only had two pictures with deer on it. We will see how it goes with that one. We may have to move it somewhere else.

I worked on my golf cart and got it going again, had to replace the two of the battery connections on one of the batteries. Had to charge Jessie's battery and then she started right up.

Once that was done I went and fished for a little while. Caught 2 small bass. Only two bites I had.

When I was leaving and went to lock up the gate a small rabbit jumped out from under the gate. It wasn't very old, it went about 3 feet and stopped, I walked back to the SUV and got the camera, so here are the pictures.

Well until next time God Bless ya.

Needed day at the farm

Well it has been 3 weeks since the last trip to the farm, so I went over there yesterday, Thursday, Feb 18 just to check on things. Everything looked good, it was one of the nicer days we have had since winter started. I didn't have anything really to do except to change out the disks on the game cameras. I also wanted to move a couple of the game cameras.

We had also just had hardwood floors put in the condo and I had saved some of the carpeting and cut it into 2'x2' squares and then cut a hole in the center of them. I am going to use these to put around the trees that we have planted to help keep the grass and weeds away from them. It will also help keep the ground moist. Here are some pictures.

Next I downloaded the pictures from the cameras, the one camera did not have any pictures on it, I did move it back down by the south pond and hopefully we will get some interesting pictures from it. I put it down low to the ground so any small animals such as coons, etc will be caught on the camera. I also moved the one camera from the persimmon tree area as these have all dropped. After getting scandisk home and looking at it, it had some nice pictures on it so maybe I shouldn't have moved it.

The camera by the mineral licks will stay where it is at. I took pictures of the mineral licks and there were a lot of tracks there.

I spent the next couple of hours just walking around the property, I was looking for shed antlers, didn't find any. I did see 5 deer, which was nice.

I did try to start Jessie the truck and will have to charge the battery the next time I am there as she would not start. I then went to use my golf cart and it would not do anything. I then looked in the battery compartment and found some corrosion on one of the battery posts and a broken wire that came from the key switch. So I will have to work on both of those on the next trip.

Here are some snow pictures from the game cameras.

New Slideshows

Hope you enjoy the new slideshows I have put on this blog. Some new pictures and some old ones.

First trip of the New Year to the Farm

Finally made it to the farm this year, had to go over and meet with the tax people, seems we still owed taxes from the year 2006 when we bought the farm. Long story and there isn't any sense in rehashing it. The important thing is that the taxes are now paid.

Went from the tax office to the farm, first thing to do was to hook both golf carts to their chargers to get a good charge in the batteries as it was suppose to get cold again. I then decided to start Jessie the truck as she had not been started since sometime in November of last year. Jessie must like cold weather. She started easier today than she has in the past.

Next I wanted to change out the batteries and memory disks on the game cameras. They have been out for a month. I also wanted to check on some of the plants that we had planted this year.

I first went to check on the holly bushes that I had planted. Boy did I get a surprise. The one bush that had been planted last spring was doing well,

the ones that I planted this fall, well they are still alive but all the leaves and some of the branches are gone. Apparently eaten by some animals, probably rabbits. I believe there were 10 of these bushes and everyone of them that I had planted this fall were eaten on. See the pictures.

I changed the batteries out on the cameras and decided to go down and drive across the dam on the south pond. I wanted to see if I could find the skull and beak from the blue heron that was eaten on the dam (see the last post). The beak and skull are gone but I now have another tree to cut up as you can see from the pictures below. Lois also has a tree to prune as the small tree is a wild cherry tree that would be nice to save.

There wasn't much on two of the games cameras, so I think the next time I go over it will be time to move those two cameras. I have put some of the pictures on the Game camera blog, the link below will take you to them.

http://htfgamecamerapics.blogspot.com/

Blue Heron and mother nature

We made a trip to the farm on Thursday, Dec. 17th to check things out as we hadn't been there for two weeks. Everything was in good shape, we had gotten some rain a few days before as you could still see the puddles. I also had a red maple tree to plant and two blue hydrangeas. We planted the two hydrangeas down under the lob lolly pines where we planted the Hostas. The red maple we planted down by the south pond.

While I was planting the red maple I noticed a funny looking area over on the dam, it looked like something white laying on the ground. When I got over to it, I could tell it was feathers from some bird. Once I got to looking closer I found a skeleton laying down on the side of the dam. It had legs and a head with beak. It was the blue heron that we have been seeing quite regularly in both of the ponds on the farm. It apparently got caught by either a coyote or bobcat. Mother nature in a complete circle, the blue heron eats the fish then is eaten. Here are before and after pictures.

here are the after picture

I worked on the oak tree and am happy to say that it is completely cut up and moved. I did take the main log and cut it so that we could have seats that we can sit on down where we have a camp fire. Once I get it all done it will have log seats and a walled fire pit. This is just the start. I thought I had taken pictures of these but apparently I didn't, so you'll have to wait.

Next we went down to the south pond and started clearing some of the brush away from the west side of it. We have some nice plans for this side of the pond and to get it done we have to get it cleared first. As usual I didn't take before pictures but hopefully as we do more of this you will be able to see what we have gotten done from the pictures I do take.

There wasn't any exciting pictures on any of the game cameras and what was there I am going to try and post them on the game camera blog.

Hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Holly & Hazelnut bushes, Oak tree

I made two trips to the farm since the last time I posted, one on November 24 and the other on December 3. On both trips I planted some holly bushes along the north fence line, this will help to isolate us from the neighbors on that side who have dogs that bark and bark and bark.

I don't know just how many I planted but it is a start.

Next I planted three new Hazelnut bushes, these I planted up by the loblolly pine trees. On all these plants that I have planted lately I have used a combination of sand, dirt from the side of the barn that has a lot of cow manure in it and dirt from the original hole. Hopefully this will be better for the plants.

I next planted four azaleas bushes to replace the ones that had died this summer. I also started working on the azaleas so that when it rains the water will be caught to help water them better. I started digging around the bushes so that there is a dam around the lower end of the bush.

On the third I worked on the oak tree that had fallen down last spring and if I hadn't run out of gas in the chain saw I would have gotten it all cut up. I did get a lot of it done as you can see from the photos.

This is a picture from June 23rd.

These are pictures from Dec 3rd

Here is the brush pile that is left from the cutting.

This will be left here for the quail, birds and rabbits.

Here is a picture of the 1 loblolly pine tree that died last year from the drought. It was seventy foot tall and the forestry man said it was at least 80 years old. It fell down sometime between the visit on the 24th and 3rd.

Until next time have a good day.