The first tree felled

Firewood is something we need quite a lot of. Not only because it gets quite cold in autumn and winter but also because we cook on a wood fired range.

Both the range in the kitchen and the fire in the lounge are connected to our hot water. During summer we get most of our hot water from the solar panels at the North end of the house but in autumn, winter and spring we have to use wood to make sure we have enough hot water.

This last winter we ran out of wood and had to buy three loads of wood. So this season we are going to make sure that we have enough wood in store. And that is why I just chopped down one of our 25 metre (80+ feet) pine trees. Now "chopped" is not quite the right word because I used our current Husqvarna 345 chainsaw. It is actually a bit too small to cut down trees of this size but with a bit of extra preparation, planning and care all went exactly as I wanted it too.

If you look carefully at the base of the stem you'll see that the "hinge" is still attached. That shows two things. One, that I could have made the cut a bit deeper (and possibly a bit higher), and two, that the tree came down in a very controlled way. In fact it was so controlled that I made most of the cut (which I had to do from both sides of the tree because the tree was more than 45cm or 18" thick), put a wedge into the cut to stop the tree from sitting down on my chainsaw blade, completed the cut, took the chainsaw out of the cut, and gave the wedge one more tap with my hammer and then very slowly the tree started falling down. It was a textbook drop and the tree fell exactly where I had planned it to go.

It took me two days to cut off all the branches, cut them to firewood size, cut the stem into rounds for splitting into firewood and transport it all to the shed. I used my tractor and a trailer to move all of the wood. This was one of the two loads of wood. You can see that the trailer is actually so full that the springs are completely flattened out.

And this is the first load of wood stacked in the shed in front of the splitter. Unfortunately I cut a lot of the rounds a few centimetres too long to go into the splitter, so my choices with those pieces are to split them with an axe, or cut a small slice off them with the chainsaw. Depending on how well they dry I'll go with the axe because it doesn't use any petrol.

I'll have to fell at least three more trees to make sure we have enough dry firewood for the next season. Even though we have a very large shed I'm not quite sure yet where I'll put the other trees to let them dry before I split them. With each tree weighing several tonnes I don't really want to move them from place to place too often because I don't aspire to become either a weightlifter or a body builder.

There is something about firewood that you only become aware of when you start making it yourself; it keeps you warm many times over. First when you cut the tree down, then when you cut the tree into smaller, bite size, pieces, next when you load the wood onto the trailer, again when you unload and stack it for initial drying, once more when you split it and stack it into the next pile for further drying, yet again when you take it to the house for burning and finally when you actually burn it. I guess that is why wood is such an eco-friendly way of heating.

Oh, and in case you're wondering why a greenie like me is cutting down trees? Since we moved here we have planted over 200 trees and now, more than two years later, I'm cutting down three. Not a bad exchange really.

Hunters and gatherers

The daffodil (narcissus) season is upon us and we're busy picking, sorting and bunching. Today when I was just about to go inside I spotted a HUGE hare hopping along the fence just by the road. Hares and rabbits destroy our crops and so I quickly went inside to get my rifle from the safe, got my bullets and bolt from the other safe, put bullets into the magazine, slid the bolt into the rifle, removed the telescope covers and went back outside. All a big rush because most of the time when you get back outside the hare is gone.

The hare was still there looking around, no doubt wondering what to eat next. I quickly put the magazine in the rifle, cocked it and sighted in on the hare. It would have been about 70 metres away. Took a shot and didn't compensate for the fact that in my haste I had grabbed the sub-sonic bullets. The hare got a big fright and took off across the road where it stopped by the other fence. Both rabbits and hares tend to stop for a moment before they go through a fence. So I took careful aim and made the needed compensations and pulled the trigger. Hit it! But by this stage the hare is a good 80 metres away and being tough as nails it simply shook its head, looked at me and seemed to say: "You bastard!! What you go and do that for!!" It then turned around and hopped away.

This is not good, because the poor thing is now wounded and it would be cruel to let it go off somewhere to die in pain. So I go running off after it, hernia repair and all, find it and shoot it again. Hit it again but it still keeps going. Try again .... no more bullets! Run back to the house and this time I load the magazine full of high velocity bullets. Run back to where I last saw the poor thing and, yes it's still there. By this stage my side is starting to tell me to take it easy and stop with the running. Try another shot ... darn it all ... too shaky and the bullet hits the ground just next to the hare. Have to get closer and catch my breath more so I can aim more carefully.

I climb the fence and slowly get closer to the hare until I feel there is no way I'm going to miss it, shaky arms or not. One more shot and I finally manage to put the poor thing out of its misery. Not a good thing considering that I normally bag hares and rabbits with one shot. Maybe I knocked the telescope when I last put the rifle away.

When I get back home and have dealt with the remains of the hare, which are going to a friend who will process them, our young dog seems to have been inspired by all of this because when she spots a young rabbit in the garden she's off after it like a lightning bolt, corners it and before you know it she's finished it off and is trotting proudly around the garden with a dead rabbit hanging out of her mouth.

I have to say that she did a better job of it than I did this time. Trouble is, now she's patrolling the garden looking for more rabbits. And a Keeshond isn't really supposed to have a prey drive. If you look at her you'd never expect her to chase anything down. And this is the most ferocious photo of her I could find!

Kicking off

And so it begins. This blog is really just a means to keep my family and friends up to date on things that are happening in my part of the world. My family, while close to my heart, are geographically separated a long way so this is a convenient way to keep them up with the play.

In time, and as my blogging skills expand, I imagine that this blog will become more interesting to casual visitors because the topics will begin to vary more. For now posts will be mostly of interest to people who already know me.

Ok. Introduction out of the way let me get into a quick catch up to now. Since I came back from Holland at the beginning of August I've had an interesting time of it here.

I was due to have my inguinal hernia operation the week after I got back but a pre-op check up showed up a wobble in my heart so the operation was postponed until that could be checked out. The treadmill stress test showed that in fact I am very fit and well and the cardiologist commented that my test was one of the best he had seen in a long while. It would seem that the wobble was in the ECG machine rather than my heart.

The op was rescheduled and went well. I had mild sedation and a spinal block so I was awake during the entire op which was a unique and very interesting experience. In a way it was a pity I couldn't see what the surgeon was doing but, there again, that might have been too much information. Recovery the first night was quite unpleasant because the spinal block meant that pretty much everything bellow my belly button was non-functioning but still quite able to transmit pain. If I had to do it again I would opt for sedation and just local anaesthetic.

Since being home things have gone well but of course doing any work on the farm is out for a few more weeks yet. And, of course, I am using this time to try and line up some more contract work or, failing that, a permanent position. As usual one of the key requirements in the type of work I am looking for is that the job delivers a tangible social good to society. And there may well be a wonderful opportunity in the wings. I've had a preliminary discussion about this and if this opportunity comes to a job offer I'll let you know what it is all about. For now I can say that this role would enable me to make a significant and long-lasting positive contribution to the well-being of families in need. This is something I am very excited about and I hope that the organisation does select me for this job.

That is pretty much where we're at to date, except that I need to buy a bigger chainsaw to be able to do the firewood. The one we bought while we lived in Wellington is fine for sawing small diameter wood but I can't actually use it to fell our firewood trees with. Because this past winter has been so cold we used up all of our dry firewood, and we had to buy in more firewood twice. That means that as soon as I am able to I need to drop a few trees and process them into firewood so it has time to dry before next winter. Right now we're hunting the online auction sites for a suitable chainsaw with a saw bar of at least 24 inches. No real hurry yet because it will be at least 2 or 3 weeks before I'll be able to use it, but if we spot one at the right price we'll buy it.

Right then, that's it for my first ramble. Comments very welcome.
Remco