The Butterfly Effect Hobby Farm

Following! I'm from eastern NC and you are basically living my dream.

I too hate trees in rows like that, especially evergreens. Your property is going to be so much more functional and beautiful without them!

Glad to see a fellow NC chicken fanatic! Thank you for following. I am looking forward to spring. Right now there isn't a weekend in sight that I see open for resting. Thankfully the weekends have been rain free for the past few. Once the trees are down and gone, I will be busy building raised beds. The soil around here is pretty much pure clay, but the other reason Voles. Our neighbors warned us and we tested it and found out... yep little varmits are everywhere and love our garden. So I will be putting hardware cloth at the bottoms of our raised beds to prevent them from destroying our veggies.
 
So this weekend I would call: "His eyes were bigger than his stomach." I woke up saturday excited about a clear weather weekend and thinking about how much I could get done. In my bravado I cut 11 pines from the stand that I am focusing on to "get right". I also cut down 1 of a 2 trunks of a pecan tree that is growing in a bad spot. Then I went to tackle one of the two remaining Cedar trees in the line. This Cedar was the 2nd largest of the group and was a bear to get down. It was around 13" -14" and my chainsaw is only 12". So it took some work and also a decent amount of hatchet work to get it down. Many of the pines were being held up by their supporting cast so it took a variety of efforts to bring all the trees down. By 3:30 I was pretty exhausted. My SO was working hard on replacing the skirting around the manufactured house. It over the years had gotten fairly beaten up and had holes from either rocks thrown by lawnmowers or any myriad of issues. I told her that I might have bitten off more than I could chew this weekend. The yard looked like a train wreck. I told her i was probably going to call it a day and try to finish up on Sunday. However I looked back and said, "Let's see how much I can still get done." I wound up carving up the pine trees and the pecan tree and getting them stacked before my body said no more.
The yard still looked a mess as the branches were everywhere and the downed Cedar was still an eyesore with it's branches everywhere. I dread cleaning up Cedars because it seems like it has a thousand branches and the branches have branches. So the Cedar would have to wait for another day.

Here's a shot of the pile of lumber waiting for the tree people. I am hoping to have them shred the lumber for chips for the garden.

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The pine stand is near the very back of the property. We are thinking of building a little deck within the pine stand and putting a couple chairs and a table so we can watch the goats in our neighbor's pasture. It's a nice relaxing view.
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I think I have probably 3 more pines to remove from this stand and I am done. 2 that are still hedging space on the Pecan tree. and one that will be in the way of the small deck I want to build.
 
Good luck - I look forward to your updates! We are also working on a 'project' - a series of old barns that we will be turning into some holiday cottages as well as our home. We haven't got as much land as you though - only 3/4 acre. I'm feeling very weary this evening as we spent the day concreting new lintels into a new opening we have created - the gorgeous old stone wall is 60cm thick so instead of 1 lintel we need to do 3 (they are 20 each!) - 2 down 1 to go!
 
Good luck - I look forward to your updates! We are also working on a 'project' - a series of old barns that we will be turning into some holiday cottages as well as our home. We haven't got as much land as you though - only 3/4 acre. I'm feeling very weary this evening as we spent the day concreting new lintels into a new opening we have created - the gorgeous old stone wall is 60cm thick so instead of 1 lintel we need to do 3 (they are 20 each!) - 2 down 1 to go!

PouleChick,

Thank you and Good luck to you as well! Please document your project as well. I would love to follow your change over from old barns to holiday cottages. That sounds awesome. It would be an amazing transformation mixing old world with new. If you don't want to create a new thread you can bring some pictures into here. We could have this as the Butterfly effect thread not just about our farm but on everyone.

The Butterfly effect is that a simple small thing ends up creating a huge impact on life. For me it was a call from an ex employee just catching up that timed just right that brought us to this new life.
 
The pine stand is near the very back of the property. We are thinking of building a little deck within the pine stand and putting a couple chairs and a table so we can watch the goats in our neighbor's pasture. It's a nice relaxing view.View attachment 1656063 View attachment 1656064

I think I have probably 3 more pines to remove from this stand and I am done. 2 that are still hedging space on the Pecan tree. and one that will be in the way of the small deck I want to build.

Such a pretty place you call home! You really busted it with cutting down the trees this weekend, hope you aren't too sore!
 
Good luck - I look forward to your updates! We are also working on a 'project' - a series of old barns that we will be turning into some holiday cottages as well as our home. We haven't got as much land as you though - only 3/4 acre. I'm feeling very weary this evening as we spent the day concreting new lintels into a new opening we have created - the gorgeous old stone wall is 60cm thick so instead of 1 lintel we need to do 3 (they are 20 each!) - 2 down 1 to go!

Love to see some pictures as @Chickenaddition suggested! I think reading and seeing what others are doing is so impressive and interesting :D
 
So I am following my usual winter routine of late. Monday, happy to go back to work and not be able to continue my mad pace of clearing the property. Sore as can be. Tuesday waking up in far less pain but still a reminder of my weekend workload. However my morning walk around the yard already my eyes are planning what to do next. Ok this one and this one and this...

I know by Wednesday I know I am going to be completely pumped to be able to get out there and make some more progress.

On a separate note. For those not familiar with voles. We had an umbrella stand in the yard. My SO moved it recently and here is the evidence of voles. Darn Varmits:rant
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So I am following my usual winter routine of late. Monday, happy to go back to work and not be able to continue my mad pace of clearing the property. Sore as can be. Tuesday waking up in far less pain but still a reminder of my weekend workload. However my morning walk around the yard already my eyes are planning what to do next. Ok this one and this one and this...

I know by Wednesday I know I am going to be completely pumped to be able to get out there and make some more progress.View attachment 1657037

That actually sounds like a sustainable, thriving routine! I'm only 30 but I don't think I have half your energy!
 

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