Woods

Spring in the woods seems to be a bigger transition than autumn. In autumn our activities focus on dealing with the masses of leaves that fall in the yard. The woods change in appearance, but the change is slow, over a period of time beginning in late August. Spring seems to happen all at once. I have my deadline for being done with firewood cutting the first of May and March and April seem to be a rush.

I finished the cutting season with two large red oaks. This tree had fallen several years ago near the point, the area where I cut so much firewood the previous year. This photo was taken March 18 after I had cut the tree and was in the middle of splitting. Most of the large rounds after being cut rolled down a slope so not much is visible in the picture.

This is a better view of some of the split wood. This is looking north toward our garden and house. This tree was about 2 feet in diameter at chest height before it toppled over.

Cutting firewood is probably the easiest part. Splitting takes twice as long, maybe longer, than cutting. Carrying and stacking firewood can take longest. One stack is almost finished, another was made at right angle. This light snow happened while I was stacking firewood.

This is an old road in the hollow to the east of our home. Molly and I were out hunting morels. Didn’t find any, there seem to be less now than in the days of the Great Morel Hunt. This photo was taken on April 14 and trees were starting to show green.

This photo shows the trees starting to leaf out.

Molly looking awfully small walking up from the hollow after our search for morels. The gully is an old road that has eroded. A 1911 map shows a dwelling was in the hollow below near this spot.

This photo was taken April 22 from the hollow to the west of our home. The photo shows a little more green in the trees. The picture was taken looking east and our home is on the top of the ridge.

Cancer root appears in early spring.

This photo was taken May 13 in the same hollow to the east of our home. This is near where I found the spots where deer had bedded in the snow last winter.

The woods are becoming so dense with green leaves that the sun forms bright splashes of light where it hits the trees.

A mystery plant with beautiful flowers I have yet to identify. This photo was taken May 21.

Blue eyed grass. We have some growing in your yard and it can be found in the woods.

The Rocks road on May 21. This is just a little further down the road from the trail I created up to the knoll shown in the photo in the previous post.

Just past the Rocks there are two wood piles covered with blue tarps. Each pile is about a month’s worth of wood for heating.

This photo was taken June 11 looking north from a road that passes our home. Four buildings can barely be seen. The shack is in the center. The large shed is to the right (the roof is visible) with the shop almost completely hidden above. Our home is almost completely hidden also, to the left. The northwest corner of the screen porch is most plain on the left edge of the photo.

I, this is George writing, spend a lot of time in the woods in winter. Most of this time is spent cutting, splitting and stacking firewood, but I also walk in the woods. Winter is a time of contrasts in West Virginia. The temperatures can be unseasonably warm, or it can be bitterly cold. It can be overcast for days or there can be clear skies with the blue incredibly bright in the cold dry air. There can be snow or mud or dry ground.

I’ve been cutting most of our firewood off the rocks road on our property. On a flat below the road to the south a large red oak fell taking with it a large white oak. I cut this red oak this year. I plan on cutting the white oak next year. The red oak when it came down also brought down a small maple tree in the left foreground of the photo.

There had been a light snow when I’d started to stack the piles of split wood. There ended up being two stacks of red oak and a much smaller stack of maple.

I came across these ice crystals covering a small patch of frozen water on the road when walking to the mail box.

The ice crystals were tiny and clumped on the frozen puddle.

Deer sleep curled up on the ground. Sometimes it’s possible to spot these deer beds in the dry leaves. It’s a lot easier to see the beds when it has snowed. In this photo there are three spots where deer slept while it snowed. After an earlier snow I came across a much larger cluster of deer beds, 6 or 7, in a small area sheltered by small beech trees. These deer are sleeping on a sheltered south facing slope.

I’ve had to create three ATV trails to get to some of the trees I’ve been cutting. This trail goes up to the knoll above the rocks. I had a pile of wood I’d cut 2 years ago up on the knoll and the trail meant I could take the trailer to the pile and bring the split wood to the house for firewood this winter. On the knoll I felled a dead white oak and cut up two fallen red oaks. That wood is stacked for next year. On the knoll this fall there were three deer scrapes—trees (in this case very small trees) where male deer had rubbed their antlers.

There are always surprises in the woods. There are long vista views that we’ll lose once the trees leaf out again. There’s almost always something close at hand, too. This is an orchid leaf that was near a fallen red oak log I was cutting. I’ll have to check and see if I can get a photo of its flower. I’ve only seen this type of orchid one other place in the woods and only seen that one’s beautiful flower once.

Elijah came to visit us in February and he helped me stack wood one morning. This is wood from a fallen red oak. I had to cut through the top for an ATV trail and it made sense to cut up the hole log.

Elijah is six now and eager to help. He really liked stacking split pieces of wood in the pile.

A large red oak fell just to the south of the rocks a couple of years ago. I started cutting it this winter. Most of the firewood I cut this year was on fairly level ground. This tree fell down a steep slope and was a challenge. On the flat is a stacked pile of firewood I cut last year.

The cut sections of this tree are quite large and heavy. I had to use a 5 foot steel pry bar to flop them so they lay flat. This photo gives an idea of the slope I was working on. The round bolts are too heavy to lift and hard to control when I cut. The last thing I want is one to break loose and roll down the hillside. Luckily, it is a lot easier to throw split pieces of wood down a steep hillside than carry them up to stack.

There are always lots to see when I’m working. This is the outer side of a piece of red oak where the bark has fallen off during splitting.