It was hot yesterday, and no I was not in the shade, but I got out there anyway because if I start taking arbitrary days off it won't get finished. So. One section down, one to go. Rocky showed up to see if Fred needed anything and was surprised I was heading out to the fence. Well, yeah, it's not done yet.
Yesterday's section was mostly trees covered with a canopy of grape, virginia creeper, and iron weed instead of a pile of the last 6 years of built up growth and dead branches covered with a canopy of vines that I have been dealing with. Underneath was like a little grove of hackberry trees with an occasional pecan. This part is a little different because a big limb or a tree fell on that last section and cratered our fence there a couple of years ago and so when we ignored it the neighbor on the other side who has dogs got out there and cleared it out as best he could and put up some fencing and then tied it into ours.
Today was cooler with low humidity and...
Ta-daaaaaah!
the corner
looking down the fence line to the street
Here's a reminder of what it looked like.
I bet I cut down 100 hackberry trees between yesterday and today from 6” to taller than I can reach. Also a few pecans and another trash tree that I can't remember its name. I'm not done of course. Still need to clear out the rest of the dewberry brambles now that they're done fruiting
as well as the 22 bare tree trunks still standing along the fence line and consolidate the smaller piles into bigger ones for burning
and then the poisoning. All the guys on the street are armchair quarterbacking for me...use roundup, diesel fuel, flame thrower (the neighbor that suggested this offered to do it for me), some other granular shit. And then there's the rest of the fence along the front of the property that needs clearing as well but it's mostly dewberrry bushes and poison ivy. Big poison ivy and the ditch on the other side is full of poison ivy so I'm going to have to hire someone to do that.
As nearly as I can tell it took me 18 days. I started April 2 getting down in the ditch cutting down the trees on the front fence and starting on the four sections along the front fence to the corner and finished April 25 (today). Out of those 23 days, there were five no one worked on it, four that my sister came and helped, and one that Rene helped. So, 13 of those days I worked on it by myself.
I think I'll take the day off tomorrow.
My god! I am so relieved that you're mainly done with that job. I swear- every time I go outside to do a piddly little amount of work I think about you on that fence and I feel horribly inadequate. You are strong and persistent and stubborn- which is how things get done.
ReplyDeleteBravo!
And yeah, take a break tomorrow.
yes, I am persistent and stubborn but it was one of those tasks that had to be done til it was done or it wouldn't get done, but I'll tell you, those last fours days I was having to drag my sorry ass out there.
DeleteOne day off??? Woman, you deserve a week in a 5 star beach resort in Andalusia.
ReplyDeleteWhat a great job.
Wow! Looks good! We must be related after all. Although I don't have a fence like that to clear, I don't mind tackling jobs of that nature. Where I just need to keep on with a somewhat repetitive task until it is done. When I was married years ago, I did all the yardwork on our property, along with moving all the firewood to the stacking area and stacking it myself and chopping it for the woodstove. My years as a medical transcriptionist were something like that. All day long we were faced with editing what was the verbal equivalent of fences overgrown with a variety of plants, bushes and trees or maybe an endless woodpile that needed stacking. Few people have what it takes to keep on with that kind of work. Medical transcriptionists are an eccentric bunch and our job no longer exists in the traditional form except in places like pathology offices where mistakes in transcription are a serious matter.
ReplyDeleteYour property reminds me of my sister's property in Gulfport, MS. Flat country landscape with hurricane fences, big sky and an extraordinarily beautiful variety of flowers, bushes and trees. I hadn't thought about that until today when I saw your fence line going to the street.
Just today I took my autoharp apart to repair the various felts that had come loose. My autoharp has 36 strings. I love tuning those 36 strings. Things like that strike me as needing the same frame of mind that can spend 13 days clearing a fence.
not to be a stickler but it took me 18 days, just 13 by myself. Once I get started on a project I like to keep going til I finish. It's hard on my body though and I've had to learn to take breaks so I limited my time to one or two hours.
Deleteyeah, flat coastal plains, big sky. in a normal year we actually get more rain than the Pacific NW so lots of lush growth. we average 50" a year, Seattle 38", Portland 43".
Impressive. We had popcorn thunderstorms all morning and I wondered if they were going to make it to y'all. It got nice and cool here. Perfect for me to repot my Japanese Hydrangea. Poor thing has been begging me to move it to a bigger pot.
ReplyDeletewe got a couple of brief showers but not enough to even really get the ground wet.
DeleteWhat a job. What a woman! So glad it's this far along. Close to the worst is over.
ReplyDeleteThat was a hellacious piece of work.
ReplyDeleteYou are amazingly energetic. I cannot work in the heat and the heat of Texas is real heat. I lived there a few years!! Watch in burning the weeds that they do not include the poison ivy as I am sure you know the smoke can be dangerous to everyone downwind.
ReplyDeletethere was a time when I could work that hard all day long. after those two hours a day now I was worthless for the rest of the day. yes, about the poison ivy smoke which is why I have the poison ivy in a separate little pile that will go in a trash bag. we always try for a still day when we burn anyway out of courtesy to the neighbors.
Deletethis is, you are, impressive!
ReplyDeleteYay! So glad all that hard work is behind you!
ReplyDeleteLooks amazing! And what a relief to have it done.
ReplyDeleteYesterday (Sunday) the wind really was down, and there were people lighting up their burn piles all around. I think there might even have been a couple of prescribed burns at the refuges. Now, if we're lucky, we'll get some rain. We've missed out on the last three systems. Houston's gotten some, and plenty north of town, but down here we're dry.
ReplyDeleteThat fence looks great. Doing a job like that a few hours a day's the way to do it. Even a couple hours a day's a lot when you're doing hard labor like that.
of course Sunday was my self appointed day off but I think it was windy here. it's always windy here. eventually I'm just going to have to torch them but I'll try and do it during the day when the next door neighbor is at work. I hope we get some rain out of this system too, same deal, they pass north of us.
DeleteI'm still not completely done. taking out the dewberry brambles now that span about 6 sections of fence but for sure the toughest part is done and Rene is supposed to bring his chainsaw tomorrow to cut down the 22 tree trunks.