Storm Damage Cleanup Starts

A couple of weeks ago there was a wind storm that blew through here. It took the roof off of my brother-in-law's porch (pictures below) and made a mess of some trees.
The trees in the pictures below are from our property. I wanted to show the progress of cleaning them up.
There was one big oak that caused most of the damage.




This is the rootball of that tree.










It landed on another oak that was on the edge of the creek and lifted the roots out of the ground. That tree is the big one leaning to the left in this picture. The creek runs left to right directly under the rootball of the tree.
Then after pushing the second tree that first oak slid all the way down to the ground and smashed the boundary fence.
The second oak stayed leaned against another tree after the storm.






We went out there the following weekend and cleaned up as much of the fallen tree that we could, which is why you see all the cut ends.
The dogs and I went out after that around the 19th of February and got these snowy pictures.

I took this one on the 8th of March while we were cleaning up. Lots of wood to pick up. FabHub is working on replacing the fence.

The big log on the ground (not the one above the ground) is from the one falling in the coming photos.

There is enough wood in those two trees, besides all of the other ones that got damaged to make it worth the effort to hire a contractor to bring his bulldozer out and build a road to them. There has been a need for a road back there for a while, but it was never a priority. Since we aren't going to waste all of that good lumber and firewood, it is now time to get it the road done. The contractor came out on the 5th of March and we started cleaning up that evening.

Here you can see the wood pile I made while FabHub was sawing up branches from the first oak that fell. You can begin to see the amount of clean up we need to do and the drain we put in so the creek can run under the new road. The main purpose of the road is to be able to get back there to pick up firewood or feed the cows in the sheltered woods sometimes.

The leaning oak is really big! Here they are using a chainsaw to notch the tree, which should help it fall in the correct direction.











Standing straight up.

Starting to lean left.

Starting to fall.

On the way down.

Crash landing.

Here is the cut end.

Some of the upper branches broke on other trees on the way down. One little tree is trying to hold it up.

That whole mess will have to be cleaned up.

Back to March 8th again, this is the base of the big tree by the tractor and truck. The top of that tree is cut up, some of it is still on top of the hill and the rest I had started throwing down the hill in front of the truck.

Guess who gets to carry and stack the wood?

It is a good workout.

This is where it all ends up.

We had the pile down to just the rack on the right by the fence and part of the one next to it. Now we have enough for next winter too.

We hoped that the big log would turn into boards, but the middle is rotten and not worth the trouble of putting on the mill. More firewood.

This is from the other side of the lower part of the road.

The road goes straight out of the woods in the back of the picture and up the hillside to the left.

The bulldozer couldn't pull this one out of the mud because it was hung up on another stump, so he pushed it to the left in order to get it out of the tree it is leaning on.
The guys can cut it into smaller pieces and pull it out with the tractor. Safer than leaving it hanging there.

This is from the top of the hill. If you look close you can see where it runs out the left of the picture down by the creek.

Bulldozer man did a really good job. The road even tilts toward the hillside. There are parts of Route 20 and I-77 that can't manage to do that right!

That is our adventure in the woods, so far anyway. FabHub got the road he's always wanted. I got a big pile of firewood for the stove. The dogs have fresh cut earth to explore. All is well.