Florida Plantation

[Chainsaw]

You are really doing a nice job clearing the back line. I can't imagine hiring anyone that would do any better than that.

 

[SwampCat]

Mulcher and Dozer both have advantages and disadvantages. If it is on ground I am going to work with dirt equipment as in disk, harrow, blade, etc - I want a dozer so the stumps are gone. If on ground I am only going to drive over and bush hog, I want a mulcher

 

[FL Plotter]

Got the mulcher dude in there yesterday, but man, was he having a time with it. Had a hydro leak that he had to keep adding hydro, and then at the 4hr mark, it started overheating....they suspect the fan motor as it's run by hydro. So, he got about 1/2 done what I wanted. Got about 1/2 off one of the long fencelines to go before you can walk the entire perimeter of the property without fighting brush.

Meanwhile, the Kubota keeps chugging along. Put about 10hrs on her yesterday pushing up the mulch debris, ripping out little stumps and backblading on each side of the fenceline.

I'm seeing about 14 deer on this 20 acres...plus coons, squirrels, a coyote or two, and a bobcat.

 

[Triple C]

FP...Nothing better than working new ground. Congrats on the land purchase! Looks like you guys got it going on down there in a good way. Really amazed how much you've done with the FEL clearing the fence lines.

 

[FL Plotter]

Another 10hrs on the property today. Paid for another 5hrs for the tree mulcher dude...while he was mulching, my wife and I were chainsawing and filling the lane with brush for him to mulch down. Then we pulled every stump we could on the front fenceline. We knew we had one big pear tree, but found another one and several smaller ones. Can now walk the entire 3/4 mile perimeter and got the new driveway rough carved out....so that's progress!

 

[FL Plotter]

Well boys, been working on my primary home putting in new sprinklers and sod that took up most of March and April. Got on a fruit tree kick, then decided to plant them in homemade portable boxes. Lots of $$ (aluminum tariff is real) and time later, and the boxes are done with 2 peach, 2 grapefruit, and 2 lemon planted in portable boxes. Got a pear in a permanent yard box and another box ready for a plum. The idea is that the portable boxed trees will transport to the new property in 6 years.

I did make it out to do some chainsawing and fighting with 2 legacy Stihls that I just can't seem to let go! I'm just too attached to the damn things so I keep fixing them although each time I swear I will sell them on craigslist. Got one apart now waiting on a new coil. Met with a guy who blew away other land clearing prices. I'm getting 4 acres cleared (3 for the house, and 1 for the food plot) for $6K total. And some other work for $95 an hour. Land clearing starts tomorrow, so I will update later this week.

Herd is still around 14 deer using the property and one bear picture....not supposed to be any bears in the area though!! My luck...

 

[cutman]

Wow. Those are beautiful.

 

[lakngolf]

Nice work. Good luck with the fruit trees, now that honey do list is done

 

[FL Plotter]

Spent the day with the dozer boys.....got the 3 front acres mostly knocked down and the 1 acre food plot outlined. Progress!

Thought we had a bunch of pear trees on the property....but we only have one huge one. Very few pears on it though. Gonna have to research how to stimulate it for the future. I've cleared around it a little, but may do more to sunlight it.

 

[FL Plotter]

They got all the trees down and now are starting to pile them up. About a 4 acre opening in front for home, pasture and pond. 1 acre food plot in the back with a 20-50' buffer left from back fenceline.

First picture looking NE from SW corner of clearing
Second picture looking SW from NE corner of clearing
Third picture looking East into new 1 acre plot near back fenceline

 

[dogghr]

Getting a bunch of work done, gonna look awesome. Can't beat a good dozer and dozer man to get stuff done.

 

[FL Plotter]

Rain has slowed progress. All the trees are piled up...just waiting for some dry to burn. Been working on the master plan some more with Google Earth Pro. House, shed, barn, pole barn, pond, dog pen, food plot....it's starting to make more sense now. The Google Earth overhead is old, so except for the colored outlined areas, it's all 20' planted pines.

 

[Weasel]

Congrats on the property! My first farm was 25 acres and it was a blast setting that up from a blank slate. Great job so far! Nice there are so many deer hanging around already.

 

[FL Plotter]

Remember those cedar planks a few weeks ago? Well, my buddy planed them down, joined them with biscuits, avoided the "soft" spots and built this for me. 10pt is from my hunting lease, but the cedar arrowhead is from MY land!

 

[FL Plotter]

We are going crazy looking at house plans....and even more crazy pricing it out. We're looking at $125 a sq ft to build and that doesn't include well/septic. And that is far from "top of the line".

We could only put in about 3 hours last weekend before the heat drove us to the car a/c. We worked the edges pulling out pines the dozier knocked over so he can pile them up and burn. Also drug out a lot of brush....I ain't 20, or even 30 anymore.

Deer taking advantage of the shortened feeder legs!

 

[Triple C]

Love the euro mount and the tree planters. Great progress on the land project!

 

[FL Plotter]

Well boys, been fighting the typical Florida weather....hot, humid, with chance of thunderstorms every day. The dozer boys burned down the piles this week and I spent 7 hours on the 4th of July bushhogging and backblading. I had planned on discing the entire front 5 acres then dragging a 6x6 to level it out, but I may have to do some box blading to get it leveled like I want it.

Here's some pictures of the progress so far. My wife brought me out 6 bags of corn to fill the feeders. Looks like I'm getting 12 does/spike bucks, a bachelor group of 3 bucks, and a mature buck on the property regularly. That's 16 deer using the 20 acres....I can't wait until I get some lush clover, chickory and grains in there!

 

[FL Plotter]

Another weekend....another day of progress. Got the lime truck lined up for Saturday for 12 tons. I pulled the samples before he showed up to get a baseline, but I know the pH is low...probably 5 or so. We put out about 2T per acre. I'll pull another sample in the spring to see where I'm at post-lime. I had big ambitions of getting 2 acres of ICPs in, but the headwinds were against me. I did a little road prep for the lime truck. Guided him around and then hooked to a "new to me" disc I had bought for this property. I knew the 3 pt pin weld was suspect and it failed before I even got the bearings greased. I loaded that on the trailer and then switched to my "new to me" boxblade to salvage some of the day. Got a lotta of sticks dragged off and some initial leveling done and in the process bent 2 chisels and a 3pt hitch pin. In hindsight, not disking until I had moved some dirt around was probably the right call. The rain pushed me off the property around 2pm, so I got a good 6 hours in but not nearly as much as I wanted!

House site:

Front 5 acres cleared:


1 acre food plot cleared:



Back fenceline:


Broke disc:

 

[lakngolf]

Love the way you just keep moving when equipment spoils plan A. Looking good and that is some blaze you had going on.

 

[FL Plotter]

Well boys, at it again this weekend. 9hrs in the Kubota seat but got some seeds (ICPs and Sunn Hemp) in the ground. Picked up the disc and boxblade from the welder and then got on it. Finished boxblading some roots off the 2 acres in the front and then disced, put down seed, and disc again the front 2 acres, the 1 acre food plot, and the back fenceline. Got rained on for about 30 minutes, but kept discing through it. Somewhere along the way, I must have backed into a pine, because I have now bent the other side of the disc 3pt hookup....back to the welder it goes. About to take the disc apart this morning because not all the grease fitting will take grease.