The Massey

I had the forester come down last week and he was a really nice guy.I wanted to look at my walnuts mostly after the 90MPH winds in August.He mentioned one of the biggest issues with mine were the amount of sticker vines and poison Ivy vines growing up them

I was scolded, mostly by the forester warden on my forester's first trip out. I now cut vines in crop trees and leave some in junk trees.

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We got right an inch at the Massey out of the rain yesterday. My brother-in-law, 4.5 miles away got 2.3", so we ALMOST got our first 2" rain in 635 days. We still haven't gotten the needed gully washers to fill the ponds back up, but this has been the best winter rainfall in a LONG time. So we are thankful and hopeful a wetter winter will make for a wetter year. Last year at this time, I was wondering how many trees we had lost during he winter months, no worries of that right now!

Hoping to cut a few trees tomorrow and perhaps bark graft a callery pear I found yesterday shed hunting. It all depends on whether or not I can find a potential pear scion or two that hasn't budded yet.
 
Spent a good chunk of the day at the Massey.
Grafted a couple scions off two different pears in the barnyard onto a callery pear on the south edge of our field. I was worried the kieffers were too far along, but I think they were okay. I followed the Native way…
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The bucks have this tree marked, but the callery pears are pretty much indestructible it seems…
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I got a little too ambitious with my first cut; I’m new to the girdling scene. Had a forester tell me how to do it. Here I went too deep though and finished on the cut on the lean side, ended up pinching the bar some, I managed to get it free with a ratchet strap.
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Worked quite a bit of the day getting more sunlight to bigger oaks.
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Anybody know what’s going on with this elm? There are several like this, I first noticed them this last fall while hunting. They were fully leafed last year.
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This old burr oak is one of my favorite trees on the farm.
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More sunlight clearing for oaks.
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Nice to see some water in some of the creek branches again.
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I’m trying to make one of the deer trails a little better. I cleared it today and will go in this summer with the weedeater and touch it up. I’ve been wanting to do this for a while now. This is through new growth of the last 10 years. I also did my own version of edging; trying to keep the browse optimum on the field edge. Also wanted to clear the view from Addison’s stand to the lower barn foodplot. Speaking of Addison’s stand, can you pick it out in the second pic at the trail's end?
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Managed to stumble onto one more neat little shed. Might be the last of the year. Grass is greening up fast and will be getting tall soon.
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I had the forester come down last week and he was a really nice guy.I wanted to look at my walnuts mostly after the 90MPH winds in August.He mentioned one of the biggest issues with mine were the amount of sticker vines and poison Ivy vines growing up them
Why are vines an issue?
 
Looks like dutch elm disease made it to your place. I wouldn't panic over it. We've had dutch elm disease in MN for decades, and we've still got plenty of elms. One thing that makes elm a great tree is they readily sprout up from seed. Be glad you've got some dying. Those with bark just beginning to fall off are hot spots for morel mushrooms. And your mushroom season should be starting any day now.

 
Especially if you got some rain recently. They're already in central MO.

 
Found a few vines yesterday I need to take care of myself. One particular white oak was especially struggling. I get it taken care of soon. A few pics from yesterday:
Here’s a couple of the burr-english oaks we planted 10 years ago. The shorter one got a pretty powerful setback with a fire a few years back.
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I’m hoping the bigger ones will be put some substantial acorns on this year.

The crabapples should have some fruit this fall, if we can avoid a late frost. It got down to 27 last night, but there was no frost at all early this morning, so I’m hoping the blooms survived.
Crossbow
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Droptine
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The other droptine, that we lost last year to sunscald, has a pretty strong shoot coming off the base, I’m still not sure if it is above or below the knuckle. It might just be a rootstock shoot. I’ll know better when it gets a little bigger to compare leaves to the others.
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I forgot to include a pic of our back plot. The rye/wheat looks great, but once again, it appears the drought did a number on the clover/chicory. It’s early yet, but I see nothing whatsoever underneath the cereals besides some henbit.
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It was supposed to rain this evening, did not….. it’s way too early to begin getting in this pattern already. :(
 
Got some good news I wasn’t expecting at the Massey today!

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Also found some morels about a week too late. I marked the locations though and will get an earlier start next year.
 
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