Category Archives: Silviculture

Cat face, beaver pond 2020-06-16

Back in the 1930s, during the Great Depression, my father and grandfather paid off the mortgage on the farm through income from turpentine. This is a catface, where the bark was scraped off a pine tree so its sap would ooze out, to be caught in a metal cup nailed below on the tree.

Catface and beaver pond

The rest of the tree long ago was logged.

Behind the pine tree stump and the adjoining oak tree, you can see a beaver pond. Continue reading →

Phoenix bird 2020-05-10

The firebird appears to be a Carolina wren.

Carolina wren

This Thryothorus ludovicianus didn’t seem to mind that I was three feet from it. Continue reading →

Phoenix Tree 2020-04-21

Update 2020-05-10: Phoenix bird 2020-05-10

Firebird:

Phoenix Eggs

We burned on March 2, 2020, and that tree Continue reading →

Swamp boat burn 2020-03-02

Dogs like water more than fire.

Yellow Dog and camouflaged Brown Dog

And yes, Gretchen was putting out fires with a coffee cup and swamp water.

But she found something unexpected. Continue reading →

Blooming pear tree 2020-03-02

Gretchen and the LeConte Pear tree.

Sniff

We might get some pears this year.

Smile

Thanks to the cousin who gave this tree to us.

And the nineteenth century cousin who found it. Here’s a story about that. Margie Love, Coastal Courier, originally 16 September 2007, updated 26 September 2011, Liberty’s LeConte pear was once famous.

-jsq

Brown Thrasher 2020-03-30

Seen through a window screen.

Hop

It’s the state bird of Georgia, a Brown Thrasher. Continue reading →

Swamp burn 2020-03-01

When you live in a fire forest, you must burn every few years. We caught up on about 23 acres of burning of piney woods, seepage slope, and swamp. All this was inside concentric rings of firebreaks, with no danger of it escaping off our property.

Don’t worry, for the wildlife there are plenty of brambles and woods and swamp unburned this year. More next year. And quail, gopher tortoises, and other wildlife don’t like the woods too thick anyway.

Gretchen spreading fire with a rake