Harrowing done

Finally.  FINALLY!  Finally it is done!!!  Finally I finished harrowing the hayfield and all the pastures.

I started way back on March 24th.  Naively I thought... "I hope to get most everything harrowed this week."  (http://tallpinesranch.blogspot.com/2015/03/harrow-start.html) It took me almost two months!

Since I got an earlier than normal start I decided to do some extra stuff.  First off I decided to really harrow the hayfield.  That meant after I drug the harrow once around the hayfield I then went over the entire hayfield again this time driving in tight circles to ensure I went over the ground multiple times.

I only went over each pasture a single time.  But once I was ready for the pastures I decided to clean up the pastures a little bit to have less stuff to drive around.  That meant combining some piles of branches into fewer piles.  I also decided to de-limb a few fallen trees and to cut the ends of some fallen trees to make their footprint shorter.  I also trimmed some lower branches from live trees.

As I moved from the south to the middle pasture, then to the north pasture my efforts increased.  While I had partially de-limbed a few fallen trees in the south pasture, I de-limbed all the fallen trees in the middle and north pastures. I hadn't planned on de-limbing the last tree to fall in the middle pasture last year, but when trimming a few branches I realized now was the time to de-limb the tree.  The tree was partially dried, but not completely dried.  If I waited until later the branches would harden as they completely dried.

For lower branches I also trimmed more and more trees as I moved from pasture to pasture. From a few trees in the south pasture, to half or more of the trees in the middle pasture, to almost all the trees in the north pasture. Part of this was because the cattle had eaten needles off some lower branches in middle and north pasture trees.

For weeks now I thought I would be done in a day.  Some days I got no pasture work done due to other events.  Sometimes I only got a few hours of pasture work.  On days where I got a full day of work done I still didn't finish.  I kept thinking only a few more trees to trim, but then I would find more trees and branches.

I used a step ladder to reach some branches at the tree trunk for branches that hung way down.  For some trees I started to climb the tree as I found dead branches.  For a few trees I was way high up in the tree following dead branches.  I was so high I could look down on a roof of a two-story house.

Finally I trimmed my last tree Tuesday afternoon, and two hours later had the harrowing completed.

Here are 13 photos of some of my pasture work: https://plus.google.com/photos/109566462412251958234/albums/6150831503157229137?authkey=CLfYu6vL3ZelNA

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