Site Discussions

Today, I caught one in my front yard - never thought they lived this far north. Seemed harmless enough so I released him back into his wooded habitat.

Some entrepreneurial lumber dealers around here sell blue-stained pine, which has a blueish hue. We did a column on the fungus: http://northernwoodlands.org/articles/article/blue_stain_fungi 

I have been feeding my skunks chicken, ears of corn some peanuts..is this a healthy diet?

All the hinge is doing, Flip, is keeping the tree attached to the stump, which is safer. You want to cut your notch in the direction you want the tree to fall. And you want to use wedges on the bad side of your lean. It’s very hard to explain good technique in writing, though, so our official answer is hire a professional.

My oak is having a mast year and has more acorns than in the last 10 years. However, the last year was a terrible oak moth year. We lost many oaks in the area due to drought and the caterpillars. I’ve seen the caterpillar (oak moth) wave come and go and know that is natural. The resulting acorn abundance, while we’re still in a drought, is interesting. Maybe the trees think they are dying?

I moved 3 sweetfern from a friend’s property in Maine (with permission) 3 summers ago.  Only one survived and it is pretty magnificent with new babies/suckers this summer.  I have it right at the entrance to yard so I can brush against it.  Healthy as anything but too large for the space since my yard is tiny and it’s crowding out, or hiding, False Solomon seal and my hellebore utterly.  How to prune?

My doctor read an article about mining timber from lakes (he thinks in New England)...he mentioned something about blue wood. He wants to build his own house. I surf the web and offered to look for him since he FORGOT where he read the article! (Maybe he’s thinking of the colorful decay..I’ve seen that in my nephew’s cafe. Can you help?
Suzi

Today, Oct 8 I noticed a willow that appeared to be fluffy and was shining in the sun.  Upon closer observation, it was actually covered in fluffy cotton which seemed to be pushing out of tiny seed capsules along the stems.  The cotton had many very tiny black seed in it.  I have lived here for 30 years with those willow bushes across the road and have never seen this in the fall.  It was only one bush among many.  I wonder if anyone else has ever seen this happen.

I need to fell a 50ft 13inch diameter dead pine very accurately into a 30ft gap. It leans 3ft in the desired direction of fall and 2ft in the most damaging direction. How must the hinge be altered/enhanced on the high side to move the top of the tree about 15ft, roughly 10 degrees?

I’m in agreement with most all of you. People and large-scale agriculture will be following the water. Right now, people are leaving Aroostook County, Maine because the agriculture there is now largely mechanized (mostly potato and grain farming) and the timber industry is also mechanizing too. I suspect, however, that that trend will reverse somewhat as there will be pressure on some large agriculture to find a new home away from the Southwest and West.

Likewise, land and home prices in the Boston area are positively exploding upwards due to all the high tech, finance, and higher education economy money flowing into that area, but at a certain point the nearby water will rise.  Even if it rises just a little bit, huge parts of the Boston area will suffer, during noreasters especially and I suspect that people there will start being forced into the rest of New England as the climate and ocean trends become clearer to more and more people.

In short, northern Maine is warming up a bit while still (for now) hanging on to its rainfall.  Land up in The County is cheap and looking around at much of the rest of the US and world, such a combination of cheap, abundant, well-watered land cannot be had by still increasing populations.  The County won’t be overlooked forever.

Like Stephen Wilder, I too hope to exit before the worst of what is to come hits (which will help out the remaining folks just a bit too.)

I’ve had this growing in my garden for about 15 years, and have to say it does have garden merit. The large leaves provide a bold texture contrast which is often needed in the landscape - mine is planted next to Holly and they look great together.  The flowers are beautiful although they have a faintly unpleasant scent, and the fall color includes some nice red tones. 

I am in agreement that there is going to be an overwhelming flow of refugees from the urban environments due to flooding and food shortages and general disruption of distribution systems. The influx of refugees in Vermont and upstate NY trying to escape from all this will result in violent confrontations and extreme stresses on social and cultural and environmental norms. It is going to be horrible and I hope to be dead and gone before it gets too bad….

Your vision is more likely, for Vermont or Maine. I don’t see it as dim. It just reflects the way people behave. Just the same, prediction is no science. Could the world of today have been predicted in 1965?

Some sort of migration due to climate change will certainly happen, but it will be more gradual than the sudden influx of refugees we see in Europe. The biggest driver will be water, or the lack thereof, both in terms of human water desires and agricultural production. California is well on the way to major change. Hundreds of thousands of acres of formerly irrigated farmland have been fallowed in order to use the water for people in cities. In the dry plains, the Ogallala Aquifer will soon sink out of reach of deep wells. Agriculture will have to shift to wetter places. The people of southern California and the rest of the Southwest will hang on as long as they can, with less and less water available. Jerry Brown’s 25% cut in water use will likely become a 50% cut in the next few years. People will no longer be moving to those areas, and some residents will drift north and east.

For Vermont, immigration will be facilitated by the milder climate. Many more people will choose Vermont because we will no longer have frigid winters. With our fragmented planning, we will not be able to steer these immigrants to live where it might make sense. They will continue to pursue the idealized Vermont dream of a few acres of land, and thus fragmentation will intensify.

Our polarized agriculture, that is small local-vore farms and huge industrialized dairy farms, will both expand. Big dairy farms will continue to clear more land. In addition, large scale veggie production will come to our state as it is abandoned in California, and more land will be cleared for it. Abandonment of useable farmland will cease, and the clearing of forested land will be concentrated on the best soils. Agriculture will become the mainstay of our economy again.

By 2065 Vermont’s forests will have shrunk, perhaps to as little as 60%, and our population will probably have doubled (which isn’t saying much in the grand scheme). It will still be a great place to live, but it will be much different from the idyllic back pasture we inhabit today.

I’m inclined to agree with your dimmer view, because it’s what’s already happening in Vermont (e.g., “local planning boards would be coopted by people who wanted in on some version of the rural Vermont experience”). I also would expect social/cultural/class distinctions to get sharper and more hostile. Part of what defines our state is its small population; once that expands, especially if in a big lump with people who come here under pressure instead of voluntarily, differences will get exacerbated rather than assimilated.

I cannot imagine how the kind of economic and social catastrophes that are likely to accompany the impact of severe climate change will be positive. I think the on-the-ground European response to the current refugee crisis is likely to take place in states that are spared the worst of the worst, where many people will be helpful and welcoming—to a point. And then I’m afraid that the worst in human nature will be brought out, as resources and space dwindle. The groundswell of support for Donald Trump and—once he got nasty—Ben Carson are I think harbingers of the kind of us-versus-them that this crisis will generate. Eventually? Can’t tell, but I don’t want to be around for the what I assume will be very long transition period.

A year ago we bought 100 acres in the highlands of middle Ontario and noticed this tree that we had never seen before. Research showed that it is this black birch. We had heard about it before but thought it was rare enough that we would not have any. In exploring our acreage we have found many stands and are excited to see it flourishing here.

My log home building instructor was adamant that logs for a home must be cut in the late fall and winter. Yes the sap is down and it will be hard to peel at that time of year but it will also be far more rot resistant. As you mentioned, during the spring and summer the tree is actively growing and creating the thicker softer band of that years growth ring. This layer is much more susceptible to insects and decay. For a major investment like a home, and one that should last for many generations, it doesn’t pay to take any shortcuts just to make it easier, at least not if doing it the hard way produces a longer lasting result.  A pressure washer with a rotating tip can make fast work of peeling a log but great care must taken not to get to close or shoot directly at the log or you will shred it and expose the softer wood.

If you’re worried about animals browsing, why not make your cuts @ 6’ above ground? As long as you’ve got a good root system, it should be stable—I’m judging by the centuries-old stave orchards in western europe who use this technique.

Hey Benjamin! Great article. I too harvested cattails this spring and found them to be such a rewarding and tasty food. I loved reading your descriptions and process of harvesting. Thanks for sharing.