Site Discussions

What accounts for such a rising demand for maple sugar/syrup in this era when so many people are cutting back on eating sugar and carbohydrates?

I once spent a few hours watching a few bald eagles teaching a youngster to find fish in an estuary off Nova Scotia - awesome day in my life.

Nice article, think your crystal ball might be a bit cloudy. Take away cheap oil and big maple gets a lot smaller. RO especially is a high embodied energy product that has a complex production stream behind it. What’s the alternative? Buckets and lines, more employment. Win win.

Some of the best syrup comes from tiny sugar shacks worked by old guys eating Cheddar cheese that numbs the lips. Not as much product, but really, really good.

Sure, Big Ag runs not one, but a fleet of monster, self-driving combines chopping corn. How often do you hear, “Man, that corn from the lower 40,000 was outstanding this year.”  You don’t. ‘Cause bigger isn’t always better. Or even as good.

While it will hopefully not become an issue for New England, in areas where fracking brine is available it represents a cheaper alternative to salt brine, but brings with it all the other fracking chemicals.  Caution is therefore needed in embracing the whole brine idea.

Good explanation of the ecological benefits of CWD.

I would have preferred that the closing paragraph was placed inside the article in place of the paragraph that states “In an intensively managed forest, ....” because the point was already made that being a “neatnik” in a patch of woods was detrimental to forested ecosystems.  And, it was made in a positive, almost humorous way.

In terms of nutrient cycling, no one can predict the amount of nutrient loss over three of more rotations of a forest which could be as long as 300+ years nor should any one even speculate what might be going on ecologically in any managed forest in the future based on past forest management activities.

It is really the responsibility of a forest landowner to determine how his/her forest is managed. 

And, an intensively managed forest does not preclude the possibility of generating or leaving CWD on the forest floor and standing dead snags.

The same can be said of a properly managed chipping harvest operation or any timber harvesting operation that is based on an ecologically based silvicultural prescription.

Where to draw the line between leaving dead wood and creating a fire hazard?  Especially in these dry conditions? And what about after a large wind incident?  Is there a reasonable percentage?

The 3 foot nest is probably Osprey.  I’ve seen them nesting in Colorado. My question is what bird lays white speckled eggs smaller than a dime in an enclosed nest shaped like a football with no hole.  I found one dropped at a park with 5 eggs.

I am wondering why there is a mourning dove in the tree outside my window cooing during the night time.  I have tried searching and can’t find any educational site stating that this is a common habit.  I don’t hear or see this dove during the day… but every night I enjoy listening to it’s song.  I wonder if anyone else has heard mourning doves sing at night?

Just a quick note on this… I have spinal cord damage and an unsteady walk and limp… I always have mountain lion problems with hunting elk in Colorado, but this last winter, while walking (limping) to my deer blind here in Indiana, I had one (coy wolf) pick me up and stalk me all the way to my blind…  Clearly too large for Canis Latrans, this one had all the characteristics of Canis Soupus.

Hi, I’m looking to make my first axe handle. I was able to hunt down a ~35″ circular log of hickory that is about 3″ in diameter. If I whittle this to the desired shape will it work? Everything I’ve seen starts with an already split piece of wood (as done in this post). I’m mainly concerned with the strength of the handle.

Thanks.

While I liked this article, I thought I’d offer one additional bit of info about Hobblebush that it doesn’t mention: the berries are edible.

There are no poisonous species in the genus Viburnum.  While several of the viburnum species native to the Northern Woodlands, (like maple-leaved viburnum, Viburnum acerifolium, and smooth arrowwood, Viburnum dentatum, produce fruits that are inedible, i.e., they don’t taste good, there are at least five Viburnum species native to to the region that produce palatable fruit. These can be separated into two categories: those with prune-like fruit, and those with cranberry-like fruit.

Into the prune-like fruit category go the species wild raisin (V. nudum), nannyberry (V. lentago) and hobblebush (V. lantanoides, formerly V. alnifolium).  All of these species start out with white flowers in flat-topped or rounded clusters (characteristic of the genus), followed by berries that start out green, and redden as they ripen, but are not fully ripe until they turn a bluish-purple or darker color, and are soft to the touch.  The ripe fruit of all of these species have a prune-like consistency and flavor.  Also characteristic of the genus, the fruits of these species have large, flat, cherry pit-like seeds in their centers, these are easily separated from the fruit in your mouth and spit out (on the ground, or into a bag for saving and propagating elsewhere). In my opinion, the fruit of the hobblebush is the best of the three, having a clove-like, spicy flavor.

I too had the impression at 12 years old that baby skunks couldn’t spray. I had unintentionally killed a mother skunk with a sickle bar while mowing a field, but the little ones were low enough to earth that the bar went over them.

Imagining some new wild pets—of which I had had a number, to my mom’s chagrin—I rushed off and got a burlap sack to haul the tiny trio home, assuming, of course, that my parents would cheerfully pay for their de-musking.

I bent to gather the first, and…Well, baby skunks CAN spray, I assure you.

I have an essay that can be Googled called “Unskunked,” of which this episode is a part.

Thanks for the “tree in the forest”. I remember in the second grade I was tripped up by this question, and thought something was wrong with the explanation that sound “requires being heard” to be called a sound. Years, later, as a science teacher myself, I taught my students that this is a trick question invented by someone who made up a definition of sound.

Dave - we’re finally off to the races in central Vermont, boiling 12 hours out of 24 for the past few days. 3/16 tubing has been great for us this year. I don’t have enough instrumentation for hard data, but comparing tubing flows with the filling of nearby buckets, the 3/16 is providing 2x to 3x what the 5/16 did in previous years, compared with the buckets. I’ll stick with the skinny stuff in the future for sure.

Now if I could just remember the new grade names when people ask…

—Chuck

Hi Peggy,

It’s a little known nature fact that, exclusively on April Fool’s Day, mice hatch from eggs.

Amazing work guys!

I got goosebumps while reading your journal and looking at your pictures… Definately a dream of mine to build my own cabin. I started drafting a plan and I’m getting all the knowledge I can through the internet.

As I was reading your journal, I was reading it with Richard’s voice, it was comforting :)

Thanks for sharing,

Jonathan

I have a NW calendar. I wonder if this is an April Fools Day joke. Because today it says “Mice are laying their six to nine eggs about the size, shape and color of puffed wheat.”
Perhaps it a typo…..

Dear Chuck,

This issue has been an interest of mine for over 30 years and I was a founding board member of a land trust in Maryland in the early 80"s.

Historically,  courts have not recognized the public interest in upholding wills and land restrictions prior to easements and many of the most important gifts of will were undone by the courts.

Belts Woods in DC was a 500 acre virgin forest given with the sole purpose of preservation and then destroyed by the Episcopal Church with judicial help that did not recognize public benefit. So the record is not good.

As for experts, they are easy to buy - thus the invention of land trusts was a huge step forward.

Maryland was a leader in land trusts and has written easements with some flexibility in mind as to exemptions for agricultural operations, like grading.
Some house sites are not designated but subject to future siting with general guidelines. (Of course the number of allowed house sites can always change as long as it is fewer.  This would not be an amendment as it could be considered an additional easement as in your cabin case.)

As far as I am aware there are almost always federal gift tax incentives in a donated easement.

We are working on easement wording for conservation burial grounds here in Maryland.  Although best sites are already under easement, we are never proposing to change existing wording - only to find unprotected property and write a new easement allowing this almost zero impact use.

The Vermont effort last year on changing conservation easements was extremely ill-conceived and rightly abandoned.  It would have been a devastating blow to other states and a bad precedent for public trust in conservation easements.
I hope the next effort is a bit more careful.

Sincerely,  Doug Carroll

Could you explain exactly where the air vents are?

Thanks.