Land clearing progress photos

[Highbeam]

I had posted some early pictures and thought I would update you folks with the current site now that it has been 6 months or so.

The site is 15 acres of pretty young forest located right in the middle of puget sound about an hour and a half from my current suburban home. It looks to have been mostly clearcut about 30 years ago but never reforested the right way. Just natural regen. I have managed to clear about 3.5 acres with a little dozer and then planted that to pasture. Just last month I had the logger out there to log and clear another 1.5 acres plus a 15 foot wide perimeter road. He plans to burn the slash and stumps from his clearing and my clearing next week. The tree and brush removal has really dried up the ground.

The plan is to clear out the center and the perimeter while leaving a buffer between of 100 feet or so. Then house/garage/barn construction should be this coming summer.

Picture one: The logger loading out pulp logs. If they aren't straight for 14 feet or more then they aren't the valuable saw logs. About half are going to pulp.

 

[Highbeam]

Number 2: Looking back towards the frontage, my pickup, the pulp pile, and that awesome JD 690 trackhoe. Rather than cut the trees and then dig up the stump, this boy would push over the whole tree and then the cutter would cut the stump off.

 

[Highbeam]

number 3: Looking at the home site. The valley below is on the site and is actually a good 8 feet plus lower in elevation. The property line is at the base of the trees on the horizon. Note the smooth ground. Those piles are huge, like 30 feet across and at least 15 feet tall. The plan is one big fire and use the several slash piles to feed the big one.

 

[Highbeam]

number 4:

The perimeter road after the logger went through. I then took the box blade and made this one fine road. This is about halfway down the 1200 foot east line looking towards the frontage. My direction to the logger was to not break the string and to comfortably fit his 11 foot wide machine through there without riding up on a stump. Clear everything and pitch it to the inside. He did good and actually got me more like 15 feet.

 

[Highbeam]

number 5: same spot looking the other way to the lowest area on the site. It is amazing how long 1200 feet feels when it is a nice straight road through a tall forest. The string line follows the surveyed property line. The surveyors set a hub and tack every couple hundred feet to help me build a stringline through the jungle.

 

[HuckBB62]

Wow, your property took on a whole different look! Like I said before Highbeam, I will never ever ever ever complain about my little brush clearing stuff again! Good job!

 

[Highbeam]

Last one. The road. It will be about 700 feet long and this is on my way out about 200 feet into it. I had him load out that deck of logs as they were visible from the street and would have made good firewood for someone driving by. Saw logs like that have pretty high value these days.