Forest Garden Project: Clearing, and Mowing The Second Segment of The Main Trail

Marked in orange is the second segment of the main trail.

It’s been a while since I have made any blog posts. I will try to change that. 🙂

Last Spring I started out pretty strong as usual with way too many plans, and big ambitions. At the time, little did I know that the coming Summers extremely hot weather would bring a pause to everything.

In early July of last year I ended up in the emergency room at the hospital with a pretty serious health scare. I was suffering from severe dehydration, and heatstroke. Since then I have been very sensitive to heat. So I didn’t accomplish most of my goals last Summer including finishing the planed second segment of the main trail.

I did get some of it done though! The first half of what I accomplished was completed in Spring, and the Second half was completed in Fall when the temperatures started getting cooler.

If you haven’t been following along I wrote a blog post about Scouting, and Planning The Main Trail, and Clearing, and Mowing The First Part of The Main Trail back in 2021. You can also take a Video Tour of The First Segment of The Main Trail to see how nice it turned out.

Let me see, where to begin?

Early Spring

The first 20 yards (18.288 meters), or so of the planed second segment of the main trail rout.

The first 20 yards or so were the hardest, and probably the most time consuming part of this segment. It was like a boulder field! Large rocks, and boulders were sticking out of the ground everywhere making it impossible to mow.

So as soon as the snow melted, and the ground thawed, I was busy at it!

Me digging a boulder out of the ground.

Digging…

Me prying a boulder out of the ground.

…prying…

Me rolling a boulder out of a hole in the ground.

…rocking, and rolling boulders out of the ground.

Victory!

It was a lot of work, but finally success!

Many holes in the ground.

All that was left to do was to fill in all of the many deep holes left in the ground. Then I could finally start mowing the trail.

Mowing The Trail

Me mowing the trail.

After clearing the first 20 yards (18.288 meters), or so of all the rocks, and boulders things went pretty smoothly. I managed to find a fairly level rout free from rocks, and boulders for a while until I came upon a rather large dead fallen tree blocking my rout, and that’s as far as I got until Fall.

This is where the boulder field was.

I think it turned out pretty well.

Looking down from the old boulder field area to the end of the trail.

It has a kind of magical feel to it.

Looking back to the old boulder field from the end of the trail.

And the local wildlife loves using it! 🙂

Early Fall

My friends Corey and Dean clearing an old dead fallen tree that was blocking trail rout.

Once early Fall came, and the temperatures started getting cooler two of my friends Corey and Dean came over with chainsaws, and cleared that old dead fallen tree that was blocking my trail rout.

Wood from that old dead fallen tree.

I have a chainsaw, and I could have probably done this myself, but I was still recovering from my health scare, and didn’t want to risk it. It’s nice to have friends that are willing to help you out, especially when you’re not feeling very well. I’m sure I will get the opportunity to return the favors someday, or were they returning old favors to me? Lol!

More Mowing

Me mowing with a self propelled walk behind lawnmower.

Once the fallen dead tree was out of my way I was able to extend the trail slowly, bit by bit, in small segments on days when the temperatures were cooler.

I found using my self propelled walk behind lawnmower to be a bit more easier to cut this part of the trail with. Because the grass was taller at this time of the year using a walk behind lawnmower gave me better visibility, and more control to avoid hitting any unseen rocks, and/or branches. Luckily I didn’t come across any more obstacles for this part of the trail.

Looking down from where that dead fallen tree was.
Trail turning back towards the woods.
Trail entering the woods.
End of the trail until Spring.
Looking back towards the woods from the end of the trail.
Looking back to where that dead fallen tree was.

Well, that’s it for now. At least until Spring thaw.

I am pretty happy with as far as I got considering my health scare kept me from working on it all Summer long. Hopefully this Summer wont be as extremely hot as last Summer was.

Coming Soon

Marked in red is what’s left of the planned main trail yet to be completed.

As you can see in the photo above marked in red that there is quite a bit of trail left yet to be completed.

My original plans were to complete this trail in 3 separate yearly segment’s, but it might take 1 or 2 more than planed? It will all really depend on my health, and the seasonal temperatures. If it doesn’t get to hot I just might be able to complete the main trail this year! 🙂

So stay tuned, and thank you for reading!

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