It took the guys from Tucker’s Timber about 10 hours to cut that big old elm down and they worked hard for all of those 10 hours. I think they did a great job with cleanup but they did have a limb bonk my neighbor’s fence and broke a section of that fence. I liked how they pointed out this broken section of fence and tried to fix the fence right away rather than try and hide breaking the fence. The tree guys are coming back to my house to repair the neighbors broken fence and do some tree limb clean up on some of my backyard trees. Based on seeing how full the truck beds are at the end of the day. I think the got about a cord of hard wood from the tree. I’m getting a discount on the tree cutting service because Tucker’s will have around a cord of hard wood fire wood cut from this one tree. The guys let me add a couple of my cut limbs to the Wood chipper pile and gave me a new wood cutting stump that has both a flat cutting surface and a flat bottom for my wood chopping needs. We had a big thunderstorm and rain about two days after the tree was cut down and I felt much better about cutting down the old tree after seeing the winds blowing through some of the big trees in my neighborhood.
Cutting down the big tree has already affected the “Front yard” ecology dramatically by adding a lot more sunlight. The kiddy pool strawberry planter has exploded with flowers and the lawn is putting on more green growth in just 2 days. I treated the lawn for bugs and added some spring feed to the lawn and now the grass is growing like crazy. It is amazing how one change in your yard can have so many additional changes that can be both positive and negative for your plans. I’m thinking about adding a couple of dwarf fruit trees for a little shade or perhaps a shaded seating area with a pergola or patio umbrella/canopy that will make up for the lost shade from the tree. I am taking this summer to see how much impact the lost of that shade tree will affect the home cooling costs and how it will affect the front yard flower/garden beds.
I attacked the overgrown grape vines so I could get three more raised beds ready for a “Three Sisters” beds of corn, beans and squash. Cutting out the old grape canes went better than I anticipated. While I did cut out some new runners and growth, most of the stuff I cut was old dried out canes that was messy and not productive vine growth. The three beds have been fallow for a year and I need to fork it, add some compost/manure but I think the beds will be ready for planting one bed of sweet corn and the other beds of dent corn. After a couple of weeks I can add the pole beans and week later the winter squash if I can find seeds for direct sowing. SW Idaho has a fairly long growing season for a northern state. While we can’t grow citrus fruits on a large scale we have many orchards full of apples, apricots, pears and grow some of the best grapes. Idaho farms also grow a lot of onions, garlic, wheat, oats and corn. So I think I’ll do okay with fresh greens and growing some stuff in my garden beds as I live in a agricultural state. Our weakest link in Idaho is gasoline/ diesel/ fuel and carbon-based fertilizer and chemical pesticides. While I may not like using chemical based poisons to eliminate insect in a large scale farming operation. I can’t say the pesticide is ineffective. I just think the cost/benefit ratio might be problematic.
Anyhoo, if you are like me on Social Security and file taxes but don’t get a refund or have to pay taxes. The IRS web site now is “Updated” and I got an update on when the check was mailed rather than a webpage of the IRS doesn’t respond with a page of the IRS does not know! I make under $20 grand a year and supposedly the IRS mailed out the check May 1st. I don’t know if it is true but at least it is better than the “We don’t know” page. If you got the IRS “We don’t know” page in the last month you might want to check back and see if the status has changed. I hate this pittance giver to USA tax payers and the big banks get to hand out government backed grants in the billions of dollars. Gold/money always runs up hill. Give the poorest person a $100-$1000 dollars and they will spend it right away! I’m doubtful all would spend it wisely, but before a week is out that money will end up in a TBTF bank. I think giving people “Free Money” is a bad thing but if the government is hell bent on giving away “free money”. They should make that money circulate as effectively as possible. That means giving that free money to the people of the middle class and poor because they will spend the money to pay rent,mortgages,credit card payments, utilities, groceries, fuel/energy. An Uber rich person might buy another Picasso. Hell I love good art but how does that art create demand/growth of the economy? Honestly how many pairs of pants can Bill Gates buy/own?