Had a wonderful weekend, even if the weather was somewhat gloomy. Got to putz around the yard with my sidekick(s) in tow (Kate-la and C-dub). With fall Soccer over with we have a LOT less on the calendar for the weekends. Instead of 2 soccer games, one on Saturday and one on Sunday, we only have one hockey game, for a short while at least...
Anyway - I decided on Saturday to not continue on removing and cleaning the tractor carb. Not sure why I can't just leave the tractor alone. I mean, it works, albeit not perfectly (Sounds like it's not firing perfectly), but it cuts grass. With the weather getting colder and grass not growing, I figured that can wait for the cold winter days where I have to work inside the garage.
So instead of the tractor I went to the fall back activity when nothing is too pressing... finding and cutting wild grape and all the other varieties of vines I have on the property. As I explained to several people- interested or not- over the weekend - I've heard that the best way to return land to a wooded state is to just wait. Mother nature will eventually reclaim the brushy thickets and alder with trees that will shade these out and kill them off. I have a hard time believing this though when I look at some parts of my yard that are overrun with vines, literally pulling down any tree that is trying to ascend towards the sun. How could a seedling survive and thrive in these conditions, if it even is able to get established in the thick shade provided by the honeysuckle? They would quickly get wrapped by a vine and choked to death before it even got started. So with no knowledge of what I am doing, other than trying to clear areas where I can plant and protect hardwood seedlings, I have embarked on a slash and burn technique in the SW corner of the property.
I've got some decent size black cherries, a handful of mature (huge) black walnuts, and a handful of Chinese Chestnuts. Looking at them reminds me of the Christmas Carol, with Ebeneezer Scrooge limping around with all the shackles hanging around him. It's a shame to see them (the trees that is) in such a state. These have been around for 60-70 years and in cases of the walnuts probably well over 100 years. I have taken it upon myself to free these trees from these shackles. I hope that I am not upsetting some symbiotic relationship here, but it feels like the vines are an unwelcome parasite to these glorious trees - so they will be dispatched with extreme prejudice.
My primary method of removing these is to cut them off where they start to climb, and then administer undiluted Brush B Gone to the cut end. I don't like to use poison if I don't have to, but these guys re-generate at an alarming pace, so I'm ok with chemicals in this case. I think in the future now that all the foliage is gone, I'll be tracing the vines back to the "mother ship" to make sure I administer poison to this as well as the satellites. Brush B Gone is supposed to work it's way throughout the plant once introduced, roots and all, but I have no idea if this will work over such a large and spread out plant. I also don't think by destroying the main mothership that I'll be able to get rid of it. I've seen long runs of vines that contact the ground sprout roots down, and presumably if left unchecked would develop into a "mother ship" of it's own...
Next step is to figure out if I have any viable seedlings of the big trees on hand. If yes, protect them. If no, time to get planting! I also plan to add some trees to the mix, although I have not decided which species I will be adding.
