In the previous post we started doing some landscaping in an area of the greater yard that is east of the fence line of the compound. This area has an old pig yard that we set up over five years ago, along with some barrels we had stored in the area for future use. Over time blackberries and other weed trees grew up and over grew and took over the area to the point that the pig yard and the barrels were completely covered up by foliage. Well I wanted to be able recover the camper shell that we used in the pig yard for a shelter so I can sell it to get a few bucks since this item isn't even doing any good sitting in the middle of the woods. Also the drums that are there can be put to use making more raised beds or drum planters for the garden since there are some trees that need to be transplanted to drums from the tire beds they're currently in and more drum raised beds need to be set up so I can further do away with the remaining ground level raised bed, among other things.
Well anyway we did get the process started by clipping stuff from the edge of the brush line as well as running over and through a lot of this with the zero turn mower to just knock a lot of this down. Hedge trimmers were brought in later on to really knock a lot of brush. I had to drag the generator over to this site to power the trimmers. Of course the mower did way more to clear a lot of this ground than just snipping the brush with shears. In the last session we managed to get the ground cleared up to the fence of the pig yard and enough to just about expose the drums. In this current session we started pushing into the pig yard. This involved cutting the overhead brush with hedge trimmers. and clearing a lot of the rotted pallet wood that remained from the pallets that were used to make up the fence. I had to really put some work in with the hedge trimmers chopping away at the super grown blackberry briars that were well over my head and intertwined with other viney plants. After working my way around to the inner edges of the fence line the ole lady ran through everything on the ground with the zero turn. As time progressed we managed to make a nice pile of brush and crap for the burn pile. Between the plant material and the old pallet wood and even a couple of old fence posts, we had a nice pile growing. Now we did manage to salvage several larger T-posts while only salvaging one of the smaller posts as the smaller ones bent up too easily and ended up getting cut below the ground with the reciprocating saw. The next move of course was removing the fence from the pig yard. As stated before, we removed the T-posts and wood fence posts from the yard. This involved having to cut multiple ties from the chicken wire and large gauge wire fencing to get the stuff separated from the posts. On a couple of occasions we used the zero turn and a tow strap to hook and drag sections of fencing from their place since the bottom of the fencing had sunk into the dirt some. I had to cut the fence at the corners of the fence line to make things easier for removing the fencing, taking time to fold/roll up the sections of fencing for staging in the outgoing scrap area. With perseverance we managed to get all of the wire fencing removed and staged for scrap, along with the fence posts. All that's left now is the camper shell and the supporting posts. Of course we'll have to cut some more weed trees and other brush around this structure to open up some space to allow for working around it more easily, but the main thing is getting it separated from the posts its setting on and moved to another staging area so we can get the remaining posts out. When the camper shell and the remaining vestiges of the old pig yard are gone, my plan will be to continue to cut the plant growth further back to where the rear of the camper shell was at then cut a straight line across, creating a new tree line for the clearing that will be where the rear of the pig yard once was. We still had to get the drums removed from the area as well. Even though we did manage to get the drums exposed, there was still some crap remaining around the drums and on top of them, mostly blackberries, which of course would've made removal painful at best. So with the hedge trimmer, more brush was cleared from around the drums so they could be rolled out and tipped over to empty the water from them, where they were then moved with the dolly to a staging area pending their use in the garden. With the grounds cleared, and continuing to be cleared, we will be making an effort to keep these grounds cleared. I took time to cut a few small stumps from some of the cut down weed trees so these won't be a problem when the zero turn runs over this area as this will be what's used to keep the grounds cleared. By clearing everything from the grounds and cutting a straight tree line, it'll make it that much easier as there won't be any maneuvering around, just straight passes up along the clearing. With these grounds cleared, it'll make it a lot easier to turn vehicles and trailers around as we will end up having 3x the space available as we had prior. Also having all this ground cleared will allow us to perform other actions such as target shooting, testing small vehicles like go karts or what not. With this area opened up this area will probably end up becoming known as the proving grounds for any future projects we complete, which of course you'll see here.
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