Jay Gaulard Blog

My Morning Walk To The Mailbox

In my last post, I said that people need to start writing more. I said that our readers don’t care what we write about, just that we write. I even threatened to take my camera out with me this morning.

Well, guess what. I did just that. Since I had to go to the mailbox this morning to put some outgoing mail in it, I decided to enjoy a little walking tour with the good ol’ camera in hand. I know this feels like a Seinfeld episode (about nothing) but this is what I do.

After I put the mail in the mailbox, I headed back down the driveway. I looked at the ground and noticed all sorts of acorns laying there all spread out. Every day this happens. There is a big Red Oak at the end of the driveway that makes a huge mess. I think the squirrels are $%^& with me. I need to call a tree service to come prune a few trees, this being one of them. I hate having this messy tree for everyone to see. Maybe when it’s getting pruned, I’ll take some before and after shots.

Anyway, when I looked down at the driveway, I noticed some ants running around. I took a bunch of pictures of them, but they were too fast and the pictures came out blurry. They would’ve been really cool because they were close up. While I was down on the driveway, I decided to take a picture of an acorn so you know what I am talking about.

Red Oak acorn

There are hundreds of these things. Every time I mow the lawn, I take out the blower to blow off the driveway. Within a few days, they are back. After taking the picture, I had to get up and run because a car was coming. That’s all they need to see…Gaulard laying down on the driveway taking more pictures.

Last night, I also mentioned that I was taking down some small trees in the woods along the driveway. My goal is to make it a bit lighter in there with some breaks of sun. I have to be careful not to take down too much, because I really like the trees. The last thing I want is full sun. I have already made a dent. I would say I am taking down anything smaller than 6″. Here are some photos of that.

Woods along driveway

Woods along driveway

Woods along driveway

As you can see, there is some filtered sunlight coming through. I probably have about 10-15 more trees to remove.

A few days ago, I discovered a faster and quieter way of doing this. Well, one way is quieter, but not faster. I am using a hand saw for some of them. Basically, I take the tree down and then cut the top leafy part off of it. I drag the stalk up and place it in the pile you see in the last photo. I drag the top of the tree down into the brush pile in the woods. I always need a good brush pile. You would be amazed at how fast a big brush pile collapses over time.

The faster way is to do what I described above, but with a chainsaw. I used to cut the wood into firewood right there, but that was noisy. I will do that all in one shot when I am done taking down the trees.

Here is a beautiful picture of one of the stumps.

Birch tree stump

At the bottom of the driveway, I noticed a new flower growing in the spot I just mulched. It was mixed in with all the others. It just bloomed so I thought that deserved some recognition.

New white flower

After I took a picture of that flower, I walked across the front lawn to get some shots of a nice pink flower up there. I did that and then I took a shot of the Highbush Cranberry that we have growing. There are a few of these bushes and the berries are getting very red.

Pink flower

Highbush Cranberry

You see how nice that was? It was a big blog post about nothing and I think I got away with it. Well, we’ll see what people write about it to see if I really got away with it.

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Tags: acorns, ants, bloom, bush, bushes, camera, chainsaw, firewood, flower, Mulch, oak acorn, photo, photos, squirrel, squirrels, Trees & Shrubs, walking tour, white flower, wood, woods, writing