difflock

Yup! And I did glue the whipping. Going to face a thorn hedge tomorrow, just removing the spindly branches that have fallen over/out. At least I got the distance from the lane to the hedge line right, but it looked proper silly when I planted the thorn quicks.

Our ponds are full, and the first one solely from rainfall, the past 12 month the big pond has never dropped, such was the weather, unlike a couple of years ago when it dropped 2' in a dry spring. Our ground is still bloody wet underfoot, despite the searing weather.

I would actually like a spot of rain, to nail down the bone dry and mischievously behaving Beech leaves? Get off my lane!

Slasher, which I bought many many years ago, like about 40. I regret not "acquiring" an unloved billhook from the Council. They stole the slashers right left and centre. But the unloved bill hooks. Nope. Leave them in the store.

60 feet of salvaged Steel Wire Armour. 2 30 foot lengths admittedly, hence the slight discontinuity in the middle. Set on a smear of Stixall. And as smooth as a babies bottom. Fingers crossed

I would need to sound like D.T. to describe the past 10 days of weather here in N.I. and indeed Donegal last weekend. Stupendous, brilliant, magnificent, etc etc etc. Esp for mid March

Thank you so much OSM for your detailed informative words of sound advice, I should(obviously!) Have pruned and tided these years ago, and there were/are so many narrow forks. The Ash I did prune have lovely clean boles up to about 7 feet( the limit of my unaided reach) but are all dead with ADB. I shall however have enough material for shafting tools for the next several generations! But I will leave felling then to the dead of the winter, which is what month for minimus sap? P S. I am going down just now with the blower To The wee Kioti fits below the trees, and the Major 8000 roller mower mulches everything green to bits.

Can't seem to add text to the images above. But I was surprised at how well the wee 50 HP Kioti handles the Major 8000 roller mower. And superb visibility, plus low enough gears for tiddly awkward bits in reverse. Plus physically small and low sans cab to get in below the hedges and trees.

Thanks all, These trees are, at least for my lifetime, intended to be purely for amenity and pleasure. But yes I have and will continue to remove some lower branches, though mostly just the overheavy oddball ones.

Thank you for that Mark. So retain every third tree. Better give the scraficial victims an extra special hug before firing up the chainsaw.

Along our front access roadway. Beech on the gravel knowe, then Oak on the peat. Like? Should I remove every other one at some point, and if so, when? Or just let them be. P.S. I was told to just buy slips and not bother with the 6 bigger and disproportionately more expensive ones. They were absolutely right. Despite the great care I took in planting the 6 bigger ones, the slips rapidly put them to shame. Marcus

I have been pondering the artifical intelligence vis-a-vis human stupidity conundrum. My money is rather regretfully on human stupidity winning this one. Einstein was right all those years ago.

Thank you Spud, yes I ran 2 full fills through her when I got home and all quite faultless. but I need a polycarbonate visor for the forestry helmet, my lips were kept well pursed/sealed behind the mesh visor as I rotovated the dog shite (from our own dogs) among the grass, but that does NOT make it any more attractive. P.s. Quite horrified at the price trimmers/brushcutters of the FS200 class have risen to. I suppose I have finally turned into my father! P.P.S. (i)John was adamant that E10 petrol was the culprit, for dissolving fuel lines and gumming up carbs. (ii) They have stopped even looking at the DIY Chinese shite retailed by so many outlets. (iii) I took a walk round the new Lidl store in Coleraine, and was gobsmacked at the array of Parkside tools and the prices, from memory £50.00 for a metal cutting bandsaw. £150.00 for a plasma cutter, £80.00 for a gasless MIG welder. Etc etc etc Pure skip filling madness, and see item (ii) above.

£39.00 later. No coffee or doughnuts, but a bit of crack. And only left in at quitting time yesterday, and ready this afternoon.