Signs of Spring...

 With the warm weather starting in March this year, it shouldn't be surprising that the snow has disappeared so fast. Just last week I started to clear the snow cover from the upper dog yard.

Now the dogs are all moved out of the sloppy snow and mud of the winter sled yard into a much drier spot for the summer.

Last week we were still hauling birch logs from the ridge top with the Skidoo.

Now we're starting to split and stack the split firewood to get it drying out.

And the mosquitoes are already out in force; not all the signs of spring are welcome!

End of the Trail...

For this year anyway, the dog runs are over. Hard to believe that last year we ran until late April (Last Dog Run?  4/19/23). This year we had our last outing on March 20, just after the vernal equinox. I took the Ski Doo out last week to check the trails. The warm spell in late March, 40-50° F,  had taken its toll. Besides the icy trail, bare spots, exposed roots and alder stubs. there was extensive overflow (aufeis) at the creek crossing.

The pond at the creek crossing is filling with overflow, flooding the trail.

All that's left to do is put away the sledding gear.

The sleds are hauled up to the shed and hung, upside down, under the overhang in back. Then we'll be hauling in a few loads of logs to buck up and split for firewood.

There's plenty of trees down along the trail, the problem is finding ones that are still good for firewood and not buried in snow or frozen to the ground. Once you find a few good down trees, it's just a bunch of grunt work to buck'em up, load the sled, haul'em back, and stack the logs. Once there's a decent pile of to logs to split, it'll be time to hook up the splitter to the tractor. Too much fun!

April No Fool...

 There should be a day after April 1, all fools day, when there's no fools; maybe it should be today. I went to to the Dr. for my bum shoulder, the fifth different one. Even tho I said what I thought I needed when I made the appointment, the Dr said he couldn't do the procedure. Then he referred me to another Dr. So who's the fool? 

Here's a pic of the instrument of destruction that took off the tip of my thumb the other day.

Given the amount of safety warnings they put on tools today, you'd think they'd put a warning on these things. BTW, my thumb's healed up fine, so maybe it's better to be lucky than smart!