Tag Archives: Forestry

Petition: Stop rezoning on Quarterman Road 2023-08-28

Update 2023-08-24: Packet: Two county rezonings, one plainly inappropriate @ GLPC 2023-08-28.

Please sign and share this petition:

We the undersigned ask that the request for 2.5 acre lots on Quarterman Road be denied.
The smallest appropriate acreage in our area is the EA minimum of 5 acres.
Rural rezonings like this lead to additional developments in the future. We don’t want it now and we don’t want it later.
We ask the Greater Lowndes Planning Commission to recommend denial in its August meeting.
We ask the Lowndes County Commission to deny in its September meeting.

Rezoning sign, site, Quarterman Road, Zoning Map, Agriculture/Forestry/Conservation Character Area

R-A allows 2.5-acre lots, while E-A allows only down to 5-acre lots. That is inappropriate on Quarterman Road, where there is no R-A, and the entire road is in the Agriculture/Forestry/Conservation Character Area. Many of us fought to preserve that Character Area only two years ago. Just last year we fought off a Dollar General on GA-122 at Skipper Bridge Road, in the same Character Area.

Now let’s stop this rezoning in the same Character Area.

According to the Lowndes County Unified Land Development Code (ULDC), Continue reading →

Arrow and the downed limb 2023-05-19

Arrow was bemused by this big sweetgum limb in the drive path, that Gretchen had noticed the day before.

Limb, Arrow 2023-05-19

She wanted to know what I was going to do about it?

Amusingly, it fell so it was supported like a pyramid by its own limbs.

I brought the tractor and a logging chain and dragged it away. Continue reading →

Deadfall, orange kayak, pond, Blondie 2023-04-11

If a tree falls in the forest, does it land on a boat?

Deadfall on boat 2023-04-11

But if it didn’t make a hole in the hull, I bet the boat will still float.

-jsq

Seven-acre burn 2022-12-30

Another successful prescribed burn at the end of 2022.

This was actually the burn of the area in which the Treat’s Rain Lilies have since come up, six weeks later.

Fire and ash 2022-12-30

There’s more to do if we ever get good conditions again, as in dry for enough days after a rain.

For those who are not familiar with prescribed burns, they are necessary to the health of pine forests. Pine trees, especially longleaf pine trees, are more resistant to fire than other trees. So burns favor pines, and without burning, oaks, sweetgums, etc. take over. And burning temporarily cuts back the gallberry, blackberry, and Smilax vine thickets that get too thick for wildlife. Quail and other birds have already moved into areas of previous burns.

Here’s a video playlist:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLk2OxkA4UvyyTZYEfjLstI_3DK0QDieb

Continue reading →

House burn 2022-03-28

If you want a southern pine forest, you have to burn every few years to keep the other trees back, and to keep the vines from climbing to the top as ladder fuels.

Start, spread, finish

This was a burn around the house, also to reduce the likelihood of wildfires or our other burns getting to the house.

Might be prudent to do it in less than five years, since there was a lot of raking to be done this time. That’s why we took two days to do this five acres.

But we did it with one match. No gasoline or diesel to spread the fire. Just flaming pine straw on rakes. Continue reading →

Fire in wood stove 2020-11-17

It’s that time of year.

Heat and light

Plenty of dead oaks to cut up for firewood.

That’s good, but also troubling: too many dead trees due to spells of drought and heat.

Here’s a brief video: Continue reading →

Frankentire 2020-06-17

Anybody else had to get one of these?

With bolt

Thanks to Adel Tire for the fix, including a new inner tube.

-jsq

Cat face, beaver pond 2020-06-16

Back in the 1930s, during the Great Depression, my father and grandfather paid off the mortgage on the farm through income from turpentine. This is a catface, where the bark was scraped off a pine tree so its sap would ooze out, to be caught in a metal cup nailed below on the tree.

Catface and beaver pond