Sunday, February 14, 2010

After blizzards 2010

This is what it looked like yesterday at about 2 p.m. As you can see, the snow is still piled high and deep. Neither the driveway, parking lot or paved training area had see shovel or plow. I was really getting pretty worried since it just seemed I continued to get pushed further and further back on every one's list. A little bit after I took this picture our local snowplow good guy came by and took one look and said there was NO WAY what remained his still working equipment could handle the job.



A little bit after that, Allen, tree care extraordinaire showed up. Took one looked at the mess and said, "Its too late in the day for me to try and start this without risking damage to my bobcat. See you tomorrow, late morning when it will be easier. Oh, and by the way, good thing you didn't let anyone else try to move this stuff with a plow."

Seems if I had it would only have made the job more difficult, more expensive and there would have been a chance he wouldn't have been able to do anything for me at all!

Look closely. What you are seeing are dog footprints INSIDE the flower garden. The snow is so deep they are able to simply walk over the top of the fence and right up to the side of the house.


About 10:30 this morning he showed up with big truck, trailer, bobcat and oldest son as a helper. They started moving the snow. They moved snow. They moved some more snow. Son shoveled in select places to give what looked like an outline for the bobcat to follow.

Alle pushed snow. He picked up snow and dropped it somewhere else. He piled snow on top of more snow.






By the time he was finished some of the piles of snow were more than seven feet high and there was more than one of them. Best part, we can now see pavement and in a few places actual ground! This will help to speed up the melt. Even so, I have this awful feeling I'm going to be looking at piles of nasty, dirty snow/ice until the Fourth of July.


At least we will be able to get people and dogs in and out of here once again. The cost? To date more than $400 and a big plate of fresh, warm brownies. My big tree? A loss. Once the snow is gone and it is possible for him to get back in here and work that tree is going to have to come down. It has been damaged past all hope of salvage. One of the problems is exactly what I thought it would be. Because almost all the lower limbs have been stripped brutally off the main trunk, it is now top heavy. Lacking the necessary close protection and support of other big trees beside it the next heavy wind storm we have will deal the final death blow and that very well could put it straight into the middle of my living room. Not a pleasant though, no matter how much I love my big trees.

4 comments:

  1. That's too bad about the big tree, but I am so glad you have some ground dug back out from under the white stuff.

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  2. Please tell me its not the catalpa tree!? Also of course it would snow this wonderfully in MD...AFTER I LEAVE!

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  3. No, silly! Look at the pictures. You can see the catawba tree is just fine. It was/is the really big evergreen tree by the driveway. You know, the one that was always in need of pruning because its lower branches liked to grab truck roofs.

    I sure wish you were here. Don't know which I miss more, your ability to yank me out of a black hole or all your help with the dogs.

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  4. Anonymous2:03 PM

    Hope you're getting dug out by now...

    And will forgive this note here, as I couldn't find a better way to wave...thought you might get a grim grin out of the PETA reality check over at my place (http://doranna.net/wordplay -- today's post). Or maybe not, but it was some of your straight-talking here that led me to finally say something even though I don't tend to get political in that particular space...

    --Doranna

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