week 5 blog 3 Dylan Wolniewicz 5/22/13

Today I started the day by feeding the birds. After that I started mowing, which did not take very long because I had done most of it on Monday and Tuesday. After that I started to get ready for the Governor Academy kids to come in. They bring 30 kids for three day one week as a workweek. They told us that they were coming at ten but they showed up early and got there at 8:30 so we were not ready for them. So we were running around trying to get all of the tools together and then we had to wait for some of the volunteers to come in to set them up on there projects with the kids. While the kids were waiting for use they all went for a walk and they were all supposed to be back by 915 but most did not come back to the top of the hill till 9:30 so we had to wait for them. Once they were all back we split them into three groups and one group was stacking wood in the sugarhouse. Another group went into the field pulling out garlic mustard. Then the last group went with my self and 3 other volunteers. The kids went ahead of use pulling sticks and cutting and thing that were hanging over the trail. Then myself and the other volunteers followed behind them with a wood chipper and we throw all of the sticks and logs into the chipper because it is too dangerous to have any of them using the chipper. 

week 5 blog 2 Dylan Wolniewicz 5/22/5

On Monday I started out the day by filling the bird feeders after that I started moving some of the trails around the property. The trail that I first started on is about 2 miles long and goes in a circle around the property. The trail is so wide that I had to take 4 passes to cut the grass on the whole trail. The main reason that we cut the trails is not so that it looks nice, but so that it keeps the tick’s form getting on to people. The tick population on the property is every high. This is due to the over population of deer that we have. Because we do not allow hunting on the property there is an over population of deer that are starting to wipe out any small trees and plaints coming into the under story. After I was done mowing that trail I went out the new barn to check the progress that they were making on that, and myself and my boss looked at the parking area and figured out that it was to small and not what we had planned. So we got a measuring tape and stakes and staked out the area that we wanted for the parking. Then we had to call the contractor and tell him that he had to make the changes. After that myself and other intern set up staging on the back side of the main building because latter on this week we will be doing painting if the weather is good enough for it. 

blog 1 week 5 Dylan Wolniewicz 5/22/13

Tuesday I started by feeding the birds then I mowed the rest of the grass around the buildings and in the parking lot. Then I took the weed wacker and started to use it under all of the fencing and under the solar panels. After that I got on the tractor and started moving wood chips to a trail that we are going to be spreading them out over with kids form Governor Academy. But we did not have enough so myself and another intern took my truck and moved the chipper to ship wood to make the pile bigger so that we would have enough to do the whole trail. After moving about 20 loads of chips over to the trail. We took the tractor and finished moved about 30 loads of wood from different piles around the property and brought them up to the wood shed to split them. So that once winter comes around and they start making maple sugar they have plenty of wood to burn. They usually use about 10 cords or more of wood each year of a mix of soft pinewood to hard oak wood. The different between the different woods is that soft pinewood burns faster and hotter than hard wood like oak. But the oak burns longer at a little less temperature so they use a mix of the wood to keep a hot and long burning fire going in the winter. After that we stared to split the wood and we did that for the rest of the day. 

week 4 blog 3 Dylan wolniewicz 5/16/13

On Monday I started the day out by filling the bird feeders and watering plaints. After that I started mowing the lawn. They have a 36-inch cutting deck on their mover and a valkey on the back. a valkey is a small stand with a wheel that gets towed behind the mower that you stand on so that you do not have to walk behind it every where. They have about 2 acres of grass that we mow once or twice a week. Once I had most of the mowing done my boss wanted myself and one of the other interns to take the tractor and bring a bench down on to one of the trails. So we loaded it up and brought it down. Once we where back I saw that the tractor had a leak in the hydraulic line. So I had to take it off and go out with one of the volunteers to pick things up form home depot and also to look at a new truck that they may be buying. So while we were out doing that we also had to find a place to make a hydraulic line. So we drove out 45 minutes to a place and they had moved to a different town. So I had to make some calls and find another place that make them. After calling my buddy that works at the DPW he told me JB auto so we went there and picked it up brought it back and put it on. Then filled the hydraulic fluid back up.

week 4 blog 2 Dylan Wolniewicz 5-16-13

On Wednesday I started the day out by filling the bird feeders and then I finished lawn mowing. After that was done I started weed whacking. This took an hour to do everywhere. After that myself and three other workers went to a different property in Gloucester to check the trials. Also on of the Neighbor to the property had called and told use that there is a lot of bittersweet growing on the trees. Bitter sweet is a vine that grows on trees and it grows up and all over the tree. It ends up killing the trees because it blocks the sun light from getting to the leaves. So we went and cut it as high up in the tree as we could and then one of the workers that is trained to use pesticides treated each and every cut piece of vine we had. Only of use was licensed to do that so it took a while for her to treat ever thing. The only time that you have to have a license to use pesticides is when you are on public property. We hiked in to the woods about 100 yards cutting and treating the bitter sweet. Then we had to use a chain saw to cut about a 8 inch in diameter bitter sweet vine that was taking over one of the big trees on the property the vine. After counting the growth ring was about 20 years old which is pretty old for a vine.

blog one week four Dylan Wolniewicz 5/16/13

Today started out as usual I fed the birds, water plants and cleaned the water pump in the pond. Then I washed an aquariums. After that I finished mowing a trail and part of the lawn and weed wacked it. After that myself, my boss and another intern went out to Avails Island on the property to cut a fallen tree. We walked out there about a mile and a half I was carrying a 20 pound chin saw the hole time with protective gear on which was every hot and heavy. Once we found the tree I cut it up and moved it. But then we saw a tree that was leaning over the trail and that was going to fall on a windy day. So instead of waiting for it to fall my boss said to cut it down so I did. We kept walking then we saw a dead and rotten tree next to the trail. Normally we would not do any thing with but we just where told by insurance agency that we have to cut and dead trees that could fall on some one.  So my boss said to cut it down. Just cutting a normal not dead tree down is hard but cutting a rotten and dead tree down is very hard. Because you do not know how rotten it is. you have to cut a wedge in the face of the tree in the direction that you want it to fall then you make the back cut. I cut down a total of 3 trees today.