Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Mowing the Fence

Mid November is the start of the hands-on management season at Blue Jay Barrens. Weather permitting, from now until the end of February is the time that the majority of the mowing and cutting will occur. The traditional opening day ceremony is the mowing of the fence line. It’s worth a little bit of effort each year to keep the fence from being overgrown.

That strip of gravel on the right side of the picture is the township road. The old fence was built almost at the edge of the road, but I chose to put the new fence at the edge of the field. I must have been a terrible fence builder because everyone who went down the road stopped and asked “Are you building a fence?” Everyone within 5 miles of me must have come by and asked that question. I thought the fact that I had fence posts in the ground and was attaching woven wire fence to the posts, made it obvious that I was putting up a fence.

There were several deer beds in the grass along the fence. We don’t get a lot of traffic down our road, but it’s odd the deer would sleep 15 feet away from passing cars.

DR Brush does a fine job mowing along the fence. I had to replace DR’s mower deck a couple of years ago and the new design has rounded corners on the front that don’t catch on the fence wire.

Two passes of the mower leave a clear zone almost four feet wide. Here’s the first red flag of the season indicating an Autumn Olive that will need to be sprayed in the spring. To be marked by red at Blue Jay Barrens is equivalent to being handed a death sentence.

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