Down in the Holler...

If you have six acres ("+") of land, you might as well be able to walk it and enjoy it, right? But there are a few areas here that, over years of neglect, have been seized by poison oak, dead trees, and dead brush. The gully ("holler") to our North West is like that. Over the early summer, while the poison oak was still leafy and green, I attacked it with periodic spraying (don't ask!). Here is some info on poison oak family - it is aptly named:
Toxicodendron is a genus of flowering plants in the sumac family, Anacardiaceae. It contains woody trees, shrubs and vines, including poison ivy, poison oak, and the lacquer tree. All members of the genus produce the skin-irritating oil urushiol, which can cause a severe allergic reaction.

Western poison oak is called T. diversilobum), which seems apt, too, because it does appear in diverse forms, as bushes, as vines (with yards-long runners just beneath the forest duff), as small trees (weaving their way up through other trees), with a concomitant alteration in the size and shape of its leaves. Brrrrr. Hate the stuff and I have a couple spots on my arms from accidental contact a few days ago. It can sometimes be hard to spot amongst all the other dormant plants this time of year; it has dropped it leaves, showing only brown, undistinguished whips to the less than diligent, or distracted, observer

PART 1:
So now, some of the poison oak has been killed and some has died off (as it does in late summer/early fall.And this seems like as good (and safe) a time as ever to go in and clear it out, and the tree dead wood, too. This is a shot of what the area looked like a few days ago before I started, looking back towards the house from the gully. 

This is the gully, looking South towards Triangle Road. Nice rocks and trees, but a lot of deadwood and poison oak shoots.

 There are some big rock slabs to be seen, mossy rocks, ancient tree stumps, and boulder clumps (see pix below), but they are shrouded in deadwood and poison oak. This is what I want to open up, to hike, to sit in, and enjoy. Most of it is shady, with patches of sunlight here and there -  and it will be even more beautiful in the spring with fresh grasses and flowers.The best would be seeing some water running - a seasonal stream. Up the gully a bit, there is a an old stool next to the gully and some wooden planks across it, so at some time in recent history, water did flow here. I'm hoping for a rainy winter.

Streambed and some big boulders on the other side

Big slab rocks

Ancient stump - something really big grew here...

Streambed

For the last couple days I have been working on the area East (house-side) of the gully, using a hedge trimmer to knock down the poison oak whips, and chainsaws to drop the deadwood. I'll be taking photos today to show what's going on (see below) and what's changed...

Part 2 (work in progress)...

I don't want to handle the poison oak, so I've been cutting it up into little pieces that can rot back into the leaf duff. I'm hoping it is the fresh leaves that carry most of the urushiol...

The dead wood larger than an inch or so I have been cutting into stove lengths to be burned this winter. There are years of firewood on this property!

 The leftover branches I bundle with a chain, tie it to the trailer ball on the van, and drag out of the gully and over to the burn pile by the garage.

The cut logs I load into the new trailer and use the new tractor mower to haul to the woodpile to the rear of the mill office..

So here's how things look opened up:

Looking down towards the gully: At the bottom by the streambed, there is a little meadow.

 And up from the gully - now a walkable slope.

Oh, it turns out that even the dormant poison oak branches will get you a rash - both my forearms can attest to that!