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nw NC | Wow... what a mess!!! Is the entire 4 acres like that? What is diameter of those cedars right at ground level? You say land is quite steep. How steep in terms of angle of slope in degrees? ( 0 being flat, 90 being straight up vertical). Removing them with chainsaw or some type of mechanical cutting device such as a hydraulic tree shear may not look like it is leaving a stump right when you cut it, but after some rainfall and cattle walking over it the stub of a stump will be there. If those are red cedars, the small stub of stump will rot loose from the soil in a couple of years and should not be a problem after that.
When do you expect to have the cedar cutting completed? If it were my land I would remove the trees using a tree puller on a skid steer or a tractor front loader, or snatch them from the ground with a small track hoe. Smooth the soil surface with tractor and rear blade or some type of land drag then seed something to start growing to get ground cover. What to seed depends on temperatures at that time (late winter, early spring, early summer, etc.) If it is really steep, then having straw, mulch quality hay or even corn stalk bales spread on it could help in preventing erosion and help get cover growing. If soil is as poor as you indicate and you want pasture , you need to lime and fertilize for such. | |
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Converting Cedar Thicket to Pasture
