A Life Well Lived

About ten years ago I had a pine struck by lightening and die. It was large (about 20" diameter) and tall (75-80 ft). It was near the lake shore and endangering my dock, so I had a local climber top it to a 20 ft tall "stump". 

That butt height was safe for the dock and provided a lot of habitat over the years. Woodpeckers (at least one Pileated family was raised in it) and smaller critters enjoyed it's safety and bounty.

As inevitable, the butt finally slumped over, forming a barrier to lakeside maintenance, so it was time for a cleanup and cremation. This is where I started taking some pics. 

The dissection revealed an inner core of heart pine through most of the butt, valuable as "lightwood", natures fire starter, so I decided to salvage some of it. In the process some of the smaller forest floor dwellers appeared.

The outer softwood was mostly soft soil by now, which I scattered and left to fertilize the area. Along with relocating the living critters still there. The two short video clips at the end show carpenter ants and termites. (These would be hard to spot in a still photo.)

The remaining scraps of lightwood pile into the hollowed-out stump and make a fire, good enough to take the stump below ground. 

The salvaged heart wood will light many fires in the fire ring at WinterCamp and in the wood stoves at Bucksnort.

Four days later - all smoothed out for regeneration of ground cover.