Tag: Northern Minnesota woods

I did not plant this abundance

Up at the camping land there is a whole lot I did not plant and I do not need to keep cultured. Of particular wonder are thousands and thousands of wildflowers.

It wasn’t always that way. If fact, the first year we owned the land, we showed up one night to a shock – the trail in and the whole campsite was wall-to-wall ferns. It had grown to 4′ tall in a few weeks. It was 1:30 in the morning. We went to bed and dealt with it the next day.

I remember back then we hadn’t even brought a mower yet. The ferns have very strong stems so we used the brush saw. That, however, was arduous, so not too long afterward, a weekend’s rental of a brush mower to work on all the trails followed. It was a dramatic difference. We were concerned for a bit that we had gone too far. But 1/2 hour after cleaning the trails, the trailcams showed deer eating again. They loved it.

The trails now are not at all fern covered. If left unmowed they are wall-to-wall wildflowers. The deer can be seen going side to side, back and forth, eating dandelions early in the season, and then wildflowers.

The ferns are still in the woods – over 4′ tall and lush.

Plum trees and raspberry bushes and strawberry plants and ferns galore

When we were last up north at the land, things looked very different.  The nice winter clean look has given way to a jungle-like appearance!

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We are learning more about what we have up there now.  If I was a bird or an animal I would be delighted.  The place is overgrown with raspberry bushes, strawberry plants are everywhere, and there are small plum trees.  A friend told us we may not ever harvest the strawberries and plums.  They are small and the birds and animals get them pretty quickly.  As for the raspberry bushes, I did not feel bad about cutting some of those down to get a clearing.  They are all over the land!

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Just like the tall ferns that now line everything!  They, too, need to be tamed a bit.

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I think it’s going to be a very gradual process.  Taking some from the land so we have a place to be without a crazy amount of ticks and mosquitos and black flies, yet leaving a whole lot in its natural woodsy state that we fell in love with.