Yesterday we spent several hours clearing out a major trash dump at the NE corner of the East Basin. There was a lot of history there! We found a license plate from 1942, shingles and gutters from a building, lots of glass bottles, rusted relics of vehicles, tractors, etc., plus much barbed wire. This dump was just inside the fence along our property boundary. Out of sight, out of mind.
While this dump was there, a whole nice grove of white oak trees developed. Some of these trees were at least 50 years old. We burned this grove on Tuesday, which removed lots of leaves and made it easier to for us to haul out the junk.
We drove our truck nearby and tossed the large pieces directly on the bed. The small pieces were put in heavy-duty trash bags. I had to make a special trip to the hardware store to buy more bags. We ended up with at least a dozen bags, if not more.
Barbed wire is especially annoying. It is hard to believe how much barbed wire we have removed at Pleasant Valley Conservancy over the past 12 years! When you think you have it all, you find another patch. In addition to the barbed wire along the fence, this dump site had large amounts of small barbed wire fragments. We started piling it up and before we were finished we had a pile about 4 feet tall and 3 X 4 feet in area.
Barbed wire is a good indication of how much grazing must have occurred at Pleasant Valley Conservancy. Everything that could not be cropped must have been grazed. Fortunately, grazing ceased a long time ago, and lots of "good" plants recolonized. For instance, lots of shooting star plants are in the area of this trash dump.
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