We have two parcels: the one with our house has 2.5 acres and the adjacent parcel has 13.6 acres. When we bought the properties, the larger parcel was leased to a tree and shrub nursery. He also was using much of the front lawn of the house as a nursery for holly bushes.

All the photos below were taken in 2020.


1) View from left side of property, looking down Project Road (west boundary). There is about 800 ft frontage. The trees in the foreground are cedar, those in the rear are cyprus.
2) New driveway I created with my Kubota. It borders the left hand (north) boundary. 
3) View at right side of property. This is not our driveway. Two houses behind us have a right-of-way via our southern boundary.


4, 5) Close up view of the cedar and cyprus trees that are shown in photo 1.
For ease of maintenance, the nursery shrubs and trees were planted in straight lines. I have thinned out about a third of these trees so the ones remainig have more room. The cut cedar trees and their sawdust smelled great. And surprisinly, even though the cedar trees were very knotty, they were relatively easy to split by hand (all the trees I cut are used to heat the house.
4) In the distance you can see the driveway of photo 1 with our car parked on it.


6, 7, 8) These photos were taken while walking up our driveway, proceeding from the street to the house. The views are towards the northern boundary. While they were using our land, we never charged the nursery any money. In return they mowed about 13 acres and kept it looking pretty. Also, when a section was vacated we were given the left overs. This was the first section of the nursey that was vacated. The nursery left no tree or shrubs here. So I bought the following types of seedings from the state: oak, cyprus, sycamore, and tulip. I hired workers from the nursery to plant the seedlings. Also, over the years I transplanted some cedar seedlings that birds were nice enough to plant for me.


9) View from the street. The trees of photos 6 -8) are visible on the left half  of the photo.
The tall loblolly bines in the background are our northern border. The cabin and its paviliion overlook a small pond that we had created a couple of years before our builder Dan came here from NC to help constuct the cabin. This cabin was the prototype for our NH  cabin.
10) Closer view of the cabin with a blue kayak barely visible at the pond.
11) The Pond 
12) This field is beween the cottage and the northern border. It is the last spot where the nursurey vacated, thus the trees are the smallest. The small  deciduous trees are Carolina ash which I purchased from the state. I have since found out that the ash borer beetle, which is devasting the ash trees of New England, can also eat these NC trees. None yet have been found in our NC county and since there are few ash in this neck of the woods, hopefully they will be slow to spread. In the meanwhile the birds and Dick have been planting some longleaf pines in this field for diversity.


13, 14) Continuing towards the back of the property, there is a mixture of loblolly pines and crape mrytle. The crape myrtle was one of the best sellers of the nursery. They are often planted along the sides of roads and have beautiful flowers in the summer. Since the flowers are only near the new growth of the tree, many people cut off the top few feet each year which forces new growth while giving a nicely shaped trees. I do not prune ours, but have cut down many for firewood as they have good hardwood. Talk about renwable energy, they grow so fast that I could cut the same tree down for firewood every 5 years! Since I already create all the firewood I need by thinining trees, I instead brush cut new growth that sprouts from a chainsawed crape myrtle. Yes, I also have all the exercise I need!
15) The tall trees are sycamore. They are related to maple trees and have huge maple-like leaves. These 40 foot high trees are less than 25 years old and will eventually be over 100 ft tall. The nursery found that they coulld not sell many sycamores, so most were left for us. Yea!
16) In the distance is visible one of our neighbors' houses. We have let him plant crops in our last 2 acres as Dick has all the land he wants to play with. Bob grows corn and soy beans on a rotating basis. He was a cop and retired when he had about 40 people working under him, but basically he is a good olld boy who loves to hunt and even acts as a guide to other hunters. He and his brother Jeff, who lives across the street, are good neighbors and watch over our property while we are gone.


17 - 20) These photos show the loblolly pine grove that is in front of our house which is barely visible in some of the pictures. Dick planted the trees when they were just 6 inch seedlings in 2007. Now some 15 years later some are 50 feet tall! Scattered amongst the trees are some holly bushes that were leftovers from the nursey.
20) The driveway to our neighbors' house is visible.


21 - 23) Behind our house is an acre grove of cyprus, river birch, and sycamore. All were planted by the nursery 20 years ago. The 50 ft cypus trees are Dick' favorite. Close to one third of the trees have been culled for firewood, but the cyprus still want more space. As for the river birch, Dick discovered last winter if they are cut when dormant then the logs have so little water stored in them they can be burned right way as firewood!
24) Our 1500 square foot house is dwafed by a live oak which is more than 5 feet in diameter. No Dick did not plant this tree, it is 100 years old, slightly older than Dick.

When we bought the house it had a nursery in the front yard and on the next lot.


HISTORICAL PICTURES

1 - 3) 2007.
When we bought the house and its 2.5 acres there was a nursery of holly bushes in the front yard. When the shrubs were removed by the nursery there were holes left, but also mounded ridges where the shrubs had been. Dick filled a lot of the holes by hand by shoveling loam from the mounded ridges. Eventually the neighbors took pity and lent him a tractor.

4) 2008
The land where we live is very flat. In fact our neighbors think a 3 foot rise on our property is a good sized hill as it is high and dry even when there is 12 inch rainstorm. To help heavy rains rapidly drain away (almost always in 24 hours), most roads have ditches on either side. Fields have their share of ditches too. Dick thought a couple of ditches in our fields were eyesores and had them converted to swales - shallow rounded ditches. In this photo Dick is bundled up as a dozer changes one ditch to a swale. And they still drain just fine.


2008 Drainage ditch being changed to a swale.


The following pictures were taken on the 13 acre parcel we bought next to the house in 2007.
The field was at that time leased as a tree/shrub nursery.
1) Small holly bushes
2) Much larger holly.
3) Magnolia (Yes we do have some magnolias still. One is huge and about 75 feet tall. Others came from the nursery and average 10 feet.)