Sun Factor
The bulk of the property is more or less a rectangle with the longer sides facing north and south.
The western half is mainly deciduous forest and so quite shady in the summer and sunny in the winter.
The eastern half is broken up into a number of areas and a few of the open areas get sunshine all day long, summer or winter.
Although there are a few mature evergreens, none provide year round dense shade, though I did notice that during a light snowfall, none ends up under them; and it melts off sooner than around the "shaded" area than further out. I think it's just a tad bit warmer under the evergreens in winter than no under them.
A fair number of evergreens, mostly white pine, but also some spruce and other pine species, have been planted in a few places, but it will be another 20 years or so before they are a major shade source.
More sunlight evaluation and related planning needs to be done: the diagram needs to be redone as several diagrams that shows the information more clearly as well as the projected sun/shade areas in 10 and 20 years based on tree growth.
Sun Factor preliminary diagram
This diagram is mostly a failure due to too much information I tried to cram into it. It works as a planning tool for myself, but not if I needed to present a plan to a board of directors, for example. The yellow areas are where there's mostly full sun most of the day throughout the year. Only a few places actually get sun all day, most have long morning or evening shade from the bordering trees. The yellow arrows were meant to show the direction of the sunrise and sunset in the summer, while the green ones are the winter positions. The double headed arrow in the middle is the drop off line -- to the left the slopes are steep and to the right there's only about a 3% slope, though in different directions.
Most of the year the central area here gets sun most of the day. The house casts a distinct shadow during the mornings but is in full blazing sun in the afternoons and evenings. This was my first explicit sun tracking video for this area and I've since decided a more accurate one, done from the roof, would be more better. This one is overly optimistic about how sunny it is, I think.
From old house front to new one in 43 seconds
Makes it looks like the time flew by, which sometimes it did. This timelapse covers nearly nine months and contains primarily images when someone was present. It also makes it clear how little direct sun this north facing studio will get.
10 minute interval timelapse of winter sun on house. Published to South yard environmental factors gallery. This video shows me how the big field is mostly shade in the winter and reminds me that only this side of the row of bald cypress gets full sun in the summer, but in the winter, they get shaded out fairly early. It also shows me I need to find another place if I want to set up a sundial sometime.
