Tree's and Loco's

Recently I had a little get together with some of the guys one Saturday afternoon and one of them brought over the new Paul Scoles scenery video (has been advertised in the magazines). Paul has absolutely gorgeous scenery on his layout and it was very intresting to see some of his techniques. One idea I picked up on was that he uses alot of natural materials and for his forest floor he just collects allot of twigs and bark and grinds them up. Well I got my wife to pick me up a real cheap food processor ( she won the tug of war for the good one in the kitchen) and tried a few different things (leaves twigs etc). I really didn't like the first couple of tries and then I remembered reading in one of the mags that someone had used pine needles for this very thing. As luck has it, I have a couple of large pines growing at the back area of my property, so I went out and started gathering some up ( I think the neighbours were wondering what the heck I was up to). I added in some very small twigs and turned on the blender. I must say I was really impressed with the results, and I think the key is to not put it down in too thick a layer. Diluted white glue of course is necessary to hold everything in place. I have included a picture to show you- I think it looks good.On another note, I have acquired two of the new Maine Central Atlas RS-11's (see photo) that were released this summer. They sure are impressive and I have one of the older versions that was released in the 80's. The detail is so much better now, that the old one has been retired to the closet!!! I have prepared them for use on the layout by installing TCS MC2P (with short harnesses) decoders and Kadee # 58 couplers. I really like these decoders as they are really small and will fit just about anywhere. Converting each loco with these really is a 5 minute job. Bye for now.