I have been in your exact same situation but with about 5 acres that were logged. I think those telling you to just seed and leave everything in place dont quite understand how much wood and branches are left behind. You litterally cant walk across your property because of the amount of material on the ground. Here is what we did. The larger material we cut up into firewood, then we piled up the bulk of the branches and burned them. It was a hell of alot of work, but 5years on now with rotational grazing sheep has made an amazing transformation. The land has become more productive every year. I wish I had tried piling branches in swales in some parts but I would definitely suggest leaving gaps where you can move a vehicle through without needing to drive all the way around. In my case I planted a crap ton of trees spaced approximately 30ft apart. Took me 3yrs to plant the whole 5acres. I planted a mix of fruit and nut producing species. Some from nursery and some from seed. It will probably be another 5yrs before I get a decent crop from the trees but some of the chestnuts have already produced a few nuts. The logged area was mostly douglas fir with the occasional alder thrown in. Very poor gravelly soil. I didnt think anything would ever grow but it is lush and amazing now. The only thing I did besides the rotational grazing (moving every1-2 days during grazing season) was sparingly spread 2-50lb bags of pasture seed mix on about 2/3rds of it. I couldnt afford any more than that. I'm in western washington so no rain from basically may through end of september. All I can say are there are lots of ways you can do it. Do what works for you and your family. No matter what you will probably make mistakes but as long as your not pouring g chemicals everywhere everything g will eventually turn out right. Also give yourself time and break the project down into segments rather than tackle the whole parcel at once.
