Storms felled two large walnut trees on my property and I'm now on track to have them milled late next week - next Thursday, to be exact.

One came down in April in a storm, but retained a connection to the ground through some roots that were not severed ... until I cut it all apart about two weeks ago. I now have the bulk of the trunk in three large logs sitting at the edge of our woods waiting for the sawyer.

Another tree came down several years ago and has been resting on its side (but elevated from the ground by the root ball on one end and the crown on the other) and I have likewise severed it into three large logs for milling.

All of these now rest on the lawn next to my driveway waiting to be milled in about 10 days.

We have a fairly wet period coming over the next 3-5 days. I anticipate we'll receive a couple of inches of rain and generally speaking, each of the next few days will be muggy and damp consistently--the air, the ground, etc...

So my question is this: Ahead of the sawyer arriving with his portable mill at my place next Thursday, should I be covering these logs with a tarp or otherwise protecting them from the rain, or does it not matter? On one hand, I feel like the bark will get saturated and the ground beneath the logs will too (inviting bugs?) but on the other hand, these trees have withstood everything nature has thrown at them for decades, so what's another few days of moisture? (although they were alive then, and admittedly that makes a difference in how they handle exposure to external moisture!).

I'm probably overthinking all of this, but any input is welcome. I'm looking forward to getting a few hundred board feet of my own walnut out of this - my first milling experience.