I had another friend stop by with a drawing knife to help debark the log. There is much dead material under the bark as well. He removed the bark I could not get off by hand, and gently scraped the log. I’d never seen it done before. I followed with a stiff brush to move the remaining dirt and debris.
Then, on advice, I used a wood sanding bit on my grinder to work the branch ends down to both a reasonable depth to match the house, and to keep them nicely smooth yet fully intact.
It is now a fine looking log, ready to be installed. That should happen tomorrow. There is a crew coming, and I shall be there grunt for the day, but I do plan to take pictures during the repair.
A tree from the ranch, milled on the ranch, and helped tune on the ranch. It is a special log we are inserting to stabilize the wall. A log of friends, manual labor, and memories.