Raised bed installation, Part 1

The bank has been cleared of the remaining brush, more roots have been pulled, rocks have been picked and raked (and yet, there are always more), and the bank is ready for phase one of the garden. 

Bonus - I found three patches of Jack-in-the-Pulpit plants that had been growing in the underbrush.  I dug them up and will replant them in the shade garden.

I ordered a bunch of raised bed kits last year, and put four of them together so far.  These cedar raised bed kits were from a website called Best Choice Products.  It's kind of an overstock-type site, and they have limited amounts of items.  I'm all about saving money, so I created an account and now earn reward points with every purchase.  Points can be used as discounts toward future purchases.  They don't always have the lowest prices, but if you time it right you can get some pretty good bargains.  These beds are 8'x2', and cost about $40 each.  Now they're at $82 each, so I did pretty well.  BCP is also part of the Rakuten network, which I also subscribe to, so I get cash back with every purchase.  And now, back to the project...

Behold!  Beds.

First I set them on the bank until I found the configuration and spacing that I wanted.  I left quite a bit of room between the beds so I can get my garden cart around them.

I then set out digging into the bank (hello pick-axe, my old friend) to level out the bed areas.  This was my original plan for the other section, but ambition is a cruel mistress and, well...blocks.  I'm now torn between using this area for veggies or for perennials.  I think for this year at least, I'll use these beds for produce.

Three of the four beds done.  Once the last one is in, I'll fill them with a mixture of the 50/50 (soil & compost) I had delivered and peat moss (to lighten the 50/50).  I have onions and scallion sets that have been patiently waiting to be planted that will go in the back beds.  Then it's on to the other beds, but that's for another post.

Welcome May!

Yes, welcome.
Let's have a snowstorm to celebrate.

*sigh*

It could have been worse.  It could have been the 6-8 inches of snow some places wound up with.  We ended up with almost 3 inches of fluffy snow, and as soon as it stopped the winds kicked up like nobody's business.  By late afternoon, there were only small patches of snow left, but it's been bitter cold.  Hey, if it kills off some of the black flies, I'm all for it!

Tractor Envy

I have a son-in-law who is, without a doubt, psychic.  It's as though he'll stop suddenly and say, "There is a strange vibration in the force...mummy-in-law needs me!" and voilà!  He appears.

Such was the case yesterday, when I began the tedious job of clipping out the bittersweet from the remaining trees.  I was only a few hours into my chore when Zac called, and within five minutes after that he pulled in with his big ol' tractor in tow.  My savior!  He easily pulled the stumps from where I had cleared, and then made short work of the remaining trees.  I didn't even have to pull the bittersweet!

Even the mules were impressed.

As a bonus, he also compacted the brush pile. 

I was definitely envious of what his tractor could do versus what Reputa can.  But I can't disparage her too much; my little tractor has saved my back more than once, so she's still worth her weight in gold to me.  *pats Reputa lovingly*

And in the end, this is what remained.

I admit, I nearly wept with joy.  In a few short hours Zac the Tractorman did what would have taken me days.  All that's left for me to do is cut the last of the briar canes and rake a bit.  It's amazing how open everything looks now!  I can't thank Zac enough.  He's a good doobie.  😊

Chainsaw Massacre

As a general rule, I'm not the sort of person who is allowed to use anything that runs off a motor, has more than two working parts, involves propane, or has a pointy end.

That being said, I just treated myself to my very first chainsaw.

It's not a massive "let's clear cut some old growth forest" saw, just a small battery operated rig.  You know, 40volts, 12" blade...this one's for the laaaadieees type of thing.  I'm happy to report after nearly two hours of attending the Rowe School of Toolmanship (thank you, Neil) I cut about ten small trees and was able to retain all my appendages.  Huzzah!

Saturday clearing, now with tree removal.

I'm getting there!  I'm leaving long stumps behind because my very kind neighbor has offered to come over and pull them with his machine.  This way I won't have to worry about them growing back.

The bittersweet vines are a different story.  That line of disturbed soil in the above photo was one long root that I managed to pull by hand.  The vines are laid out along the ground like extension cords leading to an over-lit Christmas tree, and are so entangled in the tree tops that I have to pretty much cut them all out before taking the saw to the trees for safety's sake.

most of these vines are actually rooted into the ground

you can see how thick the vines grow

bittersweet vines will actually kill trees

these are all vines that have grown throughout the tree tops

And my parting shot is one of the brush pile, which is getting a little out of hand.  I guess it's now a natural fence of sorts.  I'm thinking once the pile of topsoil has been used up and the driveway is sorted out, this area would be a nice little paddock extension for the mules.

Yessssss.  You will extend my paddock, human.  EXTENNNNND.

And I'm Off

Off in a totally different direction.  Ah yes, YADD.  Not only is this how we New Englanders pronounce the word "yard", but it also stands for yard attention deficit disorder.  I start one project, get sidetracked, and wind up with ten different projects going at once.  It's a gift, really.

We finally had a relatively warm, dry weekend on the horizon, so I thought I'd work on the tiered garden.  What ended up happening was that my string trimmer was fixed and delivered, and I was also loaned a piece of equipment that would make brush cutting child's play, so I decided to tackle the overgrown bank near the tiered gardens while I had the machine.

I absolutely detest burning brush, and I knew if I hauled brush to the dump I would have about twenty trips ahead of me, so I decided to pile the debris in an unusable corner of the property instead.  I made myself think it was fine by convincing myself the massive piles of brush wouldn't be so much of an eyesore as an exercise in eco management; brush piles create cover for small woodland creatures like chipmunks and rabbits and heffalumps and woozles.  The only problem?  In order to create an area to pile brush, I needed to clear it first.

I can't win.

So I spent a few afternoons making a space for the brush piles.  Saturday came and I began hacking away at the brambles and bittersweet along the bank.  It was a lot more work than I'd imagined.  In a four hour period I only opened up about a 15 square foot area.  But it looked fantastic, and I was spurred on.

These are the only before pictures I could find of the area I worked on.  True to form, I wouldn't be so pedestrian as to start on the END of the area, I had to start in the MIDDLE.  Of course.

And behold, the after photos.

Insanity.

I quickly discovered that the only real way to clear out the bittersweet that had enveloped every single bush, sapling, and tree was to clip it by hand, then rip and pull until about thirty feet of vine was piled at your feet.  What a mess!  Mixed in was some kind of invasive climbing rose that attacked me at every turn, and many of the saplings were young Russian Olive trees with thorns like so many tiny hypodermic needles stab, stab, stabbing.

But it looks so good.  I'm really happy with this excellent beginning, but I was exhausted, so I decided to work on something that was a little easier for a few hours - slicing down saplings.

I spent a few hours cutting and clearing, then mulching leaves with the push mower.  The goal is to clear this section to the stone wall, removing all trees under 6" in diameter.  This was a good start.

So I didn't work on walls, but I did get a lot done.  Sunday I switched gears and installed my mail box at the road, raked the waste hay from the mule paddock, and cut a few small trees on the bank. I'm motivated to keep going with the clearing project, and have put the other gardens on hold for now.

At least until something else shiny distracts me.

Give Up and Get Going

My corrected block order arrived Monday.

It was the exact same order I had refused on Saturday.

I give up.  I just want to build.  So I accepted the order and started to set my first course.  I'm only five blocks in, and it's painstakingly slow.  The base is the most important part of the build, so I need to get it right.  I'm sure I'll pull it apart and reset it six or seven times before I'm happy with it, but at least it's finally underway.

Blah, blah, blah.

My frustration is nearly palpable.  I ordered the materials for my garden project 12 days ago.  They were supposed to be delivered 9 days ago, so I could begin building last weekend.  Thanks to Coronavirus-induced overbooking because everyone and their brother decided to do home improvement projects whilst quarantined, my delivery was pushed back.  It was supposed to be here two days ago, but was delayed again.  Today the delivery finally showed up, and it was the wrong type of block.  GRRRRR.  Hopefully I'll have a corrected order Monday.

So one more weekend reserved for building has become a "what else needs doing?" query.  Oh, so much.  I decided to start clearing the bank at the head of my driveway.  It's slightly overgrown in places and Br'er Rabbit habitat in others.  To add to the fun, there is an old electric horse fence that's buried in the undergrowth.  Well, it's a good project.  I'd like to clear it out and plant my shade loving perennials under the large oaks and maples that line the upper driveway.  The Her Side(Mom's)/My Side property is bisected by a stone wall.  Here's my side, pre-attack.

Fun, fun!  My string trimmer on wheels is currently in the shop, so I'm starting by wrangling the bigger dead limbs and pulling the old fence posts.  I moved my containers down to my side because at some point I'll be setting up all my raised vegetable gardens down here, so why not just move them now?  Peas are in the large pots as usual, and radish in the white window boxes.

I didn't get an early start today thanks to a snowy morning.  Luckily it didn't amount to much, and melted by lunchtime.  Unlike a few weeks ago.

March 23rd   5:51am

March 24th   5:50am

That was a surprise.  About three days later it had melted, thankfully.  

Oh, and we've had visitors!  We've run off three porcupines and a bear is roaming the neighborhood.  He was here a few nights ago and bent one of Mom's shepherd crooks to the ground in an effort to destroy the suet feeder that was hanging from it.  The same night he hit a few of our neighbor's feeders.  Most folks have pulled their bird feeders in, but not everyone.  *eyeballs Mother*  Some people just won't pull in all of their feeders.  (I am not a feeder of feathered creatures, and it's mostly because of the other animals it attracts.  I don't appreciate bears near my mules, thankyouverymuch.)

Anyway, the brutish beast came back again last night.  Mom went out for a smoke and heard Fargo snorting and blowing, so she had me bring out the flashlight.  I did a sweep of the pasture and spotted the bear not too far from the paddock edge.  

He crashed off into the bushes once we started yelling at him.  

(Your mother was a circus poodle and your father was a Russian dancing bear!  Goldilocks reject! Go back to Build-A-Bear and finish putting your stuffing in!)

We thought we were safe from the nocturnal horror of lesser Yogi, but no such luck.  A mere three hours later I was awoken by Mom's dog barking.  I grabbed my shoes and the flashlight, and ran out on the deck furiously swinging the spotlight across the pasture.  I'd left the exterior barn light on and could see the mules clearly.  Interestingly enough, they were looking right at me.

Cue the slow-mo "Ohhhhhhhhh noooooooooooooooo!"  

I swung the spotlight to my left and 

there

he 

was.

I went into screaming banshee mode, and given my state of half dress, my insane mane of grey-white hair flying wildly about my head, the moon glinting off my yellow teeth...wait.  You get the picture.

Anyway, I had grabbed a brick off the ground as I descended the deck stairs and threw it at him as I raced across the back yard, screeching.  Stupid move, but crazy enough to send him a-runnin'.  Hopefully after that little display, he'll think twice about coming back.

Or not.  

He's a bear.

First Project of 2020!

After much hemming, hawing, plotting, research, price comparison, and sketching I've finally started my tiered garden project.  It's not going to be the grand, picturesque garden I first had in my mind.  While I had envisioned a scaled down version of the terraces of Machu Picchu, my budget and backbone have relegated me to a simpler cement block retaining wall step garden.  Oh well, so long as the plants are happy, I guess!

I've also scaled down the size, mostly due to the backbreaking chore of digging out a trench for the base.  The ground I'm working is mostly stone with a bit of dirt in it, as opposed to dirt with a few stones.  In order to dig out a trench to fill with stone for my base, I needed a pick axe.  Shovels were absolutely useless here.  Thankfully I only needed to dig down about six inches or so, but it was still a chore.

digging the trench

Digging the trench took most of the day.  The string is only there so that when people drive by they look at it and think "Oh, she knows just what she's doing.  Look at how professional!  Level and square, that's how you do it right." .  I admit, it did help keep my trench somewhat straight, but I really have no idea what I'm doing.

 

You can see the rubble I took out of the trench to the left in the above photo.  Most of it was rotten ledge rock and granite that thankfully split apart on impact.  There were a few goober rocks that I just couldn't dig out, so they stayed.

I had 5 yards of stone delivered to use as a base for the wall, and it should provide good drainage.  I don't know yet if I'll need all of it, but I'm sure I'll find a place to lose any leftovers.

Step 1 (mostly) done!  I do still need to dig and level for the side walls, but this was all I could manage for today; I'm woefully out of shape.  I'm hoping to get the sides prepped tomorrow and order the blocks.  With any luck I'll have a garden ready in for my perennials in a few weeks!

Two of Six

We've had between two and six deer yarded up in the area this winter. Usually it's a herd of four; two adult does with this year's young, but at times all six will wander through the pasture. They've been loving the low snow pack that's been allowing them to forage for acorns under the big oaks. The one to the left fascinates me with its color - I don't know that I've ever seen such a dark colored deer before. At dusk she almost looks black against the snowy backdrop.

Guilty admission: I refer to this herd as "All the Single Ladies".  When I see them I always sing that song to them, and the sound is so horrific to their ears that they scatter immediately.  If ya like it then you shoulda put a buck on it...heh heh heh.

Happy New Year!

A new year, a new decade!  Everyone is talking about resolutions today.  I hate resolutions.  I never follow through with them, mostly because I've always gone with the typical self improvement-type goals.  Lose weight, exercise, save money, blah, blah, blah...never gonna happen.  I love food, I hate regimented exercise, and I've never met a bargain I could resist.  That said, I've decided on a resolution that is attainable for me - my tiered garden project.

So here is the space before.  It's a small slope from the main yard down to the barn area.  The house well sits at the top, so we needed to clear this area to put in a water line from the well to the new barn.  No, we didn't actually clear it, that took a machine!

 

The water line was started at the hydrant in the new barn, then a trench was dug toward the existing well.

Once the water line reached the well, the plumber connected it and the area was back filled.  You can see how bony this land really is!  This is the base for my tiered gardens?  Boy, do I have my work cut out for me.

I asked the excavator if he could possibly create shelves in the dirt using his bucket by driving it down into the dirt and dragging the material outward.  He didn't want to do that because of the water line; even though it's four feet underground, the dirt covering it is needed as a protective layering.  Instead, he took some of the topsoil that had been graded off the barn site and dumped it in rows on the bank.  What a perfect solution!

Because I was preoccupied with finishing the barn, I didn't get to work on this area before everything started to freeze up.  In the spring, I'll rake the piles into "shelves" and set up my raised beds.  This will be primarily for my perennials, so I need to make a list of my plants and plot out the beds.  I hope to incorporate the old cast iron bathtub that spent most of its life as a hay trough for the horses and give it a new purpose as a funky raised bed.  I'm thinking of actually building it into the bank somewhere.  I also need to decide how best to brace the topsoil so it doesn't wash away down the bank.  I could use the abundance of stones that are on hand to build retaining walls for each bank, but dry laid stonework on that scale seems daunting.  I'll be researching the easiest, most inexpensive option in the meantime.  Spring needs to hurry up and get here!