Month: April 2019

Fence till it rains

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Every year I think I am going to get the lawn mowed before it gets out of control. Every year in the spring I get distracted fencing and then it rains repeatedly and the grass gets out of control.  I keep thinking the mower will magically be able to slice through 12 inches of wet heavy grass and it won’t.  So every year I come to the same conclusion, use Mother Nature and I turn the sheep loose in the front yard.  The only real drawback to this is going to the cars is like walking through a poop minefield.  It takes two weekends to get the entire yard eaten down.  During the week we cannot let the sheep in the yard unsupervised as the dogs would have a hay day.  
Mowing the lawn!
Tex and I moved all the leftover metal panels down by the spring. I want to install a gate on top of the culvert and still allow animals access to water. So we gave them 16 feet of water frontage so they can go down to water. Every time we fence this we try and let them get to water as the spring never dries out and never freezes. We used the tractor to move the panels around. Hopefully, we can get the posts set for the gate today. The weather just needs to hold out.

Panels moved for new fenced area

 We managed to get the entire momma/baby area fence torn out and reinstalled. I brought the tractor in and we leveled the entire area, reset two posts, fixed a couple of H-braces and restrung the fence. It looks great and now the dry flower area is completely protected.


Momma baby area fence reworked
There is a black walnut tree in the corner of the flower bed. I am hoping it is still alive. It has survived for the last five years even though it gets eaten down to the ground every year. If its still alive then this is its year as nothing can get to it to nibble it down to the ground.
Dry flower area fenced in
I wanted to keep fencing and get that gate in but Mother Nature did not get the memo. By lunch time it was pouring down rain and we had to go inside. Tex and I had Tamales for lunch, they were good but I made salsa Fresca with Serrano Chile’s and it was smoking hot, almost too much. I should have stuck with Jalepenos but the Serranos were on sale!

Upstairs bathroom insulating ducts

We switched to installing insulation and attempting to finish up the framing in the bathroom. We have about five more boards to install so we can sandwich insulation around the horizontal duct. Once that last little bit of framing is done we will start getting the plywood up and cover all the insulation. My hope is that with this insulation we will get hotter air downstairs. This next winter will be the test. Annmarie and I are still trying to come to an agreement on what type of ceramic tile to put on the floor. She wants the same thing that we used downstairs. I want a tile no bigger than 8×8 inches. That size will be easier to install if the floor is not level, which I am sure it is not.

Dug out again

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When I went to work Wednesday morning I knew the back creek was overflowing. Our front ditch was muddy and four times its normal size. Unfortunately, I had to go to work and could not just stop what I was doing and go up and unblock the jam. So after work I went to the hardware store and picked up a portable handsaw and a pitchfork that has the tines bent 90 degrees. I figured that would work better than a metal rake at getting stuff out of the creek.

I texted Tex to see if he was available but he had homework. Again, you gotta like a guy with priorities. I made a second change, I put on my chest waders! I even remembered to but a belt on the outside of the waders above my waist to prevent water from getting in rapidly and weighing me down. It’s a safety feature that I figured was important since I was working alone. I also got a pair of rubber impregnated gloves that would dry out fast after I was done. I loaded it all up in the pickup and drove to the upper end. No sense in trudging through the mud the entire distance.

The chest waders were a game changer! I finally just waded into the water and started to pull the piles apart with my gloved hands. I was in water up to my stomach. I made sure to stand on the upriver side of the mass so if it broke loose it would not take me downstream. I spent an hour and managed to tear the large blockage in half. Unfortunately, a tree in the stream bed is the reason for the blockage and there is no fix for that in belly high water. I did manage to lower the water level by about 6 inches in that spot which stopped the water from spilling over the sides. So I was successful and did not have to spend all day. It was a pleasant surprise.

The fields are getting water logged but seem to be recovering except for the growing mud spot. I really need to dig out the irrigation ditch as I believe it could catch the overflow, and run it along side the field then dump back into the stream lower down. Unfortunately, there is no way to get any type of powered equipment into the fields currently. On Wednesday I waited for delivery of the new Power Harrow and seeder. It came on a semi-truck. I was supposed to be available for delivery from 1100-1500. I was home by 1115. The delivery driver called me and then dropped off the pallet at 1445. It was prior to the 1500 deadline. I watched a movie and some bad anime waiting for him to show up. I had to run back to work and got back late. I fully expected to be able to back up the tractor to the pallet, using the quick hitch just hook on and go. I don’t know what I was thinking or why I thought easy was going to work. The attachments do not line up with my quick hitch. I had to remove the quick hitch, extend the tension on the rods and hook it all up. Then I could not lift it off the pallets as my adjustable bar needed to be tightened. This takes a stiff rod poked through a hole. I have misplaced my large screwdriver and every piece of metal I stuffed through the hole bent. I fought and swore and had the harrow in the machine shop 1.5 hours later. I moved the thing 30 feet. I read the very thin manual that came with it and learned nothing from it. I had the electronic copies sent to my email and still need to read them. I need to get this thing up and running in the next 2 weeks. If only the weather will cooperate.

New Power Harrow

No schematics necessary

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Tex and I started in on the fencing today with the intention of making great progress. I grabbed a roll of smooth wire and a bucket of gravel with the tractor and headed back to the job site. I started down the path to the bridge on the tractor but I only had the auger on the back of the tractor for counter weight. Next thing I know I am on two wheels of the opposing sides. I dumped the bucket quickly, dropped the wire into the water and managed to get the tractor to fall back onto all four tires. I dumped the gravel off where Tex was working and proceeded to go back and tear into the hillside. My previous path was not level and led me to almost tip sideways. I made sure to keep at it until I had a nice path that was safe to go up and down in the tractor on.

Meathead is going to start helping me so I also created a flat spot up on the hill and we are going to fill it with 200+# rocks. Again I am hoping to keep some dirt on the hillside so we can get some vegetation to grow. I also started digging a trench under the eaves of the roof. Unfortunately, I cannot dig very deep as there is a rock ledge just under the soil. I still managed to get 6-10 inches dug out and now need to fill it with gravel.

Tex managed to get all the posts set in gravel before lunch time. Now we need to make the H braces and start putting up wire. A rain storm started to go through so we called it lunch time. I don’t think Tex would have stopped for a “little bit of rain”. We don’t have rain like Texas.

We got the boards across the spring and just need to start hanging panels. The new crossing does it in a place in the spring where the water bottom is gravel. The old crossing has a 1.5 foot hole running through it. We wanted to avoid trying to block off the hole from sheep.

We added a new gate into the momma area. The sheep always ball up at this end of the pen so we added a gate to allow them to easily leave. I think it will be very helpful to getting them in and out of the barn and sorted. Today we installed one railroad tie, I hung the gate then Tex installed the second post to allow for a good tight fitting gate. This worked very well both times we installed gates today’s.

I found this laying on the ground, protected from predators. I drilled a hole in it and mounted it on the fence. Hopefully, we find the rest of the heads floating around will get them mounted also.

Tex is all ready to go in the morning. We knocked off early so I could spend some time with Annmarie today.

Surprise Lambs!

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I decided after last weekend that I needed to stay ahead of Tex. So every evening this week I went out and moved rocks for an hour. I tossed the rocks over fence so Tex could build a series of rock retaining ledges. I knew I was going to have to work Thursday night so he would need materials prestaged for Friday.

I spent Thursday morning getting more rocks and decided to clean up the Y gate area myself. I have been wanting to do this project for a couple of years but I thought it would take me a day or better to complete. In reality I had it all done in three hours! I managed to find a 600+# rock to anchor one side of the railroad tie. This meant I did not have to try and drive any pipe into the ground. The bigger rocks are actually easier to get with the tractor as they have enough mass to allow you to push them around and manipulate them into the tractor bucket.

It turned out very nice and now the lambs won’t have to work so hard to get up into the barn. As an added side effect the Y gate is easier to move and has a little more clearance. I keep hoping I can get some sort of plant to grow in this back lot, but so far I have had no luck getting anything to grow. I have started to move more soil around and create some retention walls in the hopes that I can get about a foot of soil to stay in place. Once the soil stays I will then try and find something that will sprout and grow fast in the spring then die off in the summer.

Annmarie went out Wednesday morning to let the sheep out of the barn and discovered that one of the yearling ewes had twins! She was surprised at that mother was not on the list of suspected ewes pending birth. She got the momma and both lambs into the momma baby area before I got home. They look good and one of them is a screamer.

When I went to bed Thursday I had rocks piled up and ready for Tex. Some of them ended up in the spring, but most stayed on the hillside. The goal is to create a series of small rock walls then back fill the walls with dirt so I end up with several 1-3 foot wide level areas along the hillside. Once the rocks are in place I will start in on moving some dirt. I am going to use the dirt over by the old blacksmith shop. This serves two purposes, it gets me dirt for the flowerbeds and it lets us sort through the dirt for interesting metal pieces from the blacksmith area. My only real concern is getting a flat on the tractor.

Thursday evening when I went out to feed I checked on the new lambs and one of them was not sitting up. It was all limp so I took it over to the front yard gate and set it in the sun till I was done feeding the cows. Annmarie came home about 5 minutes later and took it inside and started warming it up and feeding it. She had me bring in the selenium paste so she could feed it a supplement and she kept giving it a bottle. It was doing better by the time it got picked up but not great. The other lamb is doing fantastic. It’s hard for first time young ewes to raise twins.

Friday morning, after working all night, I came home to find Tex hard at it. Annmarie had him do the morning chores then I texted him to move more rocks, he dug out a channel for the culvert in the upper barn lot also. I need to go buy one of those culvert joining pieces so I can create a 20 foot piece instead of two 10 foot pieces. But I need to measure it first as I am not sure if it’s 24″ or 20″.

We marked out the spot for all the posts and got the auger mounted on the tractor. I went to bed while Tex kept at it. I did give him a sack lunch with cheese, meat, fruit, tortillas, water and a soda for lunch. Annmarie tells me that is not lunch but I eat that all the time for lunch! I didn’t get any complaints from Tex.

When I woke up I went out and surveyed his work. The rock walls look great! We just need to get some dirt on the hillside now so we can create the flat areas for the flowers. I am super excited to get this done as I like random wildflower beds.

We then finished drilling all the holes in the ground with the tractor. Sometimes the clay makes the auger just sit on the surface and not cut through. So I had Tex use the hand post hole digger to create a small hole in the middle and then I could power through with the tractor auger. This got us all the holes except for the two down by the water. Those required the use of a shovel and a breaker bar. The hole ended up being pretty big after digging out all the big rocks we found embedded in the hillside.

It’s supposed to rain this weekend. The grass looks amazing and we will be letting the sheep up onto the back hillside. They are keeping the upper pasture all eaten down.

Watered flower area almost done

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Tex came out again today, the guy is a glutton for punishment, my favorite kind of worker. He started to put up wire on the fence posts and I continued picking up rocks for the spring edging. Every time I went out to the rock pile I spent a little time dragging the ground with the box blade to catch rocks and miscellaneous debris. I would like to be able to mow it with the tractor if needed but since I have not gone over the ground its not safe. I have ruined two blades on the tractor mower already. I have also had to have the mower welded on and beat back into shape. I am trying to be more cautious now.

I managed to get most of the rocks off of the main portion of the skiff of land. I went here because there were lots of rocks. There are a lot less rocks now after two days of hauling them off. I have managed to snag most of the very large rocks. I need about 20 more 200# + rocks. They stay in place when you put them in the dirt when they weigh that much. Our largest one we set was around 600#+. My tractor will only lift 800# so it makes it pretty easy to estimate how much a rock weighs.

As I was finishing up and dragging the ground smooth I spotted a small piece of metal. I hit it with the box blade and this 80# chunk of grated iron came loose from the ground. This thing would have eaten my mower for lunch! I am going to figure out a place to use this I am just not sure where. I was thinking it could go outside one of my sliding barn doors as it has sides and a grate to prevent it from holding water. It’s a thought I may have to pursue. I want to get the aluminum pipe moved over here for storage. Any animal that steps on it makes a dent. If I store it outside of the animal area then no one can step on it. It can stay there indefinitely if needed.

We have 3-4 barn cats that we know of and this one is the only one we see on a daily basis. She wants attention all the time but after biting Annmarie we don’t reach down and pet her. Annmarie was on antibiotics for a week. The cats are doing their job as we have not seen a single mouse in the barn this winter. We are hanging our extra gates on the walls and it makes the window look weird.

I used to be able to ignore my stomach and keep working straight through until dinner time but that is not the case any more. I made Tuna surprise for Tex and I for lunch. Tuna, noodles, can of cream of mushroom soup, some onions and a can of peas. It is the bomb, I almost never make it as Annmarie doesn’t like tuna and it makes a bunch.

Tex appreciated my culinary prowess. We got our side of the fence all completed! I got both gates installed with a few little quirks and after some added wood the gaps were small enough to keep the sheep inside. I always forget how long it takes to hang a gate or door. Its far longer than you think it should be. We got the bottom row of rocks down by the spring all put in place. We have started another row of rocks about a 1/3 of the way from the top. My hope is it will help keep the elevated rock walls from sliding. We put in a bunch of T-posts next to the rock wall to see if it is actually moving. I even went so far as to cut most of the posts off at the fence height on the horse enclosure. I got Annmarie to agree to let me use the old mailboxes as bird houses. I am going to split them into two or three compartments and drill holes in the mailboxes. I could maybe even do four depending on the size of the box. We have several old mailboxes lying around. I want to mount these on top of the railroad ties. I kept the old 12 foot 4×4 that used to hold the power cables in the air to the barn. I am thinking I could build two bat houses and mount them to the pole and bolt it to one of the posts on the rock cribs. The bat house idea is going to have to wait.

We managed to get woven wire up near the barn but not four strands of smooth wire. We ran out of time. We need more rocks for the second rock wall. I may try and get a couple of loads every night after work so this upcoming weekend Tex and I can just dig in instead of waiting for me to haul them in.

We are going to finish that flower enclosure then set up the sprinklers on our front hillside. That is were the water for this flower enclosure is going to come. I don’t want to plant flower seeds until we have water or else it’s going to rain on a consistent basis.

Tex doesn’t wear gloves much. I went up to him today and pointed out that he was bleeding from a cut on his hand. He looked down, surprised that he was cut, and then just shrugged it off and went back to work. I already checked with his mother and he is current on his tetanus shot.