Month: March 2026

Getting ready for water

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Despite the fact that we got almost a 1/3” of rain this weekend it is time to start thinking about irrigation. We have a well pump with a conversion to pull surface water ready to go, I just need to get the water storage area ready. Years ago we learned that there is hole in the earthen dam. So I went up there on Sunday and dug down until I hit water. My plan is to fill the entire hole with concrete. The dam doesn’t leak until the water backs up about a foot higher than it is now. I had to find the power cables to the pump first to ensure I did not get popped by 220V of electricity. I also noticed that there is a lot of silt buildup in the throat of this channel. I will need to crawl down there with a shovel and get it all out so it doesn’t get sucked up into the pump and clog our sprinklers.

While I was doing this I heard our Border Terrier, Milo barking. He was supposed to be in the front yard of the house and I was 100 + yards away. He had gotten out through the garden gate, it was open then he found a hole in the orchard fence. I am not sure where the hole is located but he was out and causing chaos. I called him over and he was covered in mud and water. He had been down in the creek and crawling through the mud. I told him to lay down and went back to sticking my head in the hole to get to the bottom. At some point, within a couple of minutes, he was gone again. I heard him raising Cain and had to go over and call him off the blackberry bush. He had something trapped inside and was unable to get to it. He has a serious hate for raccoons and he was pretty agitated but came over wagging his tail. He had blood all over his left ear. The dummy had scratched himself on the bush! He ended up going to Grandma’s house for a spa day.

I decided to spend a few hours focused on the rock wall. It is paying off but now it is getting much harder. I am having to move a lot of dirt and dig down a couple of feet by hand. I wanted to keep the wall straight so I strung up a string line so it would not bow as bad as last time. I do want to redo it a third time! In about two more feet of wall I will have to take down the metal fence and then go pick more rocks off of the hillside. I will have used up all the rocks within reach.

I have decided to take up another hobby. I am going to try and grow some Bonsai trees. I realize they are slow going but I have 20+ years so I am going to give it a go. I have my first one started and will be looking for some more. I have some seeds to start my own trees from scratch. It will be an interesting endeavor.

Spring is here

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I managed to get the first wave of weed spraying completed on Friday. I have done every fence line but the one down by the schoolhouse. Now we wait 7-12 days to see what happens. It is the only real downside to using Roundup, there is no instant gratification when you drive by a few hours later. I was able to get done by 1400 and it didn’t start to rain until after midnight. In a week or two I will need to set the sprayer up to start laying down 2-4-D and Milestone to get ahead of the thistles. We have been battling various types of thistle since we returned. There are four different kinds of thistle present on our property.

Saturday first thing I helped unload concrete from the progeny’s house. My contribution was driving the tractors! I got both tractors and as I dumped one the Gingerman loaded the other one. It was pretty quick to unload six buckets of concrete. I have been using it to stabilize the embankment. After those two horrible floods our bank got seriously eroded. We just built the dirt back over the culvert and now something was needed to keep it in place. So I have been systematically alternating dumping on each side to widen the coverage along the embankment. It doesn’t look the best but it is a lot safer now crossing in that area. It was getting too soft to cross with the pickup. Now I would feel confident that the pickup would not just slide down the embankment. It is deep and steep enough that getting the pickup out uninjured might not be possible.

We are still feeding the cows. They are supposed to have babies in April so as they transition over to green grass I want to keep them full of nutrients. The sheep are going up and eating the grass every day. They put themselves up in the barn every night. If the weather is nice they sit right outside the barn on the small hill. This makes it very easy for us as we don’t have to do anything with them now. I will need to go out and count lambs again eventually before we move them anywhere.

It is just past the middle of March and the trees are starting to bloom, one is an apricot and the other is a peach I think. I was out adding gravel and fresh compost to the blueberry bins. Annmarie tested the sheep compost piles for me this weekend to see if I can use them for filler. Nope, they are smoking hot and filled with a bunch of nitrogen. So much that not a single weed will grow on the piles. I am going to have to get the manure spreader up and running so I can spread it out this year and not pay for fertilizer. Fertilizer is very expensive currently. I did order diesel for the farm but it’s over $5.75/gallon at the pump currently so I have no idea what it will cost. I figured I just better get it done now and when it needs it in August/September again maybe the price will be lower. I have to have the 150 gallon tank filled twice annually. It is only used for the two tractors.

I took a couple of hours on Friday and Saturday to work on the rock wall. I am starting to make progress and want to get it done so we can start planting bulbs on the left side and getting ready to place the new small metal fence on top of the wall. I am finally starting to see a difference. It took a lot of work to get there. My exercise plan is working!

Winter duties completed as spring arrives

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Mr Rainman came out last weekend to help out and on Sunday I decided that the we should actually finish the last of the winter duties since spring is here. We tore the bird netting off of the raspberries and tame blackberries. The berries had thoroughly integrated themselves into the netting, it just had to be cut away and rolled off the top. The berries needed to be trimmed anyways. So we hacked out everything in between the rows then started to trim them back. Removing the dead out first always makes it easier. A few of the raspberries have migrated over into the blackberry row. We cut some out but others just got left.

The netting did its job and kept the birds out so we could actually collect a crop. It’s the raspberries that the robins love. As soon as they start to turn colors the birds eat them without the netting we get none. It was not fun to remove but the year before we did not get any berries so it is worth the hassle. I learned to cut the raspberries short and tie them to a central wire. It helps control them and makes it easier to pick. After talking to Mr Rainman everyone treats their raspberries differently. I had no idea, I learned from my father so that is what I do. I do use sisal or cotton cord so it can just rot on the ground afterwards. It makes cleaning up easier.

Annmarie went out and checked on the bees again. They survived the winter! We have one hive only right now. We are buying another nuc the first of May. We had some moisture get into the hive over the winter and this is a bad thing. I am going to install a gutter on the back of the bee enclosure to keep the wind from blowing water from roof into it. I am also going to cover the back. We have been talking about a tarp but I am afraid the wind may tear it up. I am still thinking about what to use. I have some old tin that with four support boards I could just install along the back wall. I am also trying to be a cheapskate and use stuff we already have on the farm. I am hopeful we will get some honey this year. She did not get stung and the bees got sprinkled with freshly made powdered sugar and another chemical treatment for mites. The sugar helps the bees shed the mites which fall through the mesh bottom then the chemical knocks down the rest. It is an eternal battle.

Our bulbs are starting to come out of the ground and are now blooming. If we don’t get rain soon I am going to have to hand water the flowers to make sure they get enough water. Also we now have six of the big bushy roses planted alongside the side fence. In three years they should totally obscure the fence.

I want blueberries next and someone in Pendleton is offering 10+year old plants for $120/each. The price of a pack of blueberries in the grocery store is $8/ea. It will not take long to save money on owning our own plants. I have four 3 foot metal troughs set up in the orchard on the other side of the berries. I drilled holes in the bottom so they can drain and have filled the bottom with four inches of gravel. I am hopeful that I can get the plants next week and get them into the troughs. We really like container gardening. Not having to get on your knees and bending over all the time is wonderful and as we age it is even more wonderful!

The strawberries are trying to take over their container. I just started grabbing dead leaves and pulling. I figured as prolific as they grew last year they would have no trouble filling in again this year. The bamboo poles are where our asparagus plants are located in the bed. I bought a few more metal troughs at an auction last year and am going to create an asparagus only bin. We read that you could overgrow the asparagus with strawberries but the type we were given (free) are super aggressive and just grew like weeds. It was hard to find the asparagus. This should be our first year that we can harvest asparagus if it grows. Hence the reason for asparagus only bin, it will be obvious and we can fill it up with plants to get a nice crop from. I have a 12 foot circular bin! I cut the bottom of the bin off, it was rusted through, so the plants can go down further into the soil if they want. They have to be planted 18” deep to begin with so I figured growing down another 18” would be easy for them.

The horseradish that was given to me last year survived the winter. I planted it in the ground, away from the sheep and it is just now starting to peek out of the ground. I will dig some up in the fall and see how it tastes. I am told that fresh horseradish is amazing.

Greenhouse project started

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Friday was a solid day on the farm. Mr Rainman came out to help this weekend and we were able to work on the base of the greenhouse. This took about three hours to level and set. We filled the middle with gravel and there are four earth anchors screwed into the ground almost three feet. I tried to find bolts anywhere on the farm that were long enough to go through the anchor and into the frame. No go, I had to run to town to get four eight inch 1/2” bolts with washer and nut cost $6/each! We were going to turn the greenhouse more toward the South but due to trying to protect the door from wind we went with this orientation. The greenhouse door will be on the old house side of this foundation. It was time to get the greenhouse up as we have had it in a box for several years.

Once we had that base done, we started to haul dirt to cover the culvert crossing. The dirt has been flushed away several years ago and I had not corrected it yet. So we hauled over a few yards of dirt and flattened it out with the tractors. This should make the crossing much easier now.

Mr Rainman drove out a large bale of hay out to the momma cows. We still have the last calves in the orchard. They still hide as far from us as they can in the orchard. They do walk around even if we are outside but they are still crazy.

I decided to work on the tractor gun mount. Mr Rainman pointed out that the tractor had two bolts on the roll bar and I could just bolt the support up instead of welding it to the bucket arms. It was going to be in the way visually if I mounted it to bucket arms. It was a great idea so I went with it. I cut the channel iron to the correct length, then proceeded to clean up the metal with a grinder.

As I was grinding on the rifle rack my wire wheel kicked back and sucked up my pants! I let off the trigger as soon as I realized it but the damage was done to my pants. I ended up with a couple of small superficial scratches from the wheel. Pretty good.

I painted it, then mounted eyebolts on the ends. I figured I am always trying to hang more stuff off the tractor since I don’t have a tool box that is very big and the eye hooks will let me hang a bag or just clip stuff onto the rack. I mounted the locking arms and then tried to bolt it onto the tractor. I was off by 1/4” on one of my holes and had to scoot the hole over. This is much harder in a piece of steel than it is in wood! I got it all done and now just need to use a piece of closed cell foam cut to the barrel shape to keep the front of the rifle from bouncing around. I ordered non lubricated condoms so I can cover the barrel opening with a condom and a rubber band. I am ready for predators now! I might have to put in some practice since I only get one shot! I wanted minimal parts and movement that could get mucked up from all of the dust, dirt and rain.

We had some friends bring out 16 laying hens. They are getting out of the chicken raising gig. I had to go out after dark, find them and toss them all into the chicken coop. They were all roosting outside the coop on the fence by the old house. Chickens are not that bright. The nice thing is their chickens are used to people and being handled so they are super tame compared to mine. I hope this does not make them easier food for the predators. We now have 24 hens.

Daylight savings time is the worst

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Another weekend has passed and I did actually work on the bathroom. I had to get the two movable shelves ready. I needed to put 1/4” trim on the front edge. Of course, the boards I had already cut and sanded were too big. I had to remeasure and recut to get them to fit. I no longer trust a tape measure, after I cut them they go inside the house to get a dry fit to ensure they are the correct size. Somewhere in the old house I had some oak trim. It took a bit of digging around to find it. I had ordered some new 24” wood clamps so I was able to glue the trim in place without any difficulty. Once it has dried I will unclamp it and sand it all again until it is shiny and pretty.

The butcher came through and now everyone has all of their meat cut, wrapped and in their freezers. We don’t have to go to any sale or sort animals for a few more months. We are still feeding the sheep and cows but the grass is turning pretty green and all of the animals are consuming about 75% of their nutrients from the fresh grass. I will need to feed the momma cows again this upcoming weekend. They are supposed to have calves in April so they need to eat as much as they want.

The chickens are slacking off again. We are only getting three eggs per day. I think I have too many roosters and they are stressing the hens. I may have to thin them out again.

I have been pretty diligent about putting in at least 30 minutes of rock wall time in the evenings after work. The new wall is large enough now to see the difference. Shoveling is way better than Yoga. Plus, I get exercise and something productive happens. Annmarie tells me that once I finish the rock wall out front I have two more in the back of the house that need to be finished. I really need to get the back bridge blocks laid down. This will involve more shoveling and then laying four inch thick concrete blocks down.

I really want to get the greenhouse up this upcoming weekend but the forecast is calling for rain. We need the rain but I am unsure why it cannot come during the week so I can work outside on the weekends. If the rain is not bad we need to trim the raspberries and blackberries still. Once those are done then we can work on the greenhouse. At least that is the plan. If the rain is heavy we will work on repairing the cultivator for the little tractor. It needs some teeth replaced and the bolts are very hard to reach. Mr Rainman is coming out to help me over the weekend.

We did some adulting and got rid of our mismatched futon from the living room and now have a recliner that matches the couch and loveseat. We should have done it years ago! I love the recliner and surprisingly I sleep less in the recliner than I did in the loveseat. I am unsure why as the recliner is much more comfortable.

Annmarie had me go out and check on the bees. I had plans on opening up the hive but there were bees everywhere! I had not dressed up in a bee suit and it is the first of the year. I need to get comfortable around the bees again before I brave them without any protection. They are bringing in pollen but we are unsure where they are collecting it. There have been no bees on the flowers blooming in our front yard.