February 9, 2013 The ART gets installed...OOOOOO...the shivers.

Decided on a location for the 'art piece.' The problem is getting it balanced. I used some of the old rebar to hold it up. Eh, it gets the job done; I know that I'll have to improve it.

 All of those lines were a pain to get into place. Turns out, only one line had a vine wrapping around it. The rest were just resting in place with pressure from the tape keeping them from moving. Once I removed the tape, it was as if they had lives of their own.

I was driving to get some supplies and drove past a dead cat in the neighborhood. It made me sad to see it dead. But nothing could be done about that. I am NOT going to explore THOSE experiments again...joking. Anyway, I simply didn't want its life to be so wasted and decided to bury him in the garden. Let his body give back to the earth. I, also, decided to do it under the art piece. It's the only area that I firmly believe that I will not have to re-dig in the near future.

 Now to layer the surface with newspaper to hold down on weeds and grasses.

Standing next to it for scale.

Outstanding, the water is pooling just as I had hoped. That means that the water is infiltrating into the soil rather than running off.

The wind knocked over a bunch of my garlic chive seeds. I can still save them, so it's not a waste. But what a pain.

Suburban Hermit of Fayetteville, signing off.

February 8, 2013

Going to start with some more reference panoramas. 

If you look closely at the dirt compared to the hugel mound, you will be able to see how smooth the dirt has become and see the grass roots on the mound. As the roots and dirt dried out, pulling a steel rake through the dirt and separating the roots was a breeze. If anything, it was too easy. The rake kept clogging up after only a few strokes. Honestly, I'm not complaining. Once those roots get covered, they will simply become compost...I hope. 

 Don't think that I mentioned it, but I was driving back from picking up a load of rabbit manure when I passed a dumpster full of construction wood. Had to stop, of course. The site supervisor was happy for me to take anything from the dumpster AND he offered all of the plywood pictured to the right. Absolutely nothing wrong with it except some screws. One man's trash...as the saying goes.

 I've completely trenched the pond. Looks like a giant bathtub now.

 I can't wait to get this covered in plants or mulch. The volume of sand that I track into the house is astonishing. If my grandmother were alive, I would never hear the end of it. 

The broccoli bolted.

 I really like the flowers. I'm going to leave them alone; the bees seem to like them.

 The radishes just keep kicking. 

 My hand barely wraps the diameter.

 Can I tell you, kale LOVES North Carolina.

 My experiments with carrot tops left over from my juicing. Okay, here was my mental dilemma about carrots. If a person is a seed saver, how would he know which carrots to let go to seed? If you pull up the carrot, you may find out that it's a beautiful one-of-kind root, but now it's useless. It's a Catch-22...or is it? Here's how it's done. Pull up the carrot, decide if it's good genetic stock, remove the greens, cut off the top and replant it. The portion that you replant will NOT grow another tap root, but it will send out roots and regrow the greens, which will eventually set out seeds.

 I like doing this just for the greenery. Once everything is nicely layered in soil, I might do this just to have greens in the winter. Carrot greens are excellent for juicing. I wonder how many times the greens can be completely removed and still grow back. Will have to plan an experiment.

 Those onions are still chugging along.

 I cut the bottom off of some celery and planted it. This is a very successful technique. 

 I'm shocked by the root mass. This makes me wonder just how much we humans restrict plant growth by growing them in pots. Or, conversely, just how much roots can spread from a single plant. Honestly, that's a impressive amount of roots from just a stump cutting.

Finally put down some urbanite leading into the graden. I really like the results, considering that this is simply broken up concrete.

Some of the treasures I found in the garden. Still finding chunks of fiberglass sheeting.

 Who is old enough to remember these? I sure am.

Holy crap, look at the reinforcing wire to the right. You can't imagine the nightmare those things are.

Suburban Hermit of Fayetteville, signing off.

February 5, 2013 More pond work and a raised bed by lowering a path.

This shot is just a reference pano. Mainly, it shows the refilled stump hole. That wasn't pleasant. 

The work is slow and painful. Have to get away from it now and then. 

 The pond's rubble pile so far.

So I decided that I wanted some type of raised bed. Seems to be all the rage, and I wanted on-board that band wagon. But instead of raising the bed, I decided to lower the path. And what better spot than the garden that had risen over the years. Logically, it makes sense since I'm just lowering the path to the original surface plane.

I found this...this. Had to ask my grandfather about it. It's a rain gutter turned upside down to cover a waterline that he had installed; it terminates behind the storage shed into a sink used for cleaning fish. The gutter covering was protection from his tiller tines.

 Now, what to do with all of that dirt.

Suburban Hermit of Fayetteville, signing off.

February 3, 2013 Reference photos and some pond work.

Posting some pano reference pictures. I do this periodically just to show the progress.

This piece of hell was anchoring the end of the bridge's footer. I don't know how long it is, but it doesn't want to budge.

 The little bit of work that I got done today involved digging out the trench around the pond. Again, note the depth. FYI, I'm NOT bending at the knees. In fact, there isn't any room to bend.

Suburban Hermit of Fayetteville, signing off.