Adventures In Homesteading (Day 49-51)

Hello Everyone!

More naps gone awry, So many earthwork projects, Developing the seep, Cold water in a deep hole & The berming never ends!

Alright, I am a few hours ahead of schedule today with my writing routine... and yup... I am two days late to boot! That same thing happened to me like before... where I have been wearing myself out early in the day... then the rain blows in... and my late day nap turns into an all night sleep.

Missing my mark with the writing has not been all that big of deal... and there have been plenty of times that I could have crawled out of the tent during the wee hours of the morning... or during the rain... but whoa it seems like my 'scheduled time' keeps getting eclipsed by my sleep. It happening twice now... for a two day period each time... makes me suspicious that it has already become a pattern... but I have also been eating as much as I can (to replace used calories) which probably has a lot to do with all the snoozing.

That dry spell that we had finally broke... and it has been raining almost every day and sometimes twice a day. The rain has been really helpful so that I see how all my various spring development sites are developing... and surprisingly enough there was still a bunch of water in the test site below the temporary dog yard in the big gulch.

The last several days have been a slog of working on the earthen bridge, digging on the cellar hole, spreading topsoil on some previously constructed berms... and basically a whole bunch of 'earthworks' related tasks. Of course, I also had to haul some brush around, fell some more small poplar trees... and constantly try not to let the wet clay get too clumped up on my boots... nor slip and fall.

For the most part, I have focused my efforts on cutting in a big shelf directly above the cellar hole... and using the soil/clay that is excavated from there to get the earth bridge taller. It is worth noting that after a few days of steady rain... mixed with a good bit of sun... the earth bridge itself has firmed up rather nicely... and is much firmer than it was several days ago.

Today, I focused a lot on the main spring site... because that lowest (most downhill) and deepest hole that I dug there... has had a good amount of water in it for around five days straight now. Basically, just what I thought would happen... happened.. and the other holes above it (in the immediate seep) eventually seeped into it.

The truly interesting part about that hole... is it is the one that I dug a meter deep... and then made a tiny bore hole at the bottom of the first hole... that goes down another meter. When I cleaned the leaves and loose clay from the bottom of the larger hole... I could not help but notice that the water at the very bottom of the pool was icy cold... which yup is an excellent indicator that there might be a small amount of ground water seeping up from below!

After discovering that cold water, I went ahead and cleaned the main hole up as best I could by removing any roots... and then using the trenching shovel to gently clean its bottom out. I then lined the entire hole plus the drainage channel from the hole above it (the one with the drain tube) with one of those six mil trash bags... before stuffing another bag into the hole with water in it to spread out the other bag that I used as a liner.

Mainly I just want to keep stuff from falling into the hole with water in it as I work on digging out the two stumps that are in that seep area. Ideally, I should have also lined the other holes as well... but by the time I actually got to digging around the stumps (instead of axing around them) I had already decided that all the other seep holes could be dug out a small amount... with little effort... given how moist they are.

In other news... my boy dog got his staples taken out a few days ago... and I did not even have to walk to the veterinarian office this time. While my buddy was giving me a ride I was also able to show off just how much more land that I have here... which even they agreed... adds a lot to the place.

As far as everything else goes... I just keep plugging along here with the single minded focus of achieving my goals with the water systems... and basic infrastructure like trails and such. I am also right on track with getting some of my larger black locust seedlings planted in the ground... now that they are getting closer to the 'sapling' stage of their growth.

Well, I think that is about it for now. I hope that everyone is doing well. Ta ta for now.

This flower is really neat looking!

The root cellar hole a few days ago.

The poplar log that I extended the big berm by the bar with fit perfectly!

I stuffed poplar leaves under this log both for the composting effect and to help stop surface water.

I used some topsoil from the root cellar hole to make a 'biome' layer in this berm so roots can spread through it.

Current progress on the root cellar hole!

Lots of digging at the main spring site!

The hole that had cold water!

Some of the layers of the berm that I extended near the bar.

The earth bridge is coming along!

There was a collateral damage tree when I felled a small poplar so I used it in the berm near the bar as binder.

This is how I protected the hole with water in it while digging around the stump.

Thanks for reading!

Please check out the Homesteading Community!

Cheers! & Hive On!

All content found in this post is mine!