Posts Tagged ‘Wintervale’
New Fence
How many times will I say this? We have another new fence! Yesterday, they hung the wires on the posts creating the fence that surrounds our back grazing pasture. I discovered it is a case of “be careful what you wish for” because we have been wanting this fence for about a year, and now that I stand beside it, I feel a bit of a shock to have my ability to freely traverse that field impeded. What was I thinking!? (*start singing “Don’t Fence Me In*)
Honestly, it is going to be a special feature that will allow us to simply open a gate to give the horses somewhere to go when the paddocks become too muddy. In addition, it will grant them convenient access to what will be our primary grazing pasture. Also, it looks incredibly slick. I’m almost a bit embarrassed about how good it looks. I guess I’ve grown too accustomed to the look of the t-post temporary fences we have had to rely on prior to this.
I stood in the middle of the south run and took pictures in both directions, east and west, and have merged the results into one image. It is a bit of an optically disorienting look, making it seem as though there is a corner in the middle, but I like how it provides an equal view at the two opposite directions.
Today they will finish the installation by burying a wire beneath the gate openings to complete the electric circuit, and then they will hang the gates. We are recycling gates that were left here by the previous owners.
Our horses will be so happy!
I will be happy, too, but with the horses having so much access to pasture now, I will need to become more intentional in my efforts to get out and redistribute the manure drops they leave lying around. In the paddocks, we remove them, but in the pastures, I can get away with just breaking them apart with a rake or a good swift kick. I just need to get out there and do it.
This is one of the reasons that keeping some chickens remains on our radar. We have been told that they automatically spread out the piles by scratching for larva. You get a 2-for-1, because they help control the fly population while breaking up the manure droppings.
See how that works? I go from talking about a new fence, to getting chickens. I have come a long way from that life in the suburbs, don’t you know.
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Chippin’ Brush
With the lawn mowed and the piles of composting manure all in order, yesterday I was able to focus my attention on changing brush piles into wood chips. Once again, I found myself processing several preliminary steps to reach the point of being able to start working on the primary thing I intended to do.
I decided to let the chipper create a pile on the ground, so before I started chipping, I wanted to cut the long pasture grass down to the ground at the location where I would make the pile. I planned to use the Stihl trimmer to do that, but first I needed to change from a metal blade to nylon line for the job.
Next, I needed to solve the problem of a missing pin on one of the stabilizing arms of the 3-point hitch, before I could move the tractor and chipper down to the designated spot. When I was putting the tractor away after the last time I used it, I noticed the stabilizing arm was hanging loose, and the pin that was supposed to be holding it in place was missing.
It was a long shot, but I decided to look for the pin down near the spot where I had noticed the chipper swinging wider than normal when I was driving to put it away last time. I figured the unusual behavior probably started happening soon after the pin fell out. It was a little worse than looking for a needle in a hay stack, so I didn’t look for long.
I borrowed a pin from the ATV snow-plow blade, and was on my way. It was another beautiful day, and I remembered to take a photo before I started chipping, so I would have a comparison for how it would look afterwards. Little did I realize that it would also provide reference of how the beautiful day later turned gray in a matter of about an hour.
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I started working by myself, pulling branches from the pile and feeding them into the chute of the chipper, but soon recognized how much quicker it would be to have another person helping. Elysa and friends had come over for the afternoon, so I took a short break for lunch to see them, checked in with Cyndie, and mentioned I could use an assistant.
They were generous enough to come to my aid after they completed doing some exercises with the horses. Extra hands made a big difference, turning that pile of branches into chips in less than half the time it would have taken me on my own at the pace I was going.
It brought to mind this: I completely understand why farm families benefit from having a lot of children.
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It’s Beautiful
It was Saturday, and Cyndie was home, so I wanted to take advantage of having a potential assistant. Despite my wishes, there are some tasks that demand attention, particularly when it is essential they be completed before another task is able to occur. During the week, while the landscaper and fence crews were working, my attention needed to be on their activities, and I postponed chores like mowing the lawn and managing the manure pile.
The landscaper is done and the fencers are off for the weekend, so Saturday was a chance for me to catch up, regardless of the fact the tasks were the ones I try to save for when I have no one around to help. I absolutely needed to rotate the composting manure piles to create space for dumping the fresh daily collections. Production never stops, and I was running out of places to put it.
It worked out well that Cyndie chose to spend time with the horses, doing some grooming and then exercising them in the round pen, before turning them out into the hay-field to graze. Our activities kept us within sight of each other, so it felt like were working together, despite our different tasks.
It also worked out nicely for me that Cyndie had scheduled an afternoon fall-color drive with a friend, so I could get after the over-due mowing while she was gone.
Well in sight of the middle of October, and I am wondering if this is the last time I will need to mow for the season. I set the mower to cut the grass short and am hoping that will be it. I’m conflicted between wanting the new grass I planted in the drainage swale to grow and the lawn grass to stop growing.
The place looks great with the fresh, close-cut green grass complimented by the colorful leaves of fall. We are in the midst of a series of warm, sunny autumn days with cool nights. I want to be sure to give this pleasant weather as much attention as the wet and cold days usually get.
It would be nice if I stopped and took a few pictures to capture the beauty, I suppose. Maybe I was just working too hard yesterday, but I neglected to pull the camera out even once, even though I had it in my pocket all day. You’ll just have to trust me. It’s really beautiful here right now.
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Legacy Captured
Looking toward the fall sunshine when I captured this image of Legacy led to a great combination of light-streak and shadow. It’s as if his inherent horse wisdom is beaming out into the world from his eye. I’m particularly fond of the motion captured in his reaching leg, mid-step, and flow of mane and tail. Alternately, the bold shadow is able to make a strong statement, yet also works in a sublime way to offset him being the center of attention.
It is a great representation of our herd leader.
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Work Friends
Other than feeding our animals in the morning and again when I got home, yesterday was not a Wintervale day. I drove into the cities to spend a little time at the old day-job, allowing me the chance to again be with the fabulous people with whom I was previously employed. As wonderful as it has been to spend my full-time days managing our property, I suffer a great loss by no longer being able to work with the people who, in many ways, had grown closer to me than family.
Working 8-hours a day together for many years, through thick and thin, sharing responsibilities toward a common goal, has a way of bonding a diverse group of people. I wish I could bring them all home with me to help manage the ranch.
When done right, a healthy response to problems becomes a work of art. During my visit, an issue was discovered during final inspection, which was calmly investigated, and a solution devised. I watched the activity travel seamlessly from person to person, with ease. It was a joy to behold.
In the end, I don’t feel that I contributed any tangible value to the output of product. I served as a second set of eyes to review a completed new project. In fact, I was more of a hindrance to getting things done with all my chattering and catching up. They ordered pizza and we had a company gathering for lunch. (Don’t tell Cyndie, but it was her favorite from Gina Maria’s.) What’s not to like about a ‘work day’ like that?
It means a lot to me to not have to drive that long commute anymore. Despite the stop-and-go afternoon traffic coming home yesterday, the trip wasn’t annoying at all, because seeing them again had been such a rewarding pleasure.
They are no longer my work-mates, they have become friends from that place where I used to work.
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Several Spectacles
This morning we were up early to view the lunar eclipse. When I ventured to the bathroom, I was surprised to find our front motion light was on. By the time I returned to the bedroom to see the moon, the back motion light was on. It seems we were being circled. As I stood at the window, watching the fading moon, I eventually spotted the culprit creating all the light pollution. It was a local barn cat, out on his early morning prowl. I hope he was catching mice, or better yet, moles.
Cyndie stretched to reach behind my dresser to flip the obstructed switch that turned off the back light so we could get back to the lunar spectacle.
Yesterday there was a another spectacle around our place. I finally had both contractors underway at the same time. Fencers were fencing and landscapers were landscaping. It was invigorating.
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I hovered around each, occasionally intruding on their activity to consult. As pleasing as it was to be enjoying this progress, I kept finding myself dwelling on the fact that both activities were initially sought to occur 5-months ago. Better late than never is the way I’m framing it now.
Regardless, we are extremely grateful to have these folks providing their services. Wintervale Ranch is another step closer to becoming the place we imagined when we found this beautiful property.
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Rockin’ Now
I rescheduled a planned work day at the old job in order to be home Monday morning for the confluence of both landscaper and fence contractor arriving to work on our long-awaited projects. As Cyndie headed out the door for her work, I made some passing comment about my high anticipation, and the number of other mornings I had suffered disappointment for similar expectations.
After rising promptly to eat an early breakfast, and getting outside for chores that would make me conveniently available to greet the crews, I received a call from my fence guy. They were hit by a few “Monday issues” that would delay their arrival a day. Why was I not surprised?
Luckily, the landscape crew arrived and saved my day from being a bust. They started quickly and had the ditch created so fast that I thought the project was going to be a cinch. Then, the process of adjusting the slope of the ditch, with a laser as reference, slowed things considerably.
It didn’t help that the end they needed to make deeper was through thick clay soil, which made for very difficult digging. The upper part of the run involves an easily visible drop, but the lower portion levels out. That created something of a challenge for them to achieve an evenly descending slope.
When the drain tube was finally dropped into the channel and covered with pea gravel, I felt a sudden urge for more rain, so we could see how well it works.
Boy, if that isn’t an unlikely thing for me to be writing… an urge for more rain.
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Helping Hands
We are feeling a new level of satisfaction today, after an afternoon of long sought progress yesterday. Sure, it was Sunday, but our fence contractor showed up and made quick work of removing the old section of fence on the south side of our hay-field. At the same time, Cyndie and I worked together on clearing overgrowth in the main ditch just beyond that fence line.
With the advantage of having more people than just me out there toiling away, a lot more was accomplished in a short amount of time than I ever achieve on one of my home-alone days. While Cyndie was using the power trimmer to clear some brush, I cut out some small trees with a hand saw. After a short amount of time, I switched to the chainsaw and went after one of the large trees.
It was already dead, and there was nothing around it to worry about, so I may have been a little casual in my attempt to bring it down. My wedge cut wasn’t deep enough and the tree leaned back away from it. Luckily, I pulled the saw in the nick of time to avoid the pinch. On my own, I would have started devising some laborious attempt to pull or push it over, but with the fence contractor right there in a skid loader tractor, the solution was a breeze.
After he pushed it down, he asked me where I wanted it. I would have needed to cut it into small pieces and drag it away. He scooped up the entire tree with the forks of the skid loader and placed it on top of my brush pile. Done! I asked him to push over two other trees.
If I cut down a tree with the chainsaw, there is a stump left over. Tom would push a tree down, drive the forks under the roots, and pop the whole thing out of the ground. After he carried the entire tree to the pile, he returned to fill the hole and drive over it to pack it down. It was magical. It was incredibly quick. Tree gone, in an instant.
With obstructions out of the way, Cyndie encouraged me to go get the diesel tractor and mow the ditch with the brush cutter. I hesitated, not used to moving this fast, then allowed the momentum to carry me away. By the time we wrapped up our afternoon efforts, the majority of the ditch was cleared and mowed.
It was wonderfully satisfying. For me, it was a great chance to enjoy a day’s work with the support of helping hands.
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Mucky Misstep?
I’m having some doubts about part of the solution we settled on for improvement of the footing in our paddocks. The water is not draining through the layer of lime screenings we added. We did not focus on packing it down immediately, thinking the process would occur naturally over time. We weren’t granted that gift of time by mother nature before the heavy dose of rainfall put our efforts for improvement to a test.
The wet screenings have taken on a consistency very similar to fresh concrete.
I’m not so sure that the water would run off the top of the surface if we had packed it anyway. It is discouraging to see standing water in all the divots left where the horses have stepped. Maybe I am expecting immediate results where the reality is that the ultimate improvement will not be perfection, but a reduced duration of muck. We can hope.
What I found to be even more demoralizing yesterday was, one of the bad spots is located above the main area that the drain tile installation is intended to help. Even after the drain tile is in place and working as designed, my impression is that the high ground just beyond the barn overhang won’t be greatly affected. I’ll be thrilled to find I am wrong about that.
On a more positive note, we are entering the winter season in a completely different situation than we experienced a year ago. Last year it was dry, dry, dry. I firmly believe that the dry fall of 2013 significantly contributed to the loss of many of our pine trees when the winter that followed was so severe. This fall the conditions are almost too wet, if that is possible. Our growing flora look healthy and happy, and should be ready for whatever winter dishes out this year.
Our animals appear just as ready. Delilah was so vibrant yesterday morning, sprinting around at full speed with a gleam in her eye and a smile on her little doggie face, looking as if the temperature had finally reached a comfortable range for her thick coat. I think her preferred seasons of the year have arrived.
Winter has always been my favorite season. Now, if I could just find a way to be as ready for it this year as our plants and animals are. First priority will be new muck boots. My two main choices of footwear have both developed leaks in them. The recent rains have been good for making that known to me.
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Same Story
It’s the same old story around here lately. We’ve had three days of rain, totaling over 2.5 inches for the period, and the paddocks are a mess. It’s ironic to have the loops of drain tile tubing and the pile of pea gravel here, but it has been too wet for the landscapers to do the work of getting it installed.
They now hope to start on Monday. I am wary of what they will run into when they start digging. If they dig a scoop out of the ground and the hole fills with water, like happened to me when I recently tried to dig a post hole, will they be able to proceed? Since they are ultimately digging a trench, maybe they can dig all the way to the drainage swale and see if the water flows. It would be a good test of the concept, I expect.
If we have to wait much longer, the ground is gonna freeze. We were already threatened with snow overnight last night —which I slept through if it actually happened. It was sure cold enough. For the second night in a row, we let the horses spend the night in their stalls in the barn. The rain, wind, and cold temperatures are too much for them this soon, as they haven’t yet fully grown their winter coat.
Cyndie moved them in late, after we finished watching a movie. She reported that they were eagerly staged at the barn door, waiting and hoping to get inside.
I have been spending my time between rain showers the last few days cleaning up the last of the old hay-field fence in preparation for its removal. Doing so has affirmed my decision to spend the extra money to have this done when they come to install the fence we’ve been waiting for all summer that will enclose the pasture beyond. The posts of the old fence had really begun to lean. It is a metal fence and we hadn’t been able to electrify it because there was no isolation from ground, so Legacy had taken to messing with it, too. That’s behavior we prefer to discourage.
It will really clean up the look of that south side of our property. I’ll need to keep it clear of overgrowth, but that works to our advantage because we will then finally have a riding path available that we have long envisioned around the perimeter.
We left the horses inside this morning, awaiting the arrival of our neighbor and farrier, George, who will trim their hooves again. He tells me somewhere around 8-weeks is the period to shoot for. It always looks to me that they need it a little sooner than that. Probably because the nasty conditions they endure in our paddocks.
Here’s hoping their footing improves greatly out there in the near future. We’re tired of the same old muddy mess, over and over again.
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