It’s been a bit of a hiatus from blogging. It’s not post-election anxiety. It’s not Covid. It’s hard labor. We’ve taken advantage of unseasonable warm temperatures to address erosion issues around the barn. This involves grading, terracing, and planting. We’re finally raising the grade to pre-construction levels, bringing the back end of the grade up four or five feet, (which includes burying the root cellar.) It’s an enormous amount of work. It involves moving huge piles of sand (which we dug out for the foundation) back, up the hill, and around the barn. This earthen berm that we’re re-locating is about eight feet high, by thirty-five feet long, by twenty feet across. Thank God for the Kubota.

Oddly, hard labor is a relief from current events.

We’re nearly finished the worst areas of erosion–and the weather is running out on us. We may have to do the last bit next spring. I’m hoping to get ground-cover transplanted onto those areas we’ve graded before the snow flies. We’re using periwinkle (aka creeping myrtle, aka vinca minor) as the ground cover, because its sturdy root structure can really hold a slope. Oh, and because it was free. I’ve been collecting and hoarding it for several years. For illustration of the scale of this, it’s one sprig of ground cover every four to six inches, covering a newly terraced area about 12 feet wide and 40 feet long. After planting, I carefully mulch it with pine needles, making sure that each of the little plants has its leaves above the mulch, and can see light. Of course, I first have to harvest the pine needles from the forest (because pine needles add acid to the soils, lock together to prevent erosion, dissuade the cats from digging, … and they’re free.) At this point, I’m looking forward to shoveling snow.

To take a break from grading, we took a walk in the woods the other day. We noted that recent high winds had taken down two big trees, right off the trail, an ash, and a beech. So, yesterday, we harvested those trees–cutting them into sixteen inch pieces (from the base of the trunk, up to three three inch diameter size.) The top bits we scatter in the forest to break down. These trees both exceeded eighteen inches in diameter at the base–so it ended up being a lot of firewood. Even we were surprised that it topped out at over two trailer loads. We got it all stacked and covered, just as darkness fell. This is what we do for fun, as a break from the grading work. This will be next year’s fuel, since we’ve already harvested all we need for this season. Since we harvest only deadfall, we don’t have to “season” our firewood for a year or more–to get it dry before burning. That makes us a little lazy about bringing it in in a timely way. Our ultimate goal is to get a year or two ahead of the game.

Today, it’s raining, hard and steady. The erosion control is working. And we are taking a well-earned break.