New Year - New hope

We are all hoping for a better new year. Even if you do not believe in a better political climate, you can hope for a better economic climate and a better health climate. Getting to see our friends and visit with our kids and grandkids again will be wonderful.

We've gotten several little dustings of snow up here on the mountain in the past month. And it's been cold enough to frost our collards several times. But occasionally, even when it's cold, the sun does come out and makes you feel better. On those rare events we will try to get out and do something in preparation for the coming growing season.

For example, we've begun building our mountain of wood chips. We make the wood chips from downed limbs and dead trees mostly found along the side of our drive. This also helps keep that area clear for the Bush Hog. We use these woodchips extensively in the garden. They are good for retaining moisture and blocking weeds. We've also begun expanding our garden to be about three times larger than last year's. Check this page for a description of our hugelkultur method.

Also, we have pruned back the muscadine vines and transplanted a row of wild blueberry bushes.

Additionally we have started several trays of seeds indoors and we have already transferred some of them to their permanent location in our original garden. It is still quite early so for the cold sensitive plants I quickly constructed a small row cover from some old tarp material. On sunny days we have to pull this tarp back to keep the plants from getting too warm but it does protect them on those frosty nights and from the torrential downpours.

So far we have started turnips, cauliflower, broccoli, brussels sprouts, cabbage, several varieties of lettuce, mizuna, tatsoi, arugula, several varieties of kale, and beets.

I completed a little project I started at the end of last year to rebuild my Bush Hog. This involved replacing the lower oil seal in the gearbox and the blades. As you can see from this picture the old blades were pretty used up. Right now TRAKKER is in the shop getting work done on his clutch and brake shoes. Also I replaced the battery in the wood chipper and put new tires on its wheels.

That's it for now. Get vaccinated and stay safe. 

The last of the year we might like to forget...

Well it looks like I've broken my promise. My last New Year's resolution was to publish an update to the blog every month and I failed. You would think in this time of COVID crisis and isolation (not to mention full retirement) that I would have nothing better to do with time on my hands than update this blog.

Anyway this page will just bring you up to date on what was going on at Richmond Woods in the last part of 2020.

The Autumn brought harvest and food preservation. A visit to my friends Philip and Susan blessed me with a great bunch of muscadines. I ate fresh ones until they were coming out my ears. I decided I needed to preserve the remaining ones. I could think of no better way than muscadine jam. It goes really good on my homemade sourdough.

Our garden yielded many tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers. We preserved jars of tomato sauce. We roasted and froze bags of peppers. We pickled many jars of cucumbers, carrots, and peppers. And we dried many hot peppers that we are using to season our homemade sauerkraut and dishes like curry.

I made several improvements to my water system. I added a bubble pump to each barrel. This made ozonation of the water much more efficient. A bubble pump basically is just a submerged tube with holes at each end. An air stone is lowered to just above the lower holes and the bubbles, ozone in this case, carry water up the tube and exit through the upper holes. This creates a good circulation within the barrel and promotes better absorption of the ozone. Additionally I added new ozone generator system and I brought AC power from the shop up to the waterhouse to power lights and the new more powerful ozone generating equipment.

I made improvements to my composting toilet that I hoped would eliminate the fungus gnat problem. Unfortunately, these improvements did not help. I am currently exploring the construction of a vermi-composting toilet system that would use a standard flush toilet. I'm sure this would come as a great relief to those few people who occasionally come to visit. 😉  If you are curious, visit vermicompostingtoilets.net.

A couple of other smaller projects included building a mezzanine in one section of the shop attic space in which I could store some of my mountain of junk. And the installation of a new wood-burning stove in the cabin. I plan to overhaul the old stove and use it in the shop. Also, I installed a TV antenna - remember those? Now I can pick up several stations out of Huntsville to get local news and weather.

That pretty much covers all of the visible improvements I've made around here in the last half of 2020. Of course there are all those things you don't see like cutting mountains of firewood, pumping water, and taking care of the solar panels and battery. And, because I was robbed in November by someone that I believe to be a neighbor, I have spent considerable time installing security cameras and lights.

That's it for now. I hope you all are staying safe and taking the precautions you need to. I'm already working on updates to the blog for the first couple of months of 2021. Please standby.

Summer Solstice

I started the year off with the good intention of updating this blog at the end of every month.  We've been busy.  So, here it is the end of July and I have totally missed June.  Let me summarize: Gardening, Food, Wildlife, and Projects.  Gardening has by far taken most of our time. I have a great new respect for the farmers of America.  If I were dependent on my ability to grow food for money and table, I'd be both poor and hungry.  

Our garden beds are quite fertile. The hugelkultur concept  in combination with deep wood chip mulch is working very well in terms of growing plants. So well in fact that Carolyn seems to be out there nearly every day trimming off excess vegetation.  We have great numbers of cucumbers which have been eaten on salads until our skin is becoming green and bumpy.  Many jars of pickles have been put up. Same for peppers.  And now, just when our tomatoes are about to overwhelm us with vine-ripe fruit, a blight has struck which threatens our entire crop. And this after we have fought off a variety of pests including tomato horn worms, grasshoppers, and leaf-footed bugs.  Still, the joys of planting a seed and being rewarded with something tasty to eat or beautiful to behold far outweigh the frustrations that come with it.

Some of the things we have eaten were grown here but were not planted by us. For example, these delicious puff-ball mushrooms.  When I was a kid, I took great pleasure in kicking them to watch them explode in a cloud of dark brown spores. It was only recently that Carolyn educated me that when taken young (before they develop spores) they are quite good to eat. Here I have sauteed some slices in vegan "butter" and seasoned them with a little marinara sauce.  Another fine example are these wild blueberries. They make a most excellent pancake.  Carolyn continues to experiment with delicious vegan frozen treats and I continue to perfect my sourdough bread making.  Lately, Carolyn has discovered the art of sorbet and I have discovered the benefit of proofing my bread overnight.

Most of the projects these past couple of months have been small ones such as this recycling station,  a generator "hat" or this battery watering reservoir.  Some projects were simply to provide raw material for other projects such as these planks for paneling the shop or these wood chips for mulching and "paving" walkways. Some were utilitarian like mounting these windowboxes on the porch railing, fashioning a new handle for my cant hook from a white oak sapling or extending the sides of my trailer so I can haul more chips.  Everything takes some amount of time.

I guess gardening is kind of the main intersection of all the roads of Richmond Woods - Food, Wildlife, Projects.  I've already discussed some of the less desirable wildlife - those that attack our garden.  Insects and spores are impossible to keep out.  The electric fence has so far deterred larger raiders that would love to get at the fruits of our labor.  Alas, there is no fence around Carolyn's herb garden and one afternoon, a big black bear wandered through our yard and decided to take a roll on top of her prize rosemary bush. The poor plant was totally destroyed. Fortunately, she was able to root some cuttings from the remains. Lately we have learned that there's a mama bear with two cubs in the area. Maybe that one had just had the cubs and decided she wanted a rosemary spa treatment?

Among the less destructive wildlife are these little fellows: a red salamander, a promethea silkmoth and a young rat snake of some sort who managed to trap himself in a plastic bucket on the back porch.

That's about all I have time for. I hope you enjoyed. Stay safe. See you next month.