I’m currently waiting for my daughter in a Walmart parking lot, so I figured I may as well post an update!
We were able to catch Not Junk Pile, now named Two Toed Tony (my daughter panicked a bit, coming up with a new name) this morning. We got her to the vet, but I had to leave before she was sedated and taken to x-ray and bring the car to the garage. I got there early and, thankfully, they were able to take it in immediately.
My daughter messaged me updates. TTT had a badly broken femur. The less expensive surgery was amputation. As I write this, she is out of surgery, she did well, and will be ready for pickup at 3.
Thankfully, my older daughter will be able to cover it, but it will be a few days before funds are transferred. Until then, between my younger daughter and I, we can just cover the bill.
TTT has 6 babies that are not weaned. We will need to set up the cat cage in my room in the sun room. Her kittens will be able to get in and out through the wall sections with wider openings, while she can recovery inside. There are other mothers that will nurse them, but I don’t want to risk mastitis.
Meanwhile, we need to catch a couple of females for placement, then a couple more in about 2 weeks.
Let’s start from the beginning of the day, which started off well!
I picked a tiny harvest this morning.
I decided to pick the one cob of purple corn that was the first to develop. I knew it wouldn’t be ready yet, but I wanted to see how it was. In particular the pollination. There was a fair chunk of it that had not been pollinated at all, so the kernels did not develop, but overall, it was pretty well filled.
One of my daughter’s doesn’t like corn, so my other daughter boiled the cob and we split it between us for a taste test. Of course, not being fully ripe, it would not have reached peak sweetness, but this is not a sweet corn to begin with. It was almost meaty in taste and texture. It actually reminded me of the corn I grew up with, that my mother saved seed from, year after year. I didn’t even know sweet corn was a thing until I was in my early teens, and my mother came back from a trip to visit family in the US, with corn seeds they’ve given her. She planted them in the spring, and I remember being astonished by the flavour of sweet corn. I still liked our old corn, though, and this was very much like that. We both enjoyed our taste test.
Later on, my husband and I left early for our medical appointment. Very early. My daughter sent us some cash to treat us to lunch. My husband hasn’t gone out since his last in-person medical appointment, and that was at least 2 years ago. We stopped in the town my mother lives in to pick up gas, then went to a restaurant for lunch.
Which is when I got a message from the cat lady, asking if she could call me. Talk about perfect timing! If we had left when I originally planned, I would have been driving when she messaged me and would not have seen it for some time later.
She wanted to talk to me about possible placements for 4 female outside cats! She was contacted by someone on a farm near my mother’s town. Their yard cats of 14 and 15 years had all passed away, and they needed mousers. They have an ideal set up, including an insulated and heated barn. Basically, they would be inside cats that are allowed outside. They gave their cats quality food, regular vet visits, and – as amply demonstrated by having cats that lived more than a decade – have been able to protect them from predators. There was even a vet lined up to check on the new cats.
There are rescues out there that would happily have given them 4 or 6 female cats right now, but they wanted to go through the Cat Lady, instead. They figure to start with maybe 2 cats and keep them in the barn for a couple of weeks before allowing them outside, then getting a couple more and repeating the process.
When I mentioned that our female cats are all nursing babies right now, including the ones with older babies (they just nurse any kittens that wants to nurse!), and it turned out the vet had brought up that concern as well.
In the end, she asked me to talk to the family about it. If we go with it, she will bring a trap for us on Saturday, when she comes to pick up the sick kitty.
I’ll get back to that later…
From there, we continued to the clinic. We got there early, and were shown into an examination room right away, but the doctor was in emergency at the time (this clinic is in a hospital building), so we were among several patients waiting. By the time she finally was able to see us, it was about 20 minutes past our actual appointment. Not too bad, except my husband was really struggling with pain levels.
She ended up spending a lot of time going over his medications list. Unfortunately, he forgot to bring his meds along, but he does keep a current list in his phone. There was some confusion about doses, because what he was actually getting didn’t match what the official descriptions said were available. I think in his case, because he’s on such high doses of some things, there are exceptions being made.
One problem that was unexpected is that she could not prescribe opioids. Apparently, the College is telling doctors not to prescribe them anymore.
Opioids are the only thing that have even remotely been able to bring his pain levels down.
He didn’t need those renewed yet, though, so we should have time for him to get a new doctor, when they arrive at this clinic in the fall. This doctor added that she couldn’t take him as a new patient, but we already knew that. This is just interim. Going over his medications list, she commented that he was going to have a hard time finding a new doctor.
*sigh*
Funny how it’s easy to find a doctor, if you don’t really need one, but if you do need one, and especially with a complex file like my husband’s, it’s harder to find a doctor.
She also focused a lot on his diabetes. One of his meds actually causes weight gain. It’s an anti-depressant and he’s been on is since before we moved out here. What I remember is that it prevented weight loss, but she says is actually causes weight gain. She said it’s also for sleep. As someone who has Severe Obstructive Sleep Apnea, he certainly wasn’t taking it to make him sleep! He’s off that now, and he’s happier for it. As we were leaving, he vented his frustrations. He has so many problems, but doctors keep focusing on the diabetes. The way he put it, he’s got a heart condition that has a life expectancy of 4-6 years, from time of diagnosis. Which means 2-4 years from right now. He is in constant pain, and when I brought that up, she dismissed it. He had been told, early on, that until he gets his pain under control, he won’t be able to get his blood sugars under control. Apparently, that’s not a thing anymore. She did put in a referral to a diabetic nurse. Then she brought up “it’s the diet. It’s all the diet.” And the weight, of course. He won’t get his sugars under control unless he loses weight. I’d already mentioned, he barely eats, because of his pain levels. With all the other stuff, his blood sugars are far from a priority for him right now. She also brought up that he’s on cholesterol medication, but he’s never had high cholesterol. He was put on that by the first doctor we had when we moved out here, because that doctor puts all his diabetic patients over a certain age and girth on statins. Never mind that the actual research shows statins do nothing, and actually cause more harm than good. The doctors don’t seem to be on top of the most recent data.
<<< pause for interruptions >>>
Okay, more has happened, but I’ll get back to that later!
After my husband was done, including getting a requisition for blood work, it was my turn. I only needed one prescription renewal. Should have been fast and easy. She still had to “see” me as a patient, though, so she took my blood pressure. Which, of course, was high. It isn’t high when I test it at home. She was ready to prescribe me blood pressure medication, but I said I wanted to wait on that, because it doesn’t match at home. Granted, it’s been a while since I’ve tested myself, since my husband has the machine in his room now. So she asked me to test my BP morning and evening, three times a week, for three months, then follow up with our new doctor. It’s also been ages since I had my blood work done, so I left with a requisition for that, too.
I had also made an appointment with this doctor for my mother, but I really don’t think my mother would like her. She’s female, black and has a strong accent. When I called my mother about it, we talked it over. The only reason for her to see a doctor right now is for the same reason as my husband and I; for an interim doctor to renew prescriptions. Not the dozen other things my mother thinks a doctor should be able to fix for her. My mother has no idea about the status of her prescriptions, and once I realized she didn’t understand what she needed to ask the pharmacy well enough, I told her I would call them tomorrow, while I’m in town. If her prescription renewals are good for a couple more months, I’ll cancel the appointment. If she needs a prescription renewal within the next month or two, we’ll keep the appointment.
So that’s done.
As soon as I could, after we got home, I headed outside to do my rounds early, walk around and get some fresh air. It was starting to rain, but that was okay. I also fed the yard cats a bit earlier than usual.
Which is when I saw Not Junk Pile on the cat house roof.
With a dangling foot.
It looks like her foot is broken at the “wrist”.
Crap.
I’m bringing my mother’s car in for an oil change tomorrow. I’ve also asked to get that check engine light looked at, plus a check on the wheel alignment. I’m feeling a shudder in the front driver’s side tire that concerns me. We’ve got a budget for this.
We don’t have a vet budget right now. That’s going to have to come out of money meant for a vehicle down payment.
*sigh*
I called the emergency vet, anyhow. She said that, if we could bring her in tonight, they’d treat her. So my daugher and I got the cat carrier and went looking for her.
By then, it was raining harder, and there was no sign of her.
We went looking again later, but still nothing.
We did see her kittens, though, and figured out where their new “nest” is. It’s no longer in the tarp covered board pile (formerly known as the junk pile). They’ve found a way to get into the space under the concrete stairs outside the dining room door. A perfect spot for a mama and her kittens. Impossible for us to get at.
I’ve also been in contact with the Cat Lady. This is one of the mamas we were thinking would go to the farm she was telling us about. She’s going to work on arranging more spays for us, and will be dropping a trap off for us, too. Between adopting out 4 female yard cats, plus getting spays done, we should be able to reduce the number of kittens next year.
Of course, that will also depend on how many of this year’s kittens are female, too! Hopefully, we’ll be able to get some of them done, early next year, before they go into their first heat. This year, they started having babies before the snow was gone. 😥
While I was working on this, we’d gone out to try and catch Not Junk Pile. When it became clear we were not going to get her tonight, I sent an email to the vet clinic, letting them know the situation an dthat we’d be trying to bring her in in the morning. I then called the emergency vet back and updated her as well. That means we’ll have to be out and feeding the cats quite early, and try to get her into the carrier. My daughter and I will work to get her to the vet when they open at 8am, then drop the car off for 9am. My daughter can stay at the clinic while I take care of the car stuff. I’m also going to have to swing by the pharmacy to pick up prescription refills. My husband has been without insulin for several days now.
So far, there has been no phone call to reschedule, so I should be taking my husband to his medical appointment today. I’m not looking forward to it. It’s going to be such a painful drive for him.
I can’t wait until we are able to replace the van. I greatly appreciate having access to my mother’s car, but that little thing just cannot meet our needs.
This morning, I took video and will be putting together a garden tour video tonight, after I finish watering the garden. Until then, here is some cuteness!
Inside cuteness…
… and outside cuteness!
I have been finding piles of outside kittens in that bed in the sun room more often.
The inside kittens quite enjoyed the freshly laundered fluffy blanket and towel!
Today was a wonderfully cool day. We had a high of only 18C/64F We had scattered showers in the region throughout the day, but I did eventually get to put a second coat of paint on the folding table and stump bench. I don’t think they will need a third coat. We’ll have lots of paint for other projects.
I also worked on trimming the lumpy bits on the debarked log. I drained both batteries on the mini chainsaw, with only one last large lump that needs to be trimmed.
We did not get enough rain, though, so I’ve been working on watering the garden. As I write this, I’ve got the last sprinkler set up in the main garden area, and a timer running. Once that’s done, I still need to water the front garden beds. I should be able to get that done while the light holds. Once that’s done, I’ll be able to start editing a garden tour video.
My day was almost disrupted completely. Thank God my sister phoned, first. She started off asking if we wanted cucumbers, which I thankfully declined; we still have pickles from last year! I said no to slicing cucumbers, too.
What does it mean that my sister’s call had me feeling slightly suspicious – and that my suspicions proved warranted?
As we were talking, I suddenly heard my mother announcing that they were in our little hamlet. It turns out they had gone to the cemetery to tend the family plot, and were at a nearby park (where they have public washrooms and water available), where they had their lunch. As we were talking, my mother suddenly asked, “are you going to invite us over?”
I was expecting that.
My answer was, no.
I then reminded her that we need to plan ahead for visits. Just dropping by suddenly is very disruptive.
First, she tried to guilt me. “Don’t forget, you’re living in my house”.
“It’s not your house anymore.”
Again, I repeated that we need time to plan visits. Then she threw a real whopper at me.
“Are you afraid of [my husband]?”
That one had me laughing out loud.
She kept trying to find ways to blame my family, but I finally said that it was HER behaviour that’s the problem.
She went silent after that. My sister and I talked a bit more before she finally said that our mother was in a “mood” and it was time to go.
My mother completely cannot accept that her own behaviour causes her own problems. When she comes here, she’s rude and often cruel. She has no interest in visiting us. Her only interest is in seeing what we’ve done and to criticize me for it – and I don’t mean constructive criticism! But she also expects us to wait on her, hand and foot, and dote on her. She treats my family like crap, insults them, then wonders why they don’t want to be around her. My husband is in constant pain, but he’s supposed to come out and pander to her as well. My older daughter works nights, but she’s supposed to interrupt her sleep to dote on her. My younger daughter has pretty severe PCOS, which affects her physical appearance that has my mother being particularly cruel. Today she wasn’t feeling well, either. My mother, however, gives zero thought to how other people might feel, or what they are dealing with. Her world revolves around herself, and she expects our worlds to revolve around her. There’s only so much of that that can be blamed on her age. Frankly, she’s been like this for a long time.
Oh! There goes my timer. Time to turn off the sprinkler and water the front garden beds.
<<< one hour later >>>
I’m back!
Gosh, it’s so gorgeous out there. I didn’t want to come back inside!
Anyhow. Where was I?
Ah… yes. We managed to not get what would have been a highly disruptive and unpleasant “visit” from my mother.
I’m sure she’s going to try and find some way to punish me for not allowing her to abuse me and my family. I’m just glad my sister made sure to phone ahead this time. The last time my mother talked her into suddenly showing up here, it was quite unpleasant and set my weather dependant work back for days, so she promised to always call first!
For now, the garden is taken care of, the outside cats have been tended to, and now it’s time for me to start on that video! Hopefully, I’ll be able to finish it tonight and be able to upload it by morning. We shall see!
My trip to pick up a parcel ended up taking longer than expected. It was a Purolator delivery, which now delivers to our post office, if we use their address, and we pick it up from there. Other times, we’ve had to go to town to pick it up, or to the slightly further town my mother lives in.
Not this time!
For some reason, they decided to drop it off at another, even further, town to the north of us.
Then didn’t tell us.
If the shipping address is just a box number, they call us and ask which depot to drop it off in. My husband got no such call. He didn’t even know it was coming by Purolator. When he placed the order, he thought it was coming by mail. They’re not very good about informing how things will be delivered!
Ah, well. It was just a bit of an extra drive. I still got to pick up the mail, where I found our seed packet arrived, in advance of the crocuses we ordered, as well as my subscription shipment of lysine for the outside cats.
Once I got home, I was soon heading outside to get ready to paint the stump bench and folding table, which included hosing them down and giving them a scrub. I left them to dry while setting up the paint supplies, only to hear a strange noise in the leaves above me.
It was starting to rain!
Of course… 😄
It wasn’t much, but that was okay. I was planning to work on the trellis bed logs while the bench and table dried, anyhow.
I wanted to start with the largest log that is going to be a bottom log in the bed. The other large one we recently cut might be an issue. It has a bend in it that I’m either going to have to work around, or find a straighter dead tree of the right size.
I brought over one of our saw horses to make debarking easier. I love that draw knife! The hard part was at the wide end. It just did not want to roll over and stay put, so I could do the underside! It took some fighting, and a handy wedge shaped rock to keep it from rolling back, but eventually, I got it all done.
The next step will be to hose it down, then trim away the branch nubs and other lumps, before moving on to the next log.
Ideally, I would char this before setting it in the ground, but to char a log this size all over, I would need a torch of some kind, and I don’t have one. Still, just debarking it will help, and all the bits of bark will be part of the garden bed layers.
By the time this was done, what little rain we had was long gone, and the bench and table were dry. Here are the before and after pictures.
I debarked the stump supporting the bench, too, then pressure sprayed it with the hose. It really should have been debarked when the bench was first made. I found sawdust and ant damage under the bark. Not enough to affect the stability of the stump, yet. It’ll hold that bench for a few more years!
I did not paint the stump or the end supports. Once all the greenery grows back, it should look like the bench is just floating.
These will get at least one more coat of paint before they’re done. If the forecasts are at all accurate, I should be able to do that tomorrow afternoon, then more rain supposed to hit our area.
It feels good to finally get at least a bit more progress on those trellis bed logs! This project is taking so much longer than it should have. 😕
At around 4am or so, we finally got hit by one of the many little thunderstorms that have been passing us by. It got very loud, and we had a bit of a light show, but it seems we only caught the edges of it. We had some rain, but not enough to bring the rain barrel to even half full again.
As I write this, my husband and I should be on the road to his medical appointment, but we got a call this morning to reschedule it to Thursday. I can’t say I mind the delay. With the van gone, we have to use my mother’s car, which is going to be an incredibly painful drive for my husband. There’s no getting around it until we can get a replacement vehicle, and that still won’t be for a few more months.
Then I found a text message from the garage asking if Thursday would work to get the oil changed on my mother’s car. It would be a morning drop off, and with only one vehicle, I’d have to stay in town until it’s done, so getting to the medical appointment takes priority. Hopefully, he can fit the car in soon after.
Pain had my husband up really early today, so he took care of feeding the outside cats at about 5am. That must have confused the kitties! 😄 When I went out later to do my morning rounds, I spotted this.
It’s Octomom, bringing one of her kittens to the kibble house!
We still haven’t figured out where she moved her babies, but from how active this little one is, we’re going to be seeing all of them, soon. Mama must be more than ready to bring them to where solid food can be relied on! There are two black kittens in this litter. My younger daughter has always wanted an all black cat. If we can get them socialized, we might bring one in, after Decimus and her babies are adopted out.
Oh, that reminds me! I was messaging with the Cat Lady. She’s still working on her husband about the two kittens she’s promised to take; Ghosty and one of the outside kittens that is sicker. She says she may have a placement for Ghosty, so long as she doesn’t turn out to have something major, like feline leukemia or something. That would be so awesome! It’s getting time to take good pictures of all the kittens to send to her, so she can pass them on to her contacts. Getting a picture of Decimus will be a bit more difficult. She is either moving around too much, or covered in kittens!
Anyhow…
Today has a high of only 22C/72F. According to my desktop app, we are 20C/68F right now, and raining.
There is no rain outside.
So I’m thinking I might be able to do some painting this afternoon, then start cleaning up and debarking the logs for the trellis bed. I want to make sure to cut away and smooth out any branch ends and sticky-outy-bits. That’s something I’ve noticed causing a surprising amount of trouble with the high raised bed. You don’t notice stuff like that, until you’ve stabbed yourself with a broken branch end you never even noticed! The netting we’ve got over the beans catches on everything, too, so the smoother we can make the logs, the better.
What rain we did have last night was enough to water the garden well enough. I had to refill the rain barrel out by the Crespo squash, but the squash itself did not need watering. I neglected to take a picture of my little harvest this morning; beans, a green zucchini, and a few Spoon tomatoes were ready.
I’m really happy with how the squash patch is doing. Part of why we’re trying to many different kinds of winter squash is to not only see what we like to eat, but what grows well here. Right now, we have a couple of Boston Marrow squash developing, one on each plant. I think there’s only one, maybe two, Red Kuri, and one hulless seed pumpkin. For all the plants and flowers, we still have only one Honeyboat Delicata developing. There’s also only one Winter Sweet developing.
Then there’s the North Georgia Candy Roaster, and the Pink Banana! Both are now producing plenty of female flowers, and there seem to be quite a few squash that have been successfully pollinated. Though I’m seeing and hearing lots of pollinators – especially in the melon tower – I’m still hand pollinating the squash, unless I spot an insect actively pollinating a female flower. If things continue to go well, we should at least have a decent harvest of the candy roaster and banana squash, and enough of the others to at least taste them. That will go a long way towards deciding what we will try growing next year.
Weather willing, I will make another garden tour video soon.
But first, I need to make a quick trip to the post office and pick up some packages!
I’m kinda glad we didn’t end up going to the clinic today. I’m much appreciating the quieter day.
After yesterday’s lumberjacking, we were pretty sore this morning, but not as bad as I expected. Still, my daughters were sweet enough to feed the outside cats in the morning, so I could sleep in a bit before doing my morning rounds.
My daughters had some shopping to do in town, so my younger daughter and I left after my morning rounds were done. One of her stops was the pharmacy, forgetting that today is a statutory holiday in Canada, and the pharmacy was closed.
I did notice that a BBQ food truck was out so after our last errand, I checked it out. I had enough cash on hand to get some take out to bring home as a treat. I miss food trucks! 😄 There’s actually quite a few in the region, but where we are just doesn’t have the population base to support one.
One thing I noticed while I was waiting for the food was a sign on the nearby hardware store. Along with cycling through their hours, specials, etc., they show the local temperature. According to my apps, the hottest I was seeing was 26C/79F with a “real feel” of 29C/84F at home. The sign, however, was showing a temperature of 32C/88F! Judging by how I was feeling while standing in the shade, I’d say the sign was right.
We really ought to get ourselves a weather station. I did find the parts of one while we were cleaning up the house, but the outdoor reader was (still is, actually) mounted to one of the steel clothes line poles, so the readings would be quite off!
Speaking of the weather, we started to get alerts for severe thunderstorms this afternoon. Looking at the weather radar, I could see spots of storms, scattered like confetti, sweeping across the prairies.
So far, none have hit us. The most we got was a smattering of rain. I was outside at the time, working under a tree, and never noticed until I saw parts of the sidewalk were wet!
This is what I was working on.
The last frame for a raised bed cover now has wire on it.
Of course, it was more of a pain than expected.
The wire I used was 2″ hardware cloth salvaged from the old squash tunnel. The roll is 4′ wide, so I could just use the length, rather than cutting strips, like I had to with the fence wire and the plastic hardware cloth. I was going to cut it to 9′ until I realized I had close to double that, so I folded it almost in half.
Putting the first side on was fairly easy. I used the steel strips again, as they are a lot more secure. In the past, for wire like this, we used staples, and there’s no way staples would hold this in place while being manhandled on and off raised beds.. The only real hard part of attaching the first side was having The Phantom suddenly decide she absolutely had to have attention! She’s been making strange lately, and I thought she was getting more feral, but not today!
Also, as she rolled around, I could see a single active nip. I had been wondering, as she never looked pregnant, if perhaps she were infertile, but she does have a single kitten somewhere.
Speaking of kittens, they were all over the place, and more of them are showing red and/or sticky eyes. None as bad as the two we regularly bring inside to wash their eyes, thankfully, but my goodness, it’s bad this year!
Anyhow… where was I? Oh, yes… the wire.
Once the first side was attached, getting the second side done was a real pain. The two layers of wire mesh kept getting stuck on each other and misaligning. After fighting with is for about half an hour, at least, I finally got some jute twine and wrapped the length of it near one edge, from the fold to where one end was a few inches shorter than the other, then secured the short end as well. Only then could I finally attach the other side to the frame.
Unfortunately, I started to run low on the short screws I was using the attach the steel strips. I had just enough to secure the length, but only on the bottom edges. What it needs is more of them to secure the wire to the top edges, to keep it from pulling away.
So… more of that size of screw is on my shopping list. I did try to secure it a bit better using the staple gun, but didn’t finish. Even with the steel straps, they will easily pop out.
Aside from securing the wire to the frame some more, I am thinking it will probably need more support. The wire can hold itself up, but it bends very easily. It would take next to nothing to crush the arch. If a cat decided to jump on it or something, it would collapse completely. I think I have a couple more lengths of the PEX pipe, but I would want at least 4 preferably 5, to support the wire.
So the cover is done to the point that it can be used, but needs a bit more to make it stronger.
For this one, I’m glad I decided to fold the hardware cloth in half rather than cut it too length. If it were 1″ squares or less, it would be stronger, but with 2″ squares, it’s relatively flimsy. It will be okay when we use other strips of the 2″ hardware cloth on the box frame to protect the bed with the popcorn in it, but not so much as a self supporting arch.
So, here are our experimental results.
The first one we built was the box cover, designed specifically to go over taller things like the Tom Thumb popcorn. It is intended to support wire, shade cloth, etc., as needed. It is probably the most structurally sound of the frames we made. It is unlikely we will need to build more like this, simply because things we grow that are taller are more likely to need other types of support or protection.
I can see two problems with this design. 1) Once the sides are wrapped in wire, there is basically no way to tend the bed without removing the entire cover, and 2) for anything needing a cover this tall, removing it would require 2 people, to avoid damage. If, however, it were wrapped in fabric mesh or netting, it could be done in such a way that the netting could be lifted for access. Fabric won’t keep the racoons out, though.
Conclusion: I’m happy with it. This frame is worth making again, if we ever need to protect tall plants, but there would be little need for more, based on our current garden needs.
The second one used fence wire we found in a shed. The fence wire turned out to have varying sizes of openings, from 6″ square to 6″ x 3″ The roll was just over 3′ wide, so we had to cut 3 strips to fit into the frame, with overlaps. I went with 5′ long strips to create a high arch, which worked out well for the bush beans.
The first problem we found was with how the vertical and horizontal wires were joined. Each intersection has a wire wrap, adding significant thickness to those spots. We were using U nails to attach them, hammering them diagonally over the joins to secure them. Between the nails themselves and the thickness, this was far more difficult than it should have been.
The wire itself was stiff enough that a couple of screws snapped in the frame’s corners, which resulted in them starting to rotate. Thankfully, we had a couple of scrap 9′ lengths that cut wonky, and were able to add those to the inside of the frame, sandwiching the fence wire in between. That also strengthened and secured the corners.
We currently have the frame over our bush beans, with netting on top, to protect the beans from critters. The wire wraps at each intersection is a problem, as the net catches on them, but aside from that, it’s ideal. The net strip is wide enough that I’ve even been able to secure the edges with ground staples into the soil under the frame, too.
Conclusion: I’m really happy with this one. I’m able to lift the netting and harvest through the fence wire without having to move the frame. If I can find 6″, or even 4″, square welded wire fencing, instead of the wrapped wire, that’s what I would use to make the majority of future covers. It’s strong enough to support itself. I could probably use 6′ lengths for an even higher arch, and it could still support itself, plus any shade cloth, insect netting, greenhouse plastic, etc. Though we would not use U nails again, and go with the steel strapping, I would still be good with that double thickness of wood on the long sides, which makes the whole thing much more structurally stable, while also securing the wire. In the future, I can see most of any new covers we make to be like this one, with a few modifications.
The third one is the one with the “rigid plastic” hardware cloth. Which turned out to not be very rigid at all. This is when I remembered I had the steel strapping and used that to secure the mesh. After the first hoops I tried to use, snapped screws in all the corners, I had to add extra pieces of wood inside the short ends. Switching to PEX pipe hoops worked much better, and the steel strapping worked well to secure the hoops, too.
The plastic hardware cloth rolls came in 3′ widths, so it took three lengths to cover the frame, which then had to be lashed together. I went with 4′ lengths this time, for a lower arch compared to the fence wire cover. Once the hoops were snugged in place and trimmed to size, I used garden twist ties to secure them to the mesh and prevent them from being pushed sideways.
With the outward pressure of the hoops, this frame had a couple of screw eyes added to the middle of each long side and cord strung across, to keep the sides from bowing outwards.
Conclusion: This frame is definitely the most aesthetically pleasing of them all. It’s easy to move around with 1 person, and the lower arch is good for shorter crops. I would not, however, use this plastic hardware cloth again. It creates too much shade. Which is great if I have it over a bed of lettuce, but obviously, it wouldn’t be good to use over something that needs full sun. I also would rather have the flexibility of using whatever cover I need for a particular bed. I want these frames to be interchangeable as possible, whether a bed needs shade cloth, greenhouse plastic, or frost protection. If I need to use hoops for support again, the PEX pipe is definitely the way to go.
Last of all is the frame done today, so I’ll just go straight to the conclusion:
Conclusion: As this one didn’t need any extra wood added to the sides or ends, it is the least structurally secure, but that’s an easy fix. I would not use this 2″ hardware cloth again, though, for the same reason I wouldn’t use chicken wire. It’s just not strong enough, and bends too easily, even doubled up.. It will also need support hoops added at some point. It’ll be used, but that’s about it.
As we build more high raised beds, we will also build more covers Experimenting with the different materials has shown me a lot of what works best for our needs – and what to avoid! Armed with this information, I’ll know what to keep an eye out for and pick up as the budget allows, to have on hand for when we have more beds to protect!
Absolutely wasted, and will probably be sore and barely able to move tomorrow, but happy!
My daughter and I got so much done today. But first, the cuteness!
Would you look at that flat pancake of a kitten!
This one actually allows me to pet it, and even pick it up at times.
After our failure this morning in getting a shelter over the stump bench, I decided we may as well cut down the dead tree beside it. I was then going to clean up the bench and get at least one coat of paint on it.
The first photo is the “before” image. Instagram crops things weird, and their crop options suck, so you can’t see the bench in that one.
Which direction to get it to fall was the issue. No matter where it fell, it would be landing on something. The thing was to get it to land on something with the least amount of damage. So I tried to get it to fall on the bench, in the middle, where it has the most support. It would still be hitting the big maple on the way down, but not as much of it.
As you can see in the second photo, it came down about as perfect as could be! One maple branch broke off and that was it.
My daughter and I then cut off all the branches; me with the chain saw, her with the electric pruner/baby chainsaw.
Once the branches were clear, I cut away the few bits of wood that were holding the trunk to the stump still, then cut the end flat. We then measured out 18′, and cut it with a few inches extra. This log is the right size to match the largest log we’ve got for the trellis bed. The two largest logs will be the bottoms longs for the sides, then the thinner ones will go on top.
Next, we cleared away all the branches and extra pieces. There was another stump that had originally been intended to be part of the stump bench, but it was too rotten. That finally got cut down to ground level. The new stump was also got trimmed lower, though not quite to ground level. Maybe we’ll put a planter on it or something, at some point. 😊 We also used a rope and dragged the 18′ piece over to where the trellis bed will be built.
It was SO much easier to grad that big log with two people!
This is the third dead spruce we’ve cleared out of this one little section. At least one of them was killed off by the Virginia creeper that had been allowed to attach itself to it. This tree that we had cleared away had still been alive until last year or so.
Then, since I had the chain saw handy, and 200 ft of extension cord, I took advantage of it.
The easy part was cutting away the remains of a dead crab apple tree that was off by itself. In the photos with the dead spruce tree, you can actually see it through the dead branches of the fallen tree.
In the above photos, the first one is in between two large crab apple trees. These were suckers growing out from around the remains of trees that died long ago. They were much harder to cut away and clean up, because they were so tangled up in the two live trees. In one of those, I cut away some dead branches, too.
Now that the suckers are gone, there are branches from the live trees hanging really low, as they are no longer being held up by the suckers!
The second photo shows where the single dead crab apple tree had been. Between the freshly cut stump and the next live tree are another three stumps cut to ground level, plus two more behind where I’m standing to take the photo. Way too many trees were planted way too close together!
There is still one more at the very end that will need cleaning up. Again, the original tree had died long ago, and there are just suckers growing. There may still be one that produces tasty apples; another that I knew for sure had good apples broke in a storm last year and didn’t recover. We’ll see if any of the remaining ones are worth salvaging, but they won’t be ripe for at least another month.
My daughter made many trips to the branch pile past the fire pit, clearing away as I cut. As we were finishing up, I decided to take a closer look at the stuck tree my brother had cut down for me. I wanted to see if I could safely cut away the dead tree it was stuck on. There were actually a couple of trees that were holding it up. One was a small spruce that got bent under the fallen trunk. Sadly, I had to cut it, even though it was still alive. I could see that even if I got the bigger tree cut away, the little one would still hold up the tree we were trying to access, and cause the tree we were after to roll towards other trees, rather than fall to the ground
I was able to cut through the little spruce’s trunk, but with everything so jammed together, nothing moved. I was, however, able to get a good look at the dead tree the fallen tree was stuck on.
What you’re seeing in that first photo is a tree top. You can see that, at some point, the tip had broken off, and two branches grew upwards, forming a double top. This is pretty common for spruces. As the tree my brother cut down fell and got caught on other trees, it broke this tree top. As it slowly continued to fall lowers in high winds, the tree top ended up vertical, with its broken end on the ground as it it had grown there!
In the second photo, you can see the tree with a broken off top that I think it came from.
So I grabbed the rope my daughter and I used to drag the 18′ log out, and wrapped it around the bottom of the tree top. I wasn’t able to get it completely off, as there were branches getting caught, but it is no longer holding up the stuck tree. Since I had also cut the other little tree, that came off its stump and fell, too. Finally, the stuck tree came down! No, it’s not on the ground, but that’s just fine. It’s only being held up by its own branches and undergrowth now, and it completely accessible!
We can now clear it, cut it to size and drag the pieces out.
But not today! My daughter and I were both completely beat by then. Thank goodness it was a “cooler” day, with a high of “only” 27C/81F.
So… we didn’t paint the bench and, with possible thunderstorms or showers starting tomorrow afternoon and over the next few days (depending on what app I look at), it may not get done for possibly another week.
That’s okay. The bench and the folding table I want to also paint won’t melt. It just means we work on something else, instead. Like finally continuing that trellis bed!
I’m just so happy we were able to get all this stuff done. It feels so good!
After much fighting, the supports for the car port thingy were put together, slid through the channels in the cover, then dragged over to where it would be set up. What we needed to do next was get the whole thing upright, supported by the lengths of rebar I got to pound into the ground.
Well, here’s how it looks now.
That’s right. It’s all disassembled again.
I have no idea how this thing was put together originally. Clearly, it had been used. From the tool marks on the support pieces, it was also obvious others had struggled with it, too.
It simply would not go up.
This was how it was when I left it, yesterday.
The girls raised the first supports at the end by the tree, which took some doing as one side piece kept spinning, so instead of an arch shape, they were fighting with an S shape. Eventually, they had it so I could pound the rebar into the ground and they set the supports on them.
Of course, there was still the weight of all the other sections pulling on it, so even with the stakes supporting it, that first arch had to be held up. While they did that, I started to raise the next set of supports until they could reach out and hold it, too. They still could not let go of the first support, though.
Then one of the side supports fell off.
After pushing the cover up and over, we were able to get it back together again, but not completely. Plus, the pieces started spinning to the point that the top arch piece ended up upside down. There was just no way to get it back in position again. Particularly since the top arch piece was holding the cover, and the cover had the weight of several other support pieces hanging off of it.
There was simply no way it was going to work. Without any kind of horizontal supports, with the pieces constantly twisting and spinning, plus the weight of the cover, nothing would stay where it was supposed to. It’s not like we could put the supports up first, since they were designed to run through the channels in the cover. Maybe if we had two more people, we could have done it, but not with just the three of us.
Well, we’re just going to have to try and get things painted without any sort of shelter. We do have the market tent, but it’s broken on one side, so moving it would not be a good idea. We’re supposed to have rain in a few days, though when and how much changes depending on which app I’m looking at. If all goes well, we should be able to get at least a couple of coats done before it gets rained on.
I suppose we should take down that dead spruce, first. The only direction for it to fall without getting hung up on other trees is over the bench. The bench should be strong enough to hand it, though, since it’s built onto a tree stump in the middle, plus it has supports on each end. There are enough branches to keep the full weight of the tree from hitting the bench, too.
I didn’t pick any bush beans for a couple of days, so there was plenty to pick this morning!
I also grabbed a few Gold Ball turnips, Uzbek Golden carrots – a first harvest of those – and snagged a yellow zucchini. There’s some green ones starting to grow, and one that is almost ready to harvest, but not quite!
I uploaded other photos onto Instagram. As you go through these, can you please let me know if any of them look like the files got corrupted somehow? I am having problems with viewing batches of photos like this. They look fine as I go through the process, but after they’ve been published and I view them, there are usually visual changes to some of them. Some are so bad, I can barely see the image, so I delete the whole thing and start over. I had to do that with this batch, and I still see problems. The images are at least identifiable, though!
Please let me know if you see it to, or if it’s just my computer messing up!
The first image is of the North Georgia Candy Roaster squash that is getting SO big, so fast! It seems to be getting noticeably bigger, every day! There were also a lot of new female flowers among the candy roasters and the Pink Bananas.
There is a little patch of allium flowers that come up every year through a crack between sidewalk blocks and the laundry platform steps. They are in full bloom right now, and the bees loves them. I tried taking photos and just happened to catch the bee as it flew off to another flower head!
The earliest Sweet Chocolate bell peppers are turning colour quite nicely right now.
The next photo, of the chamomile flowers, looks like it has a block of purple over all but the top of the photo. Do you see that too?
The chamomile are blooming quite enthusiastically right now.
The very first luffa flower has opened – and is being pollinated!
Last of all is the first flower on the Classic Eggplant. Check out those spikes on it!
On another topic entirely, I brought one of the yard kittens in, so my daughter and I could wash its eyes out. They were completely stuck shut. As soon as the dried gunk was softened enough that the lids started to open, they started oozing more gunk! It’s nose was all gummed up, too, and somehow a tiny piece of flexible plastic was stuck to it! My guess is it was from the strips of plastic that covered the adhesive on the new roof tiles. We’re still finding them blowing around.
We got the kitten cleaned up as best we could, then set it outside again, but not before my daughter got a picture of it. The Cat Lady is going to be coming for Ghosty soon. I hated to asked, but I sent her the picture and asked if they would be able to take a second sick kitten.
She had to check with her husband, who was monitoring their cat that just came out of surgery not long ago. Their cat seems to be doing all right, so she will take the sick kitten. With its eyes gumming up so much, it tends to stay by the house a lot, so we should be able to find it and catch it, once we know she’s on the way.
The down side is, the rescue’s budget for August already done, having gone towards spays. Which means they’ll be taking on these two, out of pocket! They’ve already spent thousands on just two cats in the past, but they’re still willing to take on these two. The other downside is, once they’re all healthy, it’s been difficult to adopt cats out. Partly because she wants to keep them! 😄 I do expect Ghosty will get adopted out easily. She is a rather unique looking kitten. A bit freaky at times, too! She’s got blue eyes, and when the light hits them just right, her pupils glow red. We think she might have partial albinism. Her eyes are still sticky, too, but she has gotten much better since coming inside.
The Cat Lady commented that the strain causing these problems is particularly bad this year. Not just with so many sick cats, but so many kittens dying this year, too. So it’s not just at our place! We’ve found so many dead kittens this year, plus losing Question, even after bringing her inside. We’re still tossing the outside cats’ kibble with lysine to help their immune systems, but it’s the little ones that are suffering. The adults seem just fine, but with the littles, it seems that as soon as they start getting weaned, it’s just not enough.
Well, we do what we can! I feel bad asking the Cat Lady for help, though, but after Leyendecker, we just don’t have the budget to take another cat to the vet. The Cat Lady’s rescue runs on donations, but they do a lot out of pocket, too. Her husband, thankfully, makes good money, but it’s still a lot to cover out of pocket!
Ah, well. I’m just glad she’ll be able to take Ghosty and this other kitten. She is so awesome!
The Re-Farmer 