Clean up: it’s for the birds, and planning ahead

May 13, 2019 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

Today, I continued my spring clean up around the yard. Now that we have yard equipment in the side of the garage we’d stored the foam insulation from around the house last summer, this year I’ve put them into the barn for storage.

I’d love to empty that barn so we can actually use it.

All in good time!

For now, I went back to the jasmine bed, mulched it with straw and began saturating the mulch with water. Though we did get rain recently, it wasn’t enough and everything is still bone dry.

While the hose was running there, I decided to move the unused bird bath from beside the storage house to the flower bed by the bird feeder. I found a block to use as a foundation and used a hoe to dig down and level a spot for it, first. Once the bird bath was in place, I moved the bird feeder stand to its summer location. Over the next month or so, the flowers should hide at least part of the bases.

That bird bath needs a thorough scrubbing and re-painting. We shall see if that becomes a job for this year, or next. Or maybe we’ll get a new one.

I’m hoping the water is far enough away from the platform feeder that falling seeds will not become a problem. When the lilac beside it is in full leaf, it should provide some shade. This should slowly become a nice little bird garden, I hope. :-)

The birds were quick to come back to the feeding station, but I haven’t seen them checking out the water, yet.

I also cleared out the bricks that I took out when rebuilding the jasmine bed. I have decided what I will be using them for.

This is the window to the old part basement, where we used to throw logs in for the wood burning furnace. The roof that keeps precipitation from leaking into the basement is on a hinge, but I haven’t decided on how I will get it to stay all the way up while I work. If I really need to, I can also remove it until the job is done. The cat kibble is under there to keep it out of the weather. There are chunks of brick and blown in leaves, but otherwise I think it’s just dirt. The “retaining walls” built up on the sides are slowly getting unstable.

The plan is to clear all that out and redo it with a brick “floor” under the window. Which will also be a good time to get the foam insulation out of the opening and put the metal mesh window over it for the summer. The wood frame for that is rotting, though, so I hope to scrounge up the materials to redo that as well.

For now, I’ve just brought over the bricks and filled the wheel barrow with water. Partly to get rid of any dirt and whatnot stuck to them, but also to wash away any ants or other leggy critters that might get transferred over with the bricks. I’d seen some tiny red ants when I dug the bricks out, and some were still there when I moved them to the wheel barrow, so I want to make sure to get rid of those or any eggs that might be attached. I might not get back to this until tomorrow, though. It’s already gotten very hot out there – we are at 23C right now – and this area is in full sun.

That reminds me. Time to check on the kitties in the sun room again!

The Re-Farmer

Today’s kitty pictures.

May 13, 2019 / Re-Farmer / 2 Comments

When starting my rounds this morning, I had both mamas looking at the door, waiting for me in the sun room! As soon as I opened the second door from the old kitchen, Beep Beep ran right in, then looked at me… waiting…

For what, I have no idea, but it gave me a chance to peek at her babies.

Just look at them! They’re like an adorable row of furry sausages. <3

Then I looked into the box nest for Butterscotch’s babies.

It was empty.

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Clean Up: grape vines – a discovery

May 3, 2019 / Re-Farmer / 1 Comment

It was a pleasant evening tonight, and I decided to take a walk around the yard, to enjoy the longer daylight.

I go distracted and ended up clearing and trellising the grape vine. Well. A temporary trellis, as least.

I also made a discovery.

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I see you!

May 3, 2019May 3, 2019 / Re-Farmer / 1 Comment

The girls and I made a trip into the city today, and when we got back, I made sure to visit the mamas and kittens in the sun room.

Two of the kittens have their eyes open! The orange and white tabby does not, and I couldn’t see the face of the tuxedo to tell one way or the other.

They are so adorable!!!

In other news, we are finally ready to get the trees done. All of them, not just a half-job. I made the call this morning, and they will come out within the next two weeks.

So two live trees that are putting the house as risk and one dead tree that is a risk of falling onto the power lines will come down completely. Then the power lines will be cleared of branches the whole way. They will be bringing a chipper to do the small stuff, and we will be keeping the wood (there was the option of them taking the wood away, if we wanted).

We’re thinking about what the next big job (money wise, at least) should be a priority. It will mostly likely be to rent a heavy duty chipper for a week, and clear out the piles of branches all over the place. Getting a quote to get the driveway done with fresh gravel is also on the list, but as much as it could use it now, this will likely be a next year thing.

Little by little, we’re getting the job done!

The Re-Farmer

Looking around

May 2, 2019 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

We had a very foggy morning today, and there was still fog when I went out to do my rounds. I decided to see if I could get some good pictures from behind the barn, and ended up checking things out further. I have not actually gone done this way, this far, since we moved here, so much of what I was seeing was new to me.

The first thing I stopped to check out was some fencing around trees. There used to be a pig pen and a manure pile in the area. I can see that the fencing went around the trees, but I am unsure of why. It was done long ago, and much of it has fallen.

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Seasonal things

April 25, 2019 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

I’ve been able to spend more time outside in the last few days. Aside from cleaning up the downed branches in the yard and burning them in the fire pit, this has mostly been assessing things and making decisions.

I was checking around the garden area and could clearly see where the deer were coming in at the corner.

Even with the snow gone, the path the deer made through the ditch and over the fence is clearly visible!

I was also noticing some changes. Like this.

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Found it!

April 11, 2019 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

We have finally reached a point where enough snow has melted away, and the yard is dry enough, that I can walk around most of the yard.

At least while the ground is still frozen in the mornings.

Which meant I have finally been able to look for the base of the grape vine that got surrounded by spirea, next to the storage house.

I found it.

It’s still hard to see, so I put the arrow in. It’s hard to see because there is a spirea growing right up against it!

I’m going to have to be very careful, clearing that away.

Then I can prune it back and set up some kind of trellis for it to climb. I’m thinking of using the left over wire fencing I used to build the back gate. After that, it will be a matter of keeping the spirea from crowding it again. Hopefully, this will translate to better, bigger grapes to harvest this year. If nothing else, it’ll be easier to get to them! :-)

While doing my much extended rounds this morning, I had some delightful company.

Butterscotch does make it hard to walk at times. :-)

The Re-Farmer

Ice and snow

March 13, 2019 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

I swung by the lake this morning, after dropping my daughter off at work.

The fishing sheds are still there – from what I know, they were supposed to be off by three days ago! In the distance, I could see some people walking on the ice to a vehicle. There’s been a lot of plowing of snow, done, clearing “roads” to various areas. The open water that was visible the last time I got pictures from here, due to a water main break nearby, is all frozen over.

This morning, I finally started getting the weather alerts for blizzard conditions tonight, in the southeast of our province. The weather system is blowing up from the US, and there is an expected 10-20cm of snow.

Except locally. Our area is supposed to get light snow flurries overnight.

Starting from about a week from now, temperatures are supposed to go above freezing, and stay there. I’ve been reading about the ice breakers already hard at work on the major rivers to the south of us, that drain into this lake. As the ice will be breaking up and snow melting faster in the US and the South of our province than here, ice dams tend to form, leading to flooding. The ice breakers are working to prevent that and will work their way up towards the lake, as quickly as they can.

Here, the ice will soon start to “rot”, and form into candle ice. This can be very dangerous, as the ice still looks thick and solid, but easily breaks apart. On the lake, at least, the tides will break it apart and start pushing the ice onto the shore. I happened to be on this beach one time, many years ago, as the tide was coming in, and it was really quite dramatic!

It’s already warming up nicely this morning; we even had fog, as we drove to town, closer to the lake. We’re supposed to reach +1C this afternoon, but it already feels that warm in the sun. The outside cats are definitely liking the warmer temperatures, and spending less time in the sun room.

I’m looking forward to when I can empty that room and clean it out, though. The warmer it gets, the worse the cat urine smell. :-( Ah, well. All in good time!

The Re-Farmer

Well, that almost worked

March 11, 2019 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

Today, I went out to use The Beast. We haven’t had more snow, but I wanted to clear some paths that were blown over, widen a parking area, and make the path to the fire pit wide enough for my husband’s walker. We’re planning to have a cookout on the weekend. All this, I could do with the little electric snow blower, but is just much easier with the big beast.

Plus, I just wanted to use it, now that it’s running again.