Compost Wall and Grafts in Ground

I have finished planting the grafts. Friday I planted fifty or so, and tried to fully dig up the Johnson grass and other weeds from the entire area. This left little weeding and much planting to do on Saturday. It took hours longer than I expected, but by the time our soaking rain commenced, the grafts were in the ground, the soil mulched, and we were all ready for it. Happy Arbor Day.

On Friday Phil cleared a little swatch of pine trees with the chainsaw, then pushed the debris out of the way with the tractor, and strung up wire so the cows could graze near the creek. That little patch of pine trees is so overgrown, it's one of the myriad projects that I think, "Oh, if only we could get to that." Friday was the day; though not entirely cleared, halfway in a single morning is good progress. The cows were happy to move on.

Then the boys and grandparents helped Phil gather up various cattle panels that we've taken down around the finger. Logistically, it's a big task, and figuring out where and how to store them took some doing. (Phil ended up stacking them vertically against the fence, and tying them down after every couple panels. It took a long time, but they are compressed into a small space, and will hopefully not have too great a weed load grow up around them.)

Friday night, Mr. Bigglesworth joined us for dinner outdoors. The puppies barked at him, and he didn't raise a hackle or bat an eye. What a mellow, self-possessed cat!

Which was great until after dark, when we realized we hadn't seen him and couldn't find him. How disconcerting! Two days of cat ownership?

I found out the next morning that he had come scratching at the motor home door in the night, and spent the night there, contentedly curled up in bed between Phil's parents. I was very thankful to see him wander around the homestead the next day. He's not going anywhere.

Phil had wondered about bringing wood up slope with a trailer we've been borrowing to get hay. Before he could do that, though, he realized he needed to clear the driveway of the matted hay and manure pack accumulated at Christmas. So he started building a compost pile, using the tractor bucket to dump loads into a 4' space he made between two cattle panels. Ideally, a compost pile would be about 4' wide and 4' high, and as long as need be.

After a short while, he needed to add another cattle panel. Then he hooked up the backhoe, and used that to scoop the 12" or so of pack under the shelter where we fed the cows. This massive quantity seemed to continue expanding, and Phil wonders if it will make a wall 64' long. It could be.

Aesthetically, it's a bit odd to have a black wall now blocking the view of my garlic and grafts. But it's nice to be so wealthy in future compost.