How is your imagination?

Squint your eyes a bit and pretend that all this gloopy clay is in fact beautiful hand made terracotta pavers, and that the sun is shining down, and you have a cool drink in your hand, skimpy clothing on, and are reclining in a comfy chair.  Got it?

Roof Shout

I've knocked the bugger off! The clay mountain has been topped. Looking back on some old photos, I realise the garden has come a long way.

 

Before (with the weeds)

 

Before (without the weeds)

 

Now

Still got lots to do, but look at that lovely flatness at the back! I can just see those chickens running around, soon, when there are green things for them to eat.

 

Before

 

Now.

The planted sticks are where my fruit trees will go.  Not long till they are available in the nurseries.

 

Wet Muddy Paws

When your backyard looks like this after a bit of rain

 

 

and you have this many sets of paws

 

 

then all your floors look like this.

 

 

 

 

And I mean, ALL.  Beds too. Towels. Fresh washing, should you be so forgetful to leave any lying around.

As an aside...have you noticed the amount of personal space between each, at the breakfast setting? Wouldn't want to actually breath the same air now...

Clay Progress

 

Last weekend I moved dirt from 1 heap to another heap. I spread some of the top soil around a bit. But mainly I attacked the 'Clay Mountain'.

 

I'm using it to build up the high side of my (future) lawn, so the water can run away rather than pool - which happened a lot last winter.

 

 

The white stuff is clay breaker - gypsum - to break down the clay and turn it into lovely soil - or so the propaganda goes, we shall see.  I'm in experimental mode with this at the moment.  This tiny skinny strip was 1/2 a bucket full, so might need to buy a truck load of the stuff rather than a bag. Incredibly heavy stuff though!

 

Along the wall is a little strip of all the good dirt I'm excavating.  This will become a small strip of planting, I'm thinking passionfruit and grapes and climbing roses and maybe a tecomanthe speciosa.

Weekend work in the rain?

Well, this weekend looks like it might be wet.  Which will make the ramp too slippery to be able to push wheelbarrows up to a skip. So here is the plan of things to do that will take me forward, without doing all the heavy clay moving:

- move (tiny) pile of top soil to the edge, where the new strip garden will be
- dig some of the clay mountain that is a slightly more top soil than clay, and use it to level the area that will be lawn.
- spread some clay breaker lime
- continue delving for bigger rocks in 'The Quarry' - more on this later

We'll see how far that goes!  Might be really wet, in which case maybe I'll drink coffee and read the paper and draw up a plan of where the sun is on my section.

What to do with all the dirt?

So where is all this huge hole going to go?  The boys are digging through clay, a bit of top soil, and gravel from under a 100 year old path.  They need to pick axe it to loosen it, spade it away then load it into a wheel barrow.  I toyed with the idea at one stage of putting it into the bottom of planters, but have decided that in the long run, that would not produce happy plants. 

 

So then they push it up the ramp to the street level and dump it in a rubbish skip.

 

 

 

So we (me in supervision mode) have done 4 skips worth.  I tried a bit, was on wheelbarrow filling duty, but only managed a few spoonfuls to their complete barrow load.  I do, as a result though, have full appreciation for the impossibly hardness of the task - seems like super human effort in only 2 weeks to me.

 

Below is The Clay Mountain.  This is the next pile of clay to go, also to be barrowed up the ramp.  Looks like enough clay to build an entire subdivision.  Looks quite tiny in the photo though, will have to get my cat to pose next to it!