Hello Everyone!
Sweet spot timing, Another chanterelle, A tiny box turtle, Assembling shelving, Expanding the lowest terrace & Back to limited supplies!
Alright, it is now half past four in the morning and I have been up since midnight sipping espresso while enjoying the silence... but I best pause all that and dive in here before too much more time passes. Getting these entries made, edited and posted keeps bleeding over into the early morning daylight hours... and I need to get better at either starting on it all earlier or begin keeping the writing as short as possible.
The heat is the real clincher in it all, because while I often enjoy hiking around and 'loafing' during the very early hours after dawn... instead of diving straight into working... and with how hot it has been... I have been getting out early and 'hitting the ground' running so to speak. Between the constant 'on again off again' rainy weather and the sweltering heat timing things has been a challenge... so I have been trying to remain as flexible as possible whilst not wasting time either.
Anyways, yesterday morning I went hiking looking for any new mushrooms popping up... and along the way I found another chanterelle and also some new white colored mushrooms that I had not seen growing around here before. I was pretty stoked over finding the chanterelle... and of all the places to find one it was growing just downhill of the earth bridge and only a few steps off the path.
After all the hiking was done, I headed up to the driveway area to see what all that I could get done... and to see how well everything was doing after the most recent bout of heavy rain. Per usual, I swung by the spring head area to see how the spring was looking... and to put the cover back into place since the water had pooled so much there that it had displaced it.
When I got close enough to the spring, I immediately noticed that there was a dark object floating in the water... and although at first I thought it was either a piece of wood (or something similar) it turned out to be a little box turtle. Thankfully the little critter did not drown (because they are tortoises regardless of 'turtle' being in the name) and was floating in the hole filled with water... and had its head resting on a tiny ledge.
Of course, I immediately fished it from the water... and after briefly looking it over... I found a nice safe place for it in some nearby vegetation and set it down where it had enough coverage that it would not be easy prey for any birds. I did briefly consider keeping it and building an outdoor pen etcetera... but decided I would rather it live free if it was healthy... and decided that I would come back later to check on it.
Throughout the day, I went back to that area several times... and never saw the wee box turtle again... so I hope that it gets to wherever it is heading to... and makes more little box turtles some day. It might not seem like much but as I have stated numerous times before... there just is not much wildlife here and having an encounter like that was rather encouraging (to say the least) because I also saw a small rabbit a few days ago.
On a different note, I spent some time getting some stuff sorted out in the new building... and putting together some shelving to help get everything organized better. I also made some 'real' window coverings with some thick brown construction paper... and taped them into place with some painter's tape... which definitely made the place feel more private and less like a pickup window at a fast food joint.
I also tackled the task of cutting up a bunch of tree branches into stakes of various sizes... and then using them to expand upon the bottom terrace that I began the other day by putting that single pole/log in place at the foot of the slope. All in all, that project went way faster that I thought that it would... and before long I was adding 'brown' wood and back-filling the entire thing with 'dirt' and a bunch of that sandy silt from the retention area.
Basically, that latest terrace is also another hugel mound... but this time I only used small sticks inside the mound and I mainly used pine to construct the weir for the terrace. Most likely, the pine will rot out rather quickly which is fine by me... because I want where it is at to become a berm that can help channel all of the runoff water to the retention area.
By the end of the day I was feeling more than a little wiped out from everything... and wound up chewing through several days of food rations just to abate my hunger. Getting things done is nice and all but I am now back to needing to get more food... and nearly out of water from drinking so much of it while working... and actually I probably will be out once I make my next cup of espresso!
Well, on that note I am going to wrap this up and do the tedious editing and posting... while trying not to have a mini-meltdown over my throttled internet connection making the entire process incredibly annoying. I hope that folks are doing well. Ta ta for now and all that feel good jazz.