Tis a fine barn, but sure 'tis no pool
Easily the most aggravating part of this adventure so far has been the construction of Ft. Tenuous Hope. A ShelterLogic outfit from Menard’s, this thing gave us more than enough room for our meager farm implements, but at a terrrrrrrible cost! That cost being a year off our lives and two years off our livers.
Poor kids; they have no idea what’s coming to them
Spring was springing, and we wanted to move fast to put together a dedicated shelter for our onsite operations and tractor before we needed to begin tilling and planting our garden patch.
Therein lies the rub. A big patch of land with no windbreaks whatsoever and varying elevation amounts to a bunch of windy bullshit, pretty much all the time. Between that and April showers, it was difficult to time the project. We put together the bones first. None of the measurements were accurate, the ground was uneven, the documentation was severely lacking, and we were straight out of rum. But, on Day One we ended before the storm hit, with an anchored skeleton of the finished product.
Ominous clouds of foreshadowing
And actually, that stood the test of time (the test of time being a couple days). When next we were able to return to the project, our objective was to stretch the cover over the frame and wrap things up in an hour or two (as per the recommendations of ShelterLogic).
How wrong we were.
We picked a good day for this, we really did. And we got part of the way there; the included ratchets mostly worked, we had most of the parts we needed, and we got most of the reinforcements complete. Unfortunately we just missed the canvas. Not from our own error mind you, but because ShelterLock neglected to include the FULL TOTAL OF NUTS THAT WE NEEDED TO FINISH THE CROSS-RIBS OF THE GOSH DARN SHELTER.
…sorry. I overreacted. What’s the worst that could happen?
See, the problem is, we’ve already roped the canvas over the top, secured it to both front and back of the shelter in multiple spots, and begun on the crossbars to only THEN find out that we’ve been shorted by some 28 nuts.
Fine, we said. We’ll just come back tomorrow with more nuts, we said. But this is what we got; in no time the winds had already begun tearing the canvas and bending the frame apart. So we started over again, using the car to tow the frame back into shape, and bending the frame to our will. After another afternoon of effort and double-checking all locks, ratchets, and anchors, we felt reasonably accomplished. We finally had a base of operations, and could move forward with purchasing our tractor.
Yup, mission accomplished. It took a lot of work, but it’s done. Time to move on.
…
Nothing else could possibly go wrong. Nope, nothing but smooth sailing from here on out…
…
Our neighbor’s trees
It took about 48 hours for the power of the wind over the property to shear the metal skeleton apart, break the legs anchored to the ground, and send the structure flying like a leaf on the wind. Alllllll the way into the neighbor’s trees across the road.
Have I mentioned how super cool our neighbors are? Our neighbor to the west called us to let us know it happened, about an hour after we left the property. And our neighbor to the east, without whose trees our shelter would still be roaming to this day, was more than understanding. Could be worse, all things considered.
Guess we won’t be using a hoop-house structure on the property any time soon. Windmills, however, absolutely!
Zen and the Art of Fence Maintenance
In which Carly and Cal attempt to keep Kip fenced in
Project #1: Make it harder for Kip to play on the damn road
One of the first projects we’ve set ourselves upon is patching any spots Kip, our… structural reliability testing puppy could use to escape the property. We actually accomplished this earlier in the spring, while the ground was still frozen and we were far from worrying about planting. But, before we began any extensive projects, we needed to know that our dogs were save and secure roaming the property. Enter Kip, our puppy.
I’m about to test the structural reliability of your face!
The core problem was a few crooked posts along the East fence, where outflow from a nearby culvert caused the ground to shift slightly. While at the time we lacked the horsepower to move the posts themselves (the property is fenced with railroad ties), we could at least dig up the bent over fence, bring it taut, and reattach it to the shifted fence posts.
Once we hit our rhythm, this was actually pretty straightforward. The hardest part was that under the accumulated debris that was holding the fence down, it was also covered by a few inches of frozen mud, and we didn’t pack an ice pick! While it made a one-hour job into a three-hour job, steadily chipping away at the exposed ice allowed us to free the fence and reattach it at higher, puppy-proof levels.
And with that, we officially made our first mark on the property. It may not look like much now, after all that we’ve done since, but the security of knowing Kip isn’t going to start off down the road the second we’re occupied is a life saver all on its own. Good enough, anyway, to enjoy a victory lap and a couple pints at Alluvial!
Local man finishes website!
In which Cal tests out the future home of the TTF blog
Welcome to the Terrier Tough Farm blog!
For regular news and updates on how things are progressing on and off the land, you’re in the right place. Spring is already well underway, and we have quite a few updates on deck waiting for me to hit the publish button. Now that we’ve done that, stay tuned! We can’t wait to share them :)