Road Construction Completed

    The work on the access road is complete for the time being. The road is past our property through to the site where they need to do some repair on some of their equipment. That work is scheduled to take place next week, after which we probably won't see the water people again for some time.  Eventually they want to put the road all the way through to the next street, but that probably won't happen this year.  When it does happen it won't have any impact on us.

Access road looking west

Access road looking east

    In the process of working on the road they cut down a number of good sized red alder trees and two bitter cherries.  Its very tempting to try and salvage some of the wood for something other than firewood.  Alas I already have two maple trees that will need to come down some time in the coming year. The goats girdled the trunks so they are in the process of dying. Linda has expressed skepticism that the trees are really dying because they still have leaves. I think she is suspicious that I am merely lusting after the wood. I would like to have some nice Maple buzzed up into 2 inch thick planks. However, I currently  have a good part of my garage space filled with 1x6 cedar planks that will soon be ready to plane into tongue and groove for our ceiling.  So much good wood and so little disposable time.

    One happy outcome of the water right of way access road is that we now are pretty clear about the location of the property line on the north side of our lot.  Other than a portion of our blueberry patch, almost all of the property on our side of the access road belongs to us.  I am going to end up with an additional eight feet in the area I'm using for my bee yard.  That will make the beehives less crowded. A small portion of my erstwhile corn patch remains.  Now that the construction is through I will be able to use that for a small garden area on the north side of the duck pen(emphasis on the word small).  There isn't enough room there to grow corn, but a lot of other things will work there.  I have about 20 corn plants left there so I will at least get to see how my new variety of indian corn works out.  I just won't expect the ears to be filled out well.  Also there will be enough room for another clothes line for Linda. I have resolved to build a more sturdy clothes line this time around. The last one was somewhat ramshackle.

The Dry Beans are doing well

Pole Beans and Broccoli

    Our garden out front is looking pretty good. I spent some time this past week transplanting the broccoli and lettuce starts that Rachel sent home with me. Both the pole beans and the dry beans are up in the front garden.  I planted some of Linda's flowers around the birdbath as requested.  I've gathered some Indian Plum withes for a cutesy fence surrounding the garden in front, the fence being one of Linda's prerequisites.

    Hopefully we are getting close to the hatch date for some ducklings.  I checked on the hen this morning and she is still happily setting away.  June 19th was the date I estimated we should be able to expect something to hatch out.  My plan is to see if the hen will try and mother the little ducklings. If not, I will have to transfer them to a cage and take care of them myself.