Landscaping (Bare dirt, now what?)

[BeauV]

When we bought our tiny Ranchito the land was covered in the wreckage of a Thomas Church designed feux-British garden replete with boxwood hedges, rose bush arches over tiny paths, little bits of lawn surrounded by cute rows of flowers. Simply put, over the years the vision of Mr. Church had been destroyed by "improvements" which made things entirely claustrophobic.

So, we just scraped it all away and are starting over. The picture below shows the back yard with the M&Ms wondering why their Opa wanted them to stand in the middle of an acre of wood chips. Over the coming months, while I'm unemployed, I'll be the general contractor on a new garden to fill the space.

[kimbottles]

Let us know when you are done and we will schedule another road trip to view it.

[JoeP]

Nice big yard Beau.

[BeauV]

Joe, it's really a lot more than we need, but came with the house. I'll post the bird's eye view when we get it done. We have a veg garden and room for enough corn to feed us all.

[Olaf Hart]

We could recommend Duncan, our landscraper, but it wouldn't do you much good.

He and Sweet Hart were very good at finding projects for me to do ....

[SemiSalt]

Joe, it's really a lot more than we need, but came with the house. I'll post the bird's eye view when we get it done. We have a veg garden and room for enough corn to feed us all.

Asparagus? Strawberries? Currents? Quinces?

[Jamie]

I say a lawn with a space for boules. Fun with a beer, and in my case, cousins once removed.

[BeauV]

Semi, I'll be buying artichoke plants today or tomorrow. They only produce for about 3 years, so we'll plant a few each year to overlap them. In the plan, we've got Apples, Nectarines, Avocados, Lemons, Oranges, by way of fruit bearing trees. There will be enough raised bed space for lettuce, herbs, spinach, etc... Over by the corn, we'll do squashes (pumpkins in the fall) and eventually watermelon. There will be about a third of an acre in various plants we can eat. We've planned out where the trees and crops will go, so I'm full speed towards getting it all planted so we get veggies this year.

Jamie, lawns use up a lot of water in our area. We'll have a small fescue front "lawn" which we will water; in theory, fescue takes about one-third of the water that grass takes. There will be a small lawn just behind where the granddaughters are standing in the picture above. Probably about 30' by 80' or so, that's so they can run around and kick balls etc.... Once the grandkids are all grown, the lawn will get pulled up and we'll go to more natural native stuff that uses less water.

Both the Admiral and I feel that the place needs to look like California and not an English garden (which is what was originally planted here). For example, we won't plant anything under the oak trees, just let the leaves fall and the only modification will be to keep the Russian Wheat from growing. Of course, we see plenty of green grass with the 1st and 9th fairways right across a small street in front of our house.

Most folks don't realize that the rolling golden hills of California dotted with oak trees are not native at all. When people started raising cattle here after the Spanish moved in and herded most of the natives into Mission work camps they cleared the natural brush and planted Russian Wheat so the cattle would have something to eat. It went nuts and now all the semi-arid areas have 3-4 feet of wheat growing. We'll never get it out of the state, but I don't' want it in our yard.

[kdh]

Around here I let anything grow other than poison ivy or bittersweet, which is an asian invasive.

[BeauV]

Today is the kick off of the "back yard" part of the project. The guys (my gardeners) are bringing a small excavator and we'll tear out all the old brick and cement paths, grade the property just a little for the outdoor dining area and pergola, and clear the back 1/4 of the lot for the fruit trees.

I'm starting to realize the scope of the plumbing I need to do. You'll find me at the tool rental place Sunday, renting a trencher

I continue to ponder the water catchment and storage project. I did a spreadsheet and the numbers are:

• 67,600 gallons could be captured in an average year. 26k in a drought year and 100k in a wet year like the one we just had.

• The dollar value of the above is $633/year for the average year. The catchment system would lower our water bill by about 438% in a avg. year.

• The cost of the system would be about $26k, yielding a payback of over 40 years.


Of course, this payback doesn't consider the cost of replacing things destroyed by a drought, which could easily be $10-15K. Then there is the PITA of trenching, re-plumbing all the downspouts, and maintenance of the rest of my life

Pondering....

[BeauV]

We've been making progress on the landscaping. (My back is killing me, but it's a good feeling of tired muscles as opposed to the disk issues I had a few years ago.)

Up the page, there is a picture of my two little M&Ms standing in a field of wood chips. Well, today we turned a lot of that field into a lawn for them to play on. This was the Number One request from the M&Ms: "Opa, can we have a place to run with Misty?" Of course, they have me totally under their control. A few days ago we rented a massive rototiller and overturned the soil, then turned in 14 yards of manure/compost from our local dump. (Who knew that dump made compost from horse manure?) We then installed the sprinklers, rolled it flat, added edge boards, and last night I wet it all down with the new sprinklers.

0700 this morning a Peterbilt hauling an 80' flatbed trailer (at least I think it was 80' long) loaded with pallets of sod arrived on the street in front of our house. Six of those pallets, holding 2,506 sq ft of sod, were for us. Some of our neighbors started busily closing their windows, the forklift was a little loud. By 0740 we were underway laying sod.



My job, being the unskilled labor part of the team, was to haul the rolls of sod to the team that was placing them. I'm guessing they weigh about 70 lbs each, a sausage 3' long and 14" in diameter. I could only manage 4 per wheelbarrow load. (One of the team hauled 6 or 7.) The two of us could deliver sod rolls slightly faster than the other two could lay it, so we eventually got ahead and could pause, panting. (Well, I was panting, my 30yo compatriot was just resting calmly in the shade.) Here we are rumbling along.



Misty and the Admiral came out to inspect as the process wound down. Frankly, the things that were winding down were my muscles which were saying WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING!???!! The great news is that my lower back disk seems to have withstood all this without complaint. I might just get back to skiing next winter if I keep all this up. Start to finish, carrying and placing the sod took 4 of us 4 hours.



With the sod placed and being watered in, the Admiral and I reviewed progress with the vegetables and row crops. The corn is about mid-thigh high, the lettuce has gone CRAZY! We're all eating salad every day from the bed in the picture below (10' by 4'). We're not keeping up, we need to up our intake to at least 2 salads a day for all 8 of us . Darn we're going to be healthy!

[JoeP]

Vrolyk Farms products. Coming soon to the local Santa Cruz farmers market.

[BeauV]

Vrolyk Farms products. Coming soon to the local Santa Cruz farmers market.

World's Worst Profit Margin!

I don't want to think about what that lettuce costs. It's like a guy who tells his wife that his fishing boat is going to save on the food bill.

[LarryHoward]

Vrolyk Farms products. Coming soon to the local Santa Cruz farmers market.

World's Worst Profit Margin!

I don't want to think about what that lettuce costs. It's like a guy who tells his wife that his fishing boat is going to save on the food bill.

Mine believed a place on the water would lower our boat costs. Free slips!

Of course, we added 2 additional boats once we moved in.

[kimbottles]

Vrolyk Farms products. Coming soon to the local Santa Cruz farmers market.

World's Worst Profit Margin!

I don't want to think about what that lettuce costs. It's like a guy who tells his wife that his fishing boat is going to save on the food bill.

Mine believed a place on the water would lower our boat costs. Free slips!

Of course, we added 2 additional boats once we moved in.

Yeah!

Back when I bought the Lodge at Blakely Harbor I partially justified it by noting the $750 a month saved for the 60' slip we were renting then for the Swede55.

Of course I then had to buy a powerboat for the commute.....

[BeauV]

Pergola Project:

My lovely Admiral wants a pergola with an outdoor dining table that will seat the family for the Big Dinners. (That's a thing with us, everyone needs to show up and eat drink on Sundays if they're in town.)

So.... Here's how it's going. Post holes were dug and filled with concrete and I even remembered to put the steel brackets in before the concrete got hard . I mixed the concrete in a wheelbarrow in honor of my Dutch grandfather who built entire houses of concrete mixed in his wheelbarrow.

We've put down the base rock in the picture below, and are putting in the edging in the background. The crushed granite goes over this today.



Before we build the pergola, the wood needs to be treated (despite being redwood). My Admiral doesn't like the look of pre-treated wood, too many staple marks that make the wood look like.... well..... treated wood. So, we'll treat the posts first then stain the planks. It turns out that you can still buy an oil based treatment which contains a lot of copper. We used to call this stuff Cupernol (I think). I grabbed a quart, filled a bucket and started treating the ends of the posts. Bottom end, because it's close to the grownd and gets wet, top end because the rain and tree droppings will fall on the end grain and start rot. In the second picture, you can see how the dry wood has sucked up the copper solution.





Then it's off to put an oil based stain on the wood. Looks like it'll take 5 gallons to do it. Three gallons already applied.... my shoulder is sore... and 2 to go this morning once the dew is off the wood.



We'll compact the crushed granite and set up the posts later today (at least we hope to). Then my son-in-law and I will start hanging beams tomorrow. Yet another quick-n-easy project which has expanded into a lot more work that plan. But, the Admiral is worth it and it will be nice to have an outdoor eating space. (Actually our second outdoor eating space, but who's counting?)

[JoeP]

Nice project Beau. Probably too late now but did you put a weed blocking fabric down before the granite or are you going to lay down some pavers?

[BeauV]

Nice project Beau. Probably too late now but did you put a weed blocking fabric down before the granite or are you going to lay down some pavers?

No weed block. But there is 4" of base rack topped by 2" of crushed granite. We don't have any weeds around here (that I'm aware of ) which will grow through that. One thing we like about the rock+granite is that we can patch it. We do have big trees that like to toss around whatever is atop them. For example, in the front yard we have a black acacia which has lifted the kitchen garden wall almost 3' !! Eeeekk! Originally the paths were all brick set in sand. That looked like a scene from a World War I trench warfare movie. Up/down/sideways the trees had their way with the paths. We're expecting to cut, patch, and relay the rock+granite over the coming years.

We do use that fabric in the beds, like around rose bushes etc..., and it works great. Really cuts down on weeding the beds and helps keep the moisture in the soil on dry days.

[JoeP]

Yeah, trees can be a pain sometimes but I love having them. I just had a crew replace several sections of fence and one of the posts was completely embedded in the root of a nice birch on one side of our yard, They had to bridge the tree roots with a panel and move the fence in that area a few inches towards the neighbors' yard (luckily they didn't mind). I had to get rid of a nice fir that was wreaking havoc with my patio and my other neighbors garage foundation. In the front yard I had to get rid of two ornamental plum trees because they had reached the end of the line and were splitting apart. I replaced them with ornamental pear trees.

[Soñadora]

great thread, Beau. I have a love/hate relationship with yard work. Mostly hate, but when it's done and looks good, it's quite rewarding.

One thing you may want to consider is a pond. There is something very soothing about running water when entertaining in the back yard or just hanging out with a cup of coffee.

[Ish]

great thread, Beau. I have a love/hate relationship with yard work. Mostly hate, but when it's done and looks good, it's quite rewarding.

One thing you may want to consider is a pond. There is something very soothing about running water when entertaining in the back yard or just hanging out with a cup of coffee.

Our fountain in a large ceramic pot is very relaxing, now that we have given up on keeping it stocked with raccoon and heron food.

[BeauV]

great thread, Beau. I have a love/hate relationship with yard work. Mostly hate, but when it's done and looks good, it's quite rewarding.

One thing you may want to consider is a pond. There is something very soothing about running water when entertaining in the back yard or just hanging out with a cup of coffee.

Rick,

Years ago I had a pond that was fed by a stream I built complete with boulders and a tiny 18" waterfall. It was wonderful. But we have so many years of drought here that I just can't justify the cost of a pond/stream that would only be running about 3 out of 7 years (taking the last ten). Up to last winter, we had the following policies in place: Navy-Showers, "If it's yellow it's mellow and if it's brown it goes down", turned off irrigation (only Oaks and Redwoods survived, and a boxwood hedge that is in the shade all day.), sink water off when not actually wetting a dish, etc.... We dropped out water consumption by 63% over the previous owner, who was a single woman. We had 6 people living here. The entire town dropped water consumption something like 30% and if we'd had another year of drought it would have been really ugly.

So, no pond as much as I'd like one. This lot would be perfect, as it drops about 6' over one acre making the slope just right for a small burbling brook. sigh!