Electrical Trench

 To get temporary electrical at the property, the Skamania PUD requires underground installed at 3 feet depth. They also require a foot width which meant I had to excavate rather than run a trencher. This would be a new challenging experience for me.

The only way to get to the electrical pole was excavate between the gas and communication line. Yikes! I was able to do it without any tragedies though I did nearly topple the excavator a few heart stopping times as well as exposed the gas line. 

I started with the easy part where I had lots of space.

I had to build "lifts" for the mini excavator to reach across the culvert without tipping.

On the left side of this trench was a gas line, on the right was telecommunications

Success! PUD installed the temporary electrical without and complaints of my crooked excavation skills.

Stump Grind

Rather that pull out the stump with a back hoe which I would have needed to hire out, I decided to grind it down. It went fairly well and now I have more mulch than I could ever imagine.

Planting Grasses

 Since I removed many of the blackberry bushes from the steep hillside, I wanted to add other plants for erosion control. I ended up getting about 5 varieties of grasses which are drought tolerant (hopefully).

Gravel Pavers

 The only access to the property is a gravel road in the back that a previous owner installed. It's a little steep, curvy and the gravel is not packed so non 4 wheel drive vehicles tend to throw gravel all over the place. To correct that, I added gravel pavers at the steep parts and the curve.

Split and Stack

After felling the fir tree, we split and stacked the wood for days. At first we rented a hydraulic splitter then a neighbor came and suggested to hand split it. It was daunting at first, then I loved it. Great exercise and we think we yielded about 3 cords of wood. 

Tree Down

 Smack dab in the middle of the lot is a 70’ Douglas fir tree. While I love these trees and entertained the idea of building a tree house, this one was half rotten from being struck by lightning. Not once but twice!

Blackberries and Scotch Broom

 So the first thing I worked on in the new property was eliminating all the invasive plants, or at least trying to. The scotch broom came up easy. The blackberry put up a good fight all summer long. 

Then when we discovered how delicious the fruit was, we purposely kept a few bushes. 

The truck loaded with blackberry brush, some of which could classify as medieval weaponry.

Gary sliding down the hill after chopping his way through blackberry bushes.