Bits and Pieces

In April or May, we had water lines run to the garden area, and had electrical run to where the new henhouse will be one day.  The trenching machine left places that were not just rough, but holes in the ground.  I have actually stepped in a deep one, and nearly broke my leg.  Near the deck, the men who did the work left a raised berm.  It was six inches at the deck steps, but as much as two feet high near the parking area.  They made no effort to smooth it out with their ancient caterpiller, or shovel it into the holes that were left, too.  I have struggled with this all summer. 

Imagine my delight when I found a Craigslist ad last week and began trying to reach the "Skid-steer work" guy.  He happened to be the owner of a construction company that builds Wick and Morton buildings, and lives over on the other side of Basehor, near us.  Hot dog!  He came tonight and made short work of the little mound that the plumbers left, and a huge mound in the garden that has been in the way for the last four years, and on which weeds grew in abundance.  We are so glad to have it gone!  Dumped in the top of the pasture, out of the way, in an area I no longer mow.

There goes part of the garden mound.

And you can see how wide the "berm" area they left - just a long, long mound in front of the deck was by the ground that was cleared.  In the middle of it was a HUGE boulder.  The man was nice enough to pick it up and move it over to an area near where the mound was where we are caching nice boulders to use in the garden one day.

It was such a relief to have the work done.

We have been seeing quail at our wild bird feeder in the yard now for over two weeks.  I tried very hard last night to take a picture of them.  This is grainy, but you can make out the shape. We had five eating there when the skid-steer man came today, and he saw them. We have mixed our bird feed with gamebird feed, so everyone is happy, and we keep a low waterer there for them, and Keith saw one standing IN the waterer tonight.  I'll get a picture of it tomorrow.

Here is the attempted quail picture. Remember, these are about 50 feet from the house.  We are now hearing them calling all around us, the way we did when we moved here.

When I get the Nikon back in a couple of weeks, I should be able to get a better picture. The funny thing is, they don't spook easily, and I literally walked by them twice the other night.  When they go up, they go across the road to the wild area, but then call to each other right away.

We wanted to try to establish a covey in the pasture, but Keith keeps seeing them go into the garden beds!

We'll keep you posted on their doings.