Home Chores Trump Forging

It is a lot of trouble for me to adjust from Winter to Spring.  I have to bring up the hoses from the basement - didn’t I just drain and coil them a couple of weeks ago?  The we did some lawn fertilizing, worked on the mower, fixed some screens, sharpened pruning tools and did pruning.  On and on it goes and the shop isn’t seeing much activity.

Betty did some planting in the garden.  Mostly our neighbors use that space and give us part of the crop but we have to do some watering and we built a pea trellis.  She has been busy picking asparagus and putting house plants out for the summer and planting summer annuals which we brought home from several local nurseries.

I sprayed the poison ivy and greenbriar and keep the grape jelly feeder filled for the orioles.   Now I’m going to have to spend some time battling wood bees which are tunneling in the wood trim around the house.  That has been and ongoing battle for twenty years.  I’m going to leave the black carpenter ant colony in the silver maple tree alone.  I have been told that they just eat out the center rotting dead wood and the living tube around that is still strong.

Even though there is a lot of work to do there is the pleasure of being out of doors and observing what nature is showing off.  I sometimes remember to carry my pocket camera and take a few images.  I don’t really go out of my way and miss documenting most of the flower bloom and wildlife activity.  We live in a riparian forest habitat so there is a lot of it.  Each night I sit outside until I see the bats and record the time they begin to fly.

Trellis rose west of the shop.

1" long pawpaw.

Serviceberries west of shop.

Wild strawberry patch north of shop.

I wrote about how I modified the sprinklers so they wouldn’t tip over last October - http://persimmonforge.blogspot.com/2013/10/sprinkler-spike-base.html Now, I’ve made another sprinkler modification.  I mounted a impulse sprinkler on a 48” pipe and welded a spike on the bottom with a foot plate so I could push it into the ground.  This puts the sprinkler at a handy working height so I can easily adjust the spray arc restrictors.  

Tall sprinkler rainbow at SW corner of shop.

I’m about caught up now so I think I can get in a good lick of work in the shop next week.