Wandering Dogs, Finishing The Dog Yard Fence Post Install, Setting Up Gate Openings & To Trench Or Not To Trench
Well, that was one incredibly long day after waking up at one forty-nine in the morning and it is no wonder that this morning that I have not only been in slow motion but I also slept in until nearly nine o'clock. I am still super groggy and my thoughts are sluggish at best but mayhaps this espresso will do the trick and get me to be a little more 'with it' this morning. I am already struggling a bit because the space bar on my keyboard is not just malfunctioning but it also has a big crack in the plastic and the damn thing keeps sticking, double spacing or getting hung and not working at all when I press on it so I may reach a point where I just get too annoyed with it to keep fighting with it this morning. Even though I have tried several times now to repair it to no avail I just now got it working in a reasonable fashion so hopefully it stays that way and I can get all this tediously spelled out without too much more aggravation along the way.
I did pretty much the same thing that I have been doing the last many days in a row now by playing my favorite video game some in the morning (well a lot actually because I got up so early) and then by the time things warmed up outside around noon I decided to just take a nap instead of going to work at the new shelter site because by then I had already been awake for nearly eleven hours and thought it wise to not go begin working in a semi-fatigued state. The nap was pretty good actually and I headed over to the shelter site almost immediately after I woke up. I would have made it over there a bit sooner but the dogs had wondered off when I let them out to go potty and only one of them returned when I called them. All of which is (I think) a result of them being kenneled so much of late and just feeling restless and wanting to run a bit.
As much as I want to be upset with them I just cannot be because it really is a failure on my part and not theirs. Understandably I am juggling a lot at the moment and although I am working as much as I can on getting their dog yard done, getting the new cabin built and getting us into a more functional setup for managing the dogs better... I am just one person and there is only so much that I can do each day and especially so on such a large project and/or projects. Anxiety over the dog scenario is making me rather neurotic though and although kenneling is a solution it is also creating other problems for me (like them not coming when called) and thinking that they are being either 'punished' or just 'left out' which is understandable because they get a lot of separation anxiety. Some of that separation anxiety has to do with their breed but I think most of it is that they have spent their entire lives in close proximity to me all day every day and that is all they really know.
Anyway, before heading over to the new shelter site two of the dogs returned and I got them kenneled and not long after hiking to the new site and beginning work the other two showed up over there so I just put them in the temporary dog yard there and continued working on getting the post holes dug and the posts installed. I actually got all of the remaining posts done rather rapidly as well as the gate posts themselves which essentially wrapped up that phase of the project. With all the post in place I began on getting the rest of the horizontal corner braces installed as well as one of the braces for the main gate post. As far as the gates go I now have a one point five meter (roughly five feet) opening for the main gate so that I can easily carry a full sheet of plywood through it, a one point two meter opening (roughly four feet) for the south gate which is conveniently located near that pile of oak and cherry logs that I have stacked outside the fence and a two meter (six feet) gate opening on the north side which will open near a trail that leads further into the woods and to where I am thinking of placing the compost mound. I might actually section that last gate down to two one meter gates that adjoin in the middle but am yet undecided on whether I am going to do so or not. All in all I like where the gates are located and how it will make the area very functional and eliminate the need for me to walk around the entire fence via a single gate which past experience has shown me is just a major pain in the butt to deal with and rather time consuming to boot. It is worth noting that the gates will all swing inward (so when the dogs jump on them they will just be 'closing' the gate) and they will be hinged so that when they open that gravity will swing them gently downhill.
Late in the day the two meter tall wire fencing got delivered and whoa it is some stout fencing wire and although it will be heavy to work with it sure will be well worth it to create such a secure fence. My only real concern at this point is that since the ground has a rather thick layer of loamy topsoil I think that it might be tempting for the dogs (or other critters) to dig under it so I am considering either trenching in the bottom of the wire (to at least the bottom of the loamy layer) or adding horizontal boards (or round posts or landscape timbers) so that it will discourage digging. I really think that the former of the two will make for a better solution but am unsure just how well the fencing material will hold up buried in the soil. The stuff looks like it would last forever buried in the dirt (relatively speaking) but I think that I should research it a bit and see what other folks experience has been with that particular brand of fencing wire and see what the consensus is before committing to doing it one way or another. I actually do not mind having to dig eighty-two point two meters (roughly two hundred and seventy feet) of trench if it absolves me from having anxiety about the digging thing. Historically my dogs have never been much into digging under fences but they have also more often than not been able to jump (or climb) over the fences that I have had in the past which I doubt they will be capable of doing with this new one given its height.
Alright, the day is already dragging on here and I pretty much blew all my free time for the day sleeping so I better just get to wrapping this up, doing the tedious editing/posting process (which is never my favorite thing to do) and get the heck on with my day. I hope that everyone is doing well and has a nice day/night and I will more than likely do the same.
A little cactus plant that I transplanted out of and away from the southern gate opening!
The main gate opening at the new shelter site.
Why I always shake out my clothes and bang out my boots before putting them on!
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That Is All For Now!
This post was originally posted to the Hive Blockchain here:
https://peakd.com/homesteading/@jacobpeacock/apocalyptic-homesteading-day-23
