Round 2: Progress on the Fence

After a miserable time in our last attempt to dig holes for the fence, we did a little better today. Actually, we did quite a bit better!

Since I last posted, Rick and I went out to the yard, and he reconfigured where we could relocate the fence posts.  We are hopefully far enough away from the telephone wires now, and we have redesigned the fence layout so we are away from the tree trunk roots.

The weather, at last, is starting to show signs of spring.  Although Rick started out in a hooded down parka as he went out to dig holes early this morning, by this afternoon, he had shed both that coat, a lighter coat, and a sweatshirt.  We were both outside today without hats or hoods covering our ears, and we did not freeze to death.  That is progress in Wisconsin.

The pink and the white hyacinths both are in full bloom
in my backyard garden.

My gardens have been busy blooming for some time now.  The early spring hyacinth are really full and pretty right now, and the peonies and rhubarb both are up about four inches.  We have lots of rain predicted for the coming week; hopefully we can work around the showers to make some progress on the fence.  The predicted temperatures should allow us to pour concrete at last!

While I did my Friday cleaning this morning, Rick went to the northeast corner of the yard to see what he could find in our new post locations.  We are going just four feet out from the corner post on both the north and the east sides, and as expected, Rick hit roots in both holes.  He had broken a SawzAll pruning blade last week which stopped our progress.  The new blade helped him uproot quite a few roots of all sizes in the first two holes.  He almost gave up on one of them, but just as he was about to quit, he found the bottom of the root and the problem.  Once that was cleared, we could see that the ground underneath was just going to be a lot of clay and dirt.

The easiest hole turned out to be the corner one!  We should be able to put in a good, firm corner for that section of the yard.

Old shelves cover the holes on the north side of the yard.
We need to keep the holes covered so no children and no
critters (like baby bunnies) fall into the holes.

As he moved down the north side, he encountered a variety of surprises: more roots where we thought there would be none, a buried tin or metal box that was empty and literally rusting to pieces, and tricky roots that looked like buried power lines.  That last problem prompted him to call Diggers Hotline again to have them come back to our yard.  The gentlemen assured us that we were far enough away from the wires, and that what looked like wires really were very black-colored tree roots.

In all, Rick dug eight holes today.  He only went down a couple of feet; that was deep enough for us to know what kind of roots or wires we might encounter.  We also established the spacing for the holes.  I am happy to see the progress he made today.  That progress gives us both hope that we will be able to build this fence by ourselves after all.

While he had the SawzAll out, Rick also dug down around the trunk of the small pine tree that our neighbor Jake had cut down. The tree was planted by the former owner of the house, and it was located right on top of the property marker.  When Jake learned that the tree really was on his land, he gladly cut it down.  The SawzAll made short work of the stump just below the ground.  Rick had to be careful, though, because the roots were right next to the telephone junction box, and there were wires everywhere.  I am happy to see the trunk gone.

Rick dug all the holes from the corner post to the trees on the
east side of the yard. 

While Rick was digging holes, I was taking the dirt to fill in the two four-foot deep holes he had previously dug in our now-abandoned positions.  Then I took some of the black dirt that he unearthed to fill in some holes and valleys in our front yard.  We have many more places in our front yard to redistribute the dirt.  That is one thing that will not be a problem with this yard renovation.  Both our back and front yard go up and down like waves on a stormy sea.

Rick talked to his doctor yesterday; his Achilles surgery is definitely set for May 19.  We need to work each day that is not wet to get as much done as possible before that time. Today showed us both that we have a good chance of getting quite a bit enclosed.