A Few Photos

 On the way in to the office this morning they were cutting all the logs to uniform lengths and re-stacking them into neat piles ready to be loaded onto the logging trucks.
















This is a couple of shots of the new loafing shed. Nothing special from a construction point-of-view - just 4x4 treated posts, 2x10 and 2x12 frame with 5/8 plywood sheathing...oh, and a corrugated galvanized tin roof.







The shed measures 12 feet by 12 feet and has a 3 foot roof overhang on the open side. It is almost 9 feet high at the front and more than 7 feet high in the back.




 

It's kind of difficult to see the round pen in that mess of rails and fence posts, but trust me, it's there! Almost 30 cubic yards of crushed shale has been compacted to form the base. It will be topped with around 20 cubic yards of dust-free sand.
The round pen is actually a 14 sided polygon, loosely approximating a circle with gates forming two sides of the polygon.
You can see our (new to us) horse trailer off to the side. The trailer's small tack room gives us handy storage and access to the saddles and bridles when we want to ride.





Whisky, taking a  break from eating (rare event!).

Fathers' Day weekend

Happy Fathers' Day to all the dads out there! I often think of my dad, but especially at this time of year. Not only do we celebrate Fathers' Day, but his birthday is June 14th. Dad died almost 20 years ago of ALS and I miss him very much. He would have been 81 this year.
On a happier note, it was great to get a call from my son, Justin. We don't speak often enough but I love him very much and appreciate it when we can chat and catch up on his growing family.
Carol called and spoke with her dad, Alec, at about the same time I was talking to Justin. It's hard to celebrate when you're far from family, but it does make those times special when we do manage to get together.
We worked hard (as usual!) over the weekend and managed to get a few tasks accomplished. I was up early on Saturday to be at the rental shop to pick up a plate compactor we had rented. The crushed shale we used for the round pen base needed to be compacted before a layer of sand goes on top. Once compacted, the shale does not absorb much moisture so a gentle slope was necessary to shed any rain that falls. That was one of the reasons we chose to put the round pen where it is. From the west gate, the ground falls away about 12" to the east side of the pen. We had put some 2x12 lumber between the posts at ground level to contain the shale and sand. I would estimate that we have a compacted base roughly 6" thick. Ron is bringing up the sand this week and once installed, it should be around 4" deep. This will be plenty to give the horses some very solid footing to work with regardless of the weather conditions.
Our farrier, Jordan Camille, was up on Sunday morning to trim all the horses feet. He asked to work from the round pen and seemed quite impressed with it. He did comment that the rails might be too low for breaking colts but since we never intend to do that, it is not really a concern for us. Being that Sunday was Fathers' Day, Jordan had asked to start early so he had arrived a little after 7am! He was done by 10am and on his way back to his wife and two boys, Tyrell and Ryder, shortly thereafter.
After a cup of coffee, I went out and finished painting the loafing shed in River Run. We had one coat on the exterior already so I did a single coat on the interior and finished it up with a second coat on the exterior. It looks nice colour matched to the house! Once we finish trimming the house windows and doors, we can put some of the white trim on the shed to dress it up a little.
For Fathers' Day, Carol made up a nice brunch for us which we managed to scarf down easily after our busy morning. She has also been hard at work cleaning up the junk piles around house. She's been burning the scrap lumber and some of the smaller pieces of wood we've removed from the ground in the paddocks. We also took a pickup load of scrap material and garbage to the landfill. Anyway, it's making a big difference! All the garbage in front of the house is now gone, and so is one of the two piles off the side of the house. It's looking much nicer! We still have one giant pile of crap in the back beside the driveway, but we're hoping to get rid of that one over the next few weeks as well. Our burn barrel is working round the clock trying to keep up!
We got out for a wonderful trail ride yesterday afternoon. We timed it perfectly between 2 thunder showers. Having the horse trailer with it's built-in tack room parked down by the paddocks worked much better this time. We tacked them up in the new round pen after locking everyone else in The Vale. We had left all the gates open which made it easy to get out of the paddocks safely and without much fuss. Jake and Sierra are much better when they both ride out together - not so much calling out. The four of us all had a great ride with Carol leading on Jake and me following on Sierra. We went out by the well, turned east down the narrow field past the grassy pond and then carried on down the hill. After a few hundred meters, we turned south and climbed up through the trees to an open pasture. We were concerned how the horses would react when turned for home but needn't have worried. Jake and Sierra were both real gentlemen the whole time. We had scouted a few places to trot and were successful when we made the attempt. Apart from a few head tosses by Jake once on the old Sinclair Road, the two of them couldn't have behaved better. What a wonderful ride for our first real "trail ride" at Gull Lake Ranch! We comfortably rode them back down to the paddocks and into the round pen to dismount and untack them. Whisky, (our young guy) must have missed the big boys because as soon as he saw us coming down the trail on our way back, he took off galloping at full speed from one end of his paddock to the other (a few hundred meters). It took him quite a while to settle down even after we let them all back together. We suspect he must have been happy to have his feet all trimmed up and comfortable as they were quite a mess before Jordan got to them. Whatever, it scared me a bit to see him running so quickly over the uneven ground, but wow, he's very fast!

We finished the day up with Carol's famous BBQ ribs. Yummy!

Logging Pics

I'm amazed at how quickly the loggers can make the trees disappear. I suppose that I shouldn't be too surprised - they did tell us that they would take between 2 and 3 weeks to log off the quarter section of Crown land that our driveway runs through. This is an area 1/2 mile squared (almost a kilometre square!). It has only been a few days and enormous tracts of forest have disappeared, replaced by neatly stacked piles of logs, ready for transport.
Emotionally, I am more upset about it than I thought I would be. It's very sad to see those beautiful trees reduced to something represented only by a line on a spreadsheet of some enormous company, yet leaves the local wildlife with less of the precious habitat they need to survive and thrive.
Anyway, I rationalize everything by remembering that it's not my call, and on the other hand, I'm happy that this will leave our road in better condition.
The photos don't do justice to the enormity of the change in the landscape. Keep in mind that all these images were thick, dark forests only a week ago. New sight lines have already allowed the sun to shine in places it has been unable to reach for many years.

It will be interesting to see the landscape again in even just a few more weeks. To their credit, the loggers are leaving many trees - those too big or too small to be economically harvested in this manner. Sadly, a lot of the very small ones get destroyed just the same, collateral damage under the relentless march of the giant machines as they harvest their larger brethren.

Logging Update

It's a little later than we anticipated, but Interfor has started logging the quarter section of Crown Land next to our property. No chainsaws and axes for these guys! It's all done with enormous pieces of mechanized equipment. I haven't taken any pics yet, but will get on it so you can see how it all works. We first heard the buzz of the equipment working on Sunday afternoon and already they have clear cut some enormous swaths through the forest. It's amazing how quickly they can take down the trees! They estimate only 2 -3 weeks to cut it all, followed by 2-3 weeks of hauling the logs away. I made that sound like a linear thing, but the reality is that the hauling starts up very soon after the cutting starts and both tasks are carried out at the same time. So, if that really happens that way, we should have our peace and quiet back in a little over a month. We'll see...
We haven't been standing still at home either. Since the restrictions came off the roads a few weeks ago, we called Ron Hall, our trucking company friend to have him haul up some gravel and sand for our round pen. We estimated 3 truck loads of crushed shale and two truck loads of sand would do it. He brought the crush up last Wednesday and Carol and I spent the weekend moving it from the driveway, through all the gates and fences and down to the round pen. I have the tractor parked by the pile of material and use it to put two bucket loads of the gravel into the back of the Bobcat ATV. It has a powered dump box so we simply manoeuvre it to the spot we need the stuff and push a button to dump it. Of course, we still have to rake it all flat but at least we're not having to shovel it out of the back of the pickup!
Next up we have to compact it down with a tamper and then put a few inches of sand on top. Ron tells us that the compacted shale will withstand lots of abuse and moisture giving our horses some solid footing to work on. The sand is special in that it is supposed to be "dust free". I guess time will tell.
Wednesday also saw Dr. Jennifer Jackson, our large animal vet, out to see the guys, float a few sets of teeth and get everybody vaccinated. I have to say that was the first time I have ever had my hand in a horses mouth...up to the elbow! So much to learn! Jennifer seemed very happy with all the horses so apparently, we're doing a satisfactory job of looking after them!
It was also good to see our friend, Morgan, again. He is now a technician and assistant to the vet, and seems to be enjoying himself. Way to go, Morg!
We finished building the loafing shed and have the first coat of paint/stain on it. We got it to match the siding colour on the house so it looks like we meant it to look that way!
Last weekend also saw the arrival of the cattle on our property. Brian and Louise brought them down so we now have 2 people, 2 dogs, 5 horses, 25 cows, 25 calves, 2 yearling bulls and a bunch of wild animals all living at our place. It's a busy place these days!
I promise to get some pictures up in the next few days and apologize for being tardy in that regard.