Thursday this and that

By , January 31, 2008 8:14 pm

Today was fun with beavers day. And no not that kind of beaver. 🙄 This is the kind that builds the dams in the creeks and makes lakes out of low lying areas.

Started the day out with moving one of the dead cars to the area in front of Bill’s bus, mainly to get it out of the way of folks coming into the parking area. Scrapped the weeds and brush that had grown up under and around that car and drove over it a bit to flatten it all out. Drive is now wider in the final turn. 😎

Then went across the creek and started pulling brush and small trees out of the creek and off the bank to allow the big wild cherry that fell in the blizzard of 93 to come out once I cut it off on the other side. Tree is still mostly alive, just big time in the way for several future projects. Fought with it for quite a while and tore up my towing strap pretty good and then decided I needed chain and another kind of hook. Have a bunch that will work on the transport dollies so removed one piece from the one I’ve already started taking apart. So easy to type that last sentence but removing the chain took over 30 minutes of beating and hammering then I got to looking at it and thinking instead of just doing the get a bigger hammer number and supported it from the back and it drove right out. Next time shouldn’t take more than 5 or so. All in figuring out how to do the job. 🙄

Went back and started trying to pull the tree out of the creek/beaver pond and made a bit of headway but the rain started so I went to the barn and put the tractor up. Went inside and got to digging around for metal to make a grappling hook to remove beaver dams with. Found some plow parts for the points and used a lawnmower blade for the shaft and bolted it all together. Added a section of chain and as the rain had let off a bit got the tractor out and went back down to the creek and tried the hook out. Not a total failure but close. Need a shaft at least 2 feet long. May need 3 or so to get it to hook right. But it allowed me to pull the middle of the dam apart enough to release over a foot of backed up water. Spent a half hour or so with a rake and removed a lot more of the dam. Then the rains came again and we called it a day. Need to get the hook modified and the arms reshaped a bit so I can remove the other 4 or 5 dams that the little pests have built. I suspect that the one I opened up today will be rebuilt tomorrow, unless this rain we are now getting the leading edge of, keeps them inside, which I doubt.

And that was pretty much the day. Sitting here listening to the rain and thunder. Supposed to get an inch or so with this batch coming though now. Will help with the drought but need a lot more that this to get the ground water levels up. Hope the drain is open all the way through the dam. Suspect that the lake bed will have water in it tomorrow whether it is open or not.

Gonna look through some feeds, read a bit and call it an early night I think. Hopefully I will be able to move tomorrow so will see how much stuff at the playing field has to be repaired after the rains and wind tonight. Till then… 😉

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