Well, there’s no longer a stream flowing through the front of my property. The water company finally found out about our little oasis and fixed the broken water line. I am glad for their sake.
Goldie found it a great opportunity to bark. Good thing I was not recording today.
We enjoyed watching them work. My favorite part was when they dug up the very wet dirt to get to the broken pipe. The dirt was so much warmer than the air that it steamed! Have I mentioned we have had a cold snap? There was frost this morning.
I think you can see steam if you enlarge it. Pretty dirt, though!
They dug and dug and it sure was wet.
I didn’t see this, but I heard they threaded the new pipe through the old pipe, which seemed like a smart idea to me. Then, boom, they cleaned up. It really looks good. Our soil in this part of the ranch is sure pretty, if a bit on the clay side (that’s ok, we also have sand and loam).
Pretty good job!
I went and checked, and yep, no water is flowing into the usual spot the stream starts from. Now it will only flow between now and spring when it rains. Poor little wild animals will have to drink out of the ponds. I guess I worry about them needlessly, since the ponds didn’t dry up this year after they got enlarged last year.
I’ve needed a self esteem boost for a few days, but this morning Apache made me feel really dim, and I didn’t need any more of that! I went to get him this morning for a lesson, then noticed Drew was still in his pen. I went to release Drew, and saw Apache head out the gate to his pen, which I’d not shut. He then went through the gate to his little paddock.
I wanna go back out.
That’s okay, I thought. Then I saw the gate to the big pasture was open and Apache was trotting right through it. Sigh. Off he went to join the Buckskin Buddies. I went over to get him and he trotted away. One he galloped. But, in the end, he let me halter him, saddle him, and load up.
After that, all was well! Our practice has paid off! I was amazed at how well he did on the circles and figure 8s. Even when he messes up, I’m getting better at correcting. That’s important. Now we are refining techniques. Wow, that feels good.
If I’m so good, why didn’t I get anything from Dairy Queen?
And we started a slalom formation where I learn to bend and turn, speed up and slow down (transitions). I was really surprised at how far we got on it today. Of course, there is a lot to learn, still, but it was fun to get to start so soon! Then, the trainer told me what great progress we are making quickly. It’s rewarding to be figuring this stuff out, at last.
I wanna be free.
And Apache rocks! No grass eating all lesson.
Speaking of Rocks
Remember yesterday, when I found that we have a layer of light rock a few feet down? One of our readers, Trisha, mentioned that it may be an aquatic layer.
White rock
So, I went out to look at the rock up close, to see if I could figure anything else out about it. The layer is very thin and powdery.
This shows the layer.
When I touched the rock, it crumbled. It doesn’t hold together like limestone usually does. It falls into little chunks or granules, whereas the soil above it sticks together and is very clayey.
Clay
Also in our soil are large rounded rocks. They have a flint-like interior.
Rock on top of the clay soil.
Anyway, the white stuff seems to be a chalk, which makes me think there was some point in the past that this area was covered by water and supported something with shells, but not for too long.
Hunk of chalky stuff.
I saved the piece above so maybe I can get it analyzed. And I’ll try to figure out when we were underwater more recently than the Paleozoic period (this rock isn’t that deep).
Finally, we are daring to have a meeting at the Hermit Haus again. Our Master Naturalist class wanted to finish its sessions, so we figured out a way. Only the students who have Zoom trouble and 3 staff are in the building. Each audience member is at a separate table.
People wear masks unless eating.
The rest of the class, as well as anyone else who wanted to attend dialed into the Zoom meeting.
That took a lot of planning and figuring out our needs. I am proud of our Master Naturalist board members for hashing it all out.
Our tech guy, Don, spent a lot of time getting us a good setup for the mix of online and in person attendees. He got us some nice speakers and microphones so people can ask questions. We tested it all earlier today and it worked great.
Now I know.
There was a weird glitch with our speaker being unable to join the meeting, but I got it working by signing him into our organization account. Yes!
And the talk is going great! Sound is good. Speaker is Hilary in a Dad joke kinda way. Whew. I’m so pleased to be able to give to our community by hosting events again, while still being careful.
Loamy sand and sandy loam.
And I now know a LOT about soil. And saw some of my friends. Everyone seemed so pleased. And I got to wear my cool new mask.
Look! It has a raven and a feather.
Thanks to Robyn at Coffee and Cotton for the high quality products
The Hermits' Rest 