After the wicked weather in early July, we had a lot of work and clean up to get done. I was still hoping we could find more of our missing logs and my friend Josi thought a log hunt sounded like good fun. Ron was more interested in getting the logs we still had moved to the south end of our farm for safety. Josi offered to come out last week end and help with the moving.
The plan originally was to get the last 75 logs inoculated with oyster spawn on Saturday July 8, but a family event took priority. Josi agreed to come out Sunday morning for this “quick” project.
It was just the four of us but we all knew what the drill and everything was already set up.  I just brought a few sausage biscuits for breakfast and lots of water.  Josi arrived at 8 am and we jumped right in.

Ron handled the grinding and Jo, Josi and I did the inoculation, waxing and stacking.  In just over 2 hours we were done.  But the day was not over.  Josi had not been across the stream yet to see the operation in progress.   She was about to get more involved than she planned.

First it was shiitake picking time.

Ron gave her a quick lesson on what they look for and he and Jo got started.  I took Josi on a walking tour to the south end to show her what we have going on and planned for that part of THF.  Our path was very over grown and still had pools of water in spots.  But no damage to any of our planted areas.

When we got back to the mushrooms, Ron was gone.  The bags they brought to hold the shiitakes had too many holes in them. He went back to the Transit it find some others.  Came back with one and his missing Leatherman tool and the extra knife.  We had not been able to find them in months.   Now that he had those, Josi was able to help harvest the mushrooms.

It is definitely a learning process.   You have to select the right size, one that is not squished and not too chewed up by critters.  Ron tends to pick them smaller than I would, but I don’t have his eye.  Jo, on the other hand, her picking is up to his standards.   It helps to have more hands as the logs need to be turned and then re-settled on the pallet.  God help you if you spin it too much and it lands in the mud.  Guess who did that?

Boots are a must out there.  We have some serious mud to work in.  If you are not careful you can easily lose your balance or your boots.

Picking all done and now it was time to soak the next set of logs.  Now that we have actual customers with a buying schedule we have to keep the shiitakes growing.  That means soaking logs for 24 hours at a time, a week before you need to pick.

While Ron and Jo had brought the cleaned up water pump back to the farm and run it for an hour to make sure all was well, the thing did not want to start.  I believe it was just annoyed with Ron.  After all, it usually runs for just 15 minutes at a time.

Once they got it running, I handed hose to Josi . She was going to re-fresh the water in our  soaking tanks.  We use the water for as many soaking sessions as we can.

This, of course is the biggest reason for all the mud we are dealing with.  We use lots of water in this project.  Good thing is that none of it goes to waste.  It all ends back in the ground to be used again.   Once all of the tanks were overflowing, it was time to get the logs in the water.

35 logs are divided between the 4 tanks, shoved down into the water and held there with cinder blocks.

Just after 1 pm, we were finally done.  Well, Josi’s part was done.  She got to head home to get  few things done for herself.  Jo, Ron and I headed home to started cleaning and bagging the shiitakes.  That added a few more hours to our day.

Another long day at THF. Made easier with the addition of hard worker, my friend Josi.  Volunteers and visitors are always welcome at Tiny House Farm, but be aware.  If we work a friend this hard, you can expect the same.  Boots and gloves suggested.

and so are our shiitake mushroom logs.

We left THF today with just over 4 pounds of beautiful looking shiitakes.  And Ron expects to pick about 15 more pounds over the next couple of days.  Not one of the logs we had on our A frames was lost.   There was some debris up against the set closest to the creek but the rest of area was just wet.  Seriously wet with lots of thick mud. But such a relief.  We are still in business.

Not all the news was good though.  We have lost some of the logs we prepped this year.   Cannot tell for sure just how many.  It was just over two months ago when we got them all set up on the pallets for what we thought was safe keeping.  I never did get around to taking photos to document just how many and where exactly they were.

The two end pallets were washed away from this spot. That is 50 logs right there.  And one of the totem experiments is gone too.  It just wasn’t strong enough to stand up the force of the water.

On the other side of the path, we are missing at least one more pallet.   Maybe more.    Such a waste of the work involved in getting the logs ready for shiitake growing.

By the time I took this pictures I had already had my adventure for the day.  The creek was down quite a bit but still running high and fast.  Ron and Jo headed across while I stopped to take their picture.  That turned out to be a mistake.   I have never liked walking through muddy water.  Not being able to see the rocks I am stepping on makes me uneasy. This time was worse and I took a step, lost my balance and down I went.  Jo headed back toward me as I struggled to get to my feet and I went down again.  Soaked through and through and with my waders full of water. I had also wacked my right knee pretty good.  Going to be adding to my bruise collection.  Ron had the nerve to be annoyed at me, as though I had been careless on purpose.   After all, he told me not to fall.  I staggered across the creek, up the bank and sat down on our stacked logs.  Jo helped me get the boots off.  They went off to check on the mushrooms while I gathered myself and took more pictures.

The power of water is just overwhelming.  I walked out to the south end of the farm to check on things.  The water had obviously been there, but most had drained off.  No damage to be found except for branches down and debris about the place.  I went back to the mushroom area and Ron suggested I go the other way to look for logs.  On the way I discovered that our great heavy plastic sled was also gone.  Someone is going to happy when they find that.

I found a pallet and some of our logs.  13 in total are now stacked on the pallet waiting for us to recover them.  Of course no way we can use the 4 wheeler and trailer to get them.  Too many trees and bushes to even try getting through.  It will be a hand carry job.    I really wanted to keep going down stream

looking for more logs,  but even our waders were not going to be enough to deal with the deeper, stronger water.   Ron meet up with me and that was that.  It was time to head home.  I really needed a shower and change of clothes.

Our disaster wasn’t as big a hit as we feared.  We have taken some losses but the tent held strong, we found all of our hand tools and most of the odds and ends we had stashed on a pallet, covered by a tarp were still there.  We even found the two metal chickens Ron bought.  Obviously we will have to make some changes.  Maybe GPS tracking for our logs. Or just a big chain to keep them from floating away.

If anyone out there living along Sconondoa creek finds logs with funny looking holes drilled in them – they belong to THF.  We would really appreciate it if you bring them back.

That is not only the Morton salt motto, but the way our weekend went. Jo had the weekend off and we planned to get some work done on the farm. The last 25 mushroom logs need to be inoculated and it will be a relief to have them done.
Once again we stopped at The Corner Diner for breakfast. Then back to the house to load up and off we went. We didn’t have the Transit as it was still in the shop. Needing new tires, some brake work and something about the bearings. All of that was taking longer than expected.
As we arrived at THF, it was chilly and the wind was picking up. We opened up the tent and started to get ready for work. It is obvious that we have some tweaking do to with our set up. The tent is great, but the sliding door doesn’t work as well as we would like it to.  It tends to get in the way when it is bunched up on one side.

Our attempt at using the door to create additional work space clearly can use some improvement.  But in a pinch this set up worked well enough.  Ron got busy with the drilling, Jo handled the inoculation and I was again in charge of waxing.  The logs we were dealing with was soaking wet and the wax was not sticking as well and it was taking longer than usual to process each log.  Ron decided that we should stack them inside the tent.  That would give the log a chance to dry and hopefully, the wax a chance to set up.  Did I mention that it was now pouring rain?

We had about 6 logs done when Don called.  He wanted to know if we were out at the farm.  Ron told him that,  of course we were.    It was just a bit a rain we were dealing with.  Nothing that should interfere with the work that needed to be done.

Timing really is everything, isn’t it?  If this rain had been falling on April 15, it was have been very nasty.  No way we could have gotten the finished logs across the creek with our 4 wheeler.  And with all the people we had on site, it would have been very crowded in the tent and no one would have had much fun.   All of us would have stayed crammed in the tent, trying to keep dry.

Once again, I caught Ron supervising while Jo works.  Do you see how wet the log is?  Not to mention both Ron and Jo.   It rained and then stopped and rained again.  At times so hard that we could not hear ourselves talking over the noise of rain hitting our tent roof.  We kept one ear perked for thunder.  The first flash of lightening, and I was going to be out of there taking Jo with me.  Ron could finish on his own.

Don arrived, dressed for the weather and jumped right into the work flow.  With four of us working, we whipped right through the remaining 25 logs.  And what a relief it was to be working on the last one.  The rain had stopped so we cleaned up and then puttered around waiting for the generator to cool enough to put away.   We wandered around the place looking at the flooded areas, trying to figure out where all the water was coming from.  About an hour later we decided it was time to head home.   This was only one project that we needed to get done over the weekend.   I really hoped the weather would improve.  It is May and really should be a bit warmer.  Rain, wind and temps in the mid 30’s is not what we need.   Especially as we need to get more work done outside.

Ron has plans to get his ginseng re-potted and into the greenhouse.  I need to get some work done on our home garden.  Oh, I almost forgot to mention.  We have garlic growing in our backyard.  Not stuff that we planted either.  When we trimmed and cleaned the garlic last year, we tossed a bunch of the imperfect cloves into the yard behind the woodpile.  Guess they showed us as we will be eating them later this year.   And I have a few volunteer kale plants already doing well out back.

We got very little done.  It was so cold and wet that we didn’t feel inclined to do anything.  A few chores about the house and some paperwork sorting was all I had to show for the two days.  Ron didn’t make it back out to THF either.

Our 19 year old Misty cat.  She is a cranky old lady, but she does enjoy reading my blog.  As any cat lover will tell you, she really just likes the heat from the laptop.  But I like my version better.  Murphy has no interest in it.  Though she will keep me company when I am writing.

Ron just reminded me I forgot to tell you that I came home with a tick again.  Jo had just told me about the news stories she read about them being worse this year.  Once Ron removed it for me, Jo proceeded to come up with every tick related comment she could think of.  That I was ticked off was her favorite one.  I just love my girl.

Jo has the weekend off,  we have more logs to drill and the weather is cooperating.  What more can we ask for?  Well, breakfast at our favorite diner of course.  Jo had no complaints being woken up at 6:30 am and headed out to The Corner Diner Too.  I still haven’t been there for lunch, but I again highly recommend the breakfast.  The owner, John can identify his regulars by the orders that come across his grill.

By 8:30 we were fully fueled up, loaded up and heading out to THF.  The plan was to get done what we could.  Two vehicles again so Jo and I could leave Ron behind once we were done.  We brought the left over hot dogs and the usual candies for Ron to snack on.  He does like his sweets when he is working.

This Saturday, our setup was so easy.  Open up the tent, pull the grinder table outside and get the generator going again.   Jesse arrived which was a delightful sight.  Ron told me that he mentioned this weekend to both Don and Jesse, but we are the only 3 who are quite so committed to this project.   Well actually, only Ron who is wholly committed to this project.  Jo and I are being dragged along willy-nilly.

It was chillier out at THF than we expected it to be.  I need to stash a couple of watch caps in our going out to farm bags.   It was warmer in tent which helped.  Jesse and Ron got started with the drilling, Jo likes doing the inoculation and I was wax girl today.  We found our rhythm quickly and the logs started stacking up outside.

This is what the newly drilled holes look like.

And these are the holes after they have been filled with mushroom spawn and covered with wax.   Lots and lots of holes.  In fact the only thing we have more of on the farm is our rocks.

Ron gave Don a call to see if he was going to come out.  Don thought Ron had only planned a puttering day, didn’t know we were actually going to be doing serious work.

A bit later he came walking down the path.  With his full winter jacket on.  He was ready for the cooler temps.  With Don’s added help with we busted through 68 logs in short order.  The boys decided to haul the logs across the stream and I got the hotdogs going on the grill.  By the time they were done, the dogs were ready and I discovered that I had forgotten the rolls.  I even walked back to car to see if I had left them there.  No luck.  So we ate them with our fingers, Don with a stick.  It was fun and brought back memories of our childhood.  When that was the norm.

Once we finished our lunch Jo and I were ready to head home.  Final clean up and we headed out.  Ron was very pleased with the amount of work we got done.   We surprise him all the time.  He, Jesse and Don stuck around for a couple of hours, talking over future plans.   Ron will run them by me someday and I will do my best to reign him in.  We have a great partnership that way.

Ron and I have been married for 30 years and even though we  both have been “nature people” neither one of us saw THF in our future.   While we are not totally “green” out there, after all we do need the generator and 4 wheeler to get the work done.  But we are growing with organic methods and the plants we are putting out there are native to our area, so Happy Earth Day Everyone.

Who are willing to come out to THF and work hard for us.

Just too tired to think or type last night, even though I was home about 3:30 pm.   It had been a long day.  Thank goodness we had some left over burgers and hotdogs.  Already grilled too.  Made for an easy dinner once Ron finally got home about 6 pm.  He stayed out there talking with the boys.   He had headed out at THF before 7 am, getting the fire barrel started and finalizing our setup.  I had a couple of last minute things to get done or pick up so I got there about 8.  Jo followed with the coffee.   I had to send her frantic text to make last stop at home. I forgot to bring my homemade cookies.   Got to have my cookies.

John, Don and Jesse arrived next and the day got started.  My friend Josi was there next.  We were also expecting her daughter Sophi, but she was not feeling well.  This would be the first time Josi would have the chance the see the whole operation.  Her last two visits had been to deliver the logs with no time for exploring.  Big changes since she was there last.

Ron was expecting visitors from Oswego NY.  He had met Jerry and Mary  Ann Hartman at a shiitake workshop a few months ago.  They are thinking about doing their own logs and Ron talked them into coming to Augusta to get some hands on experience.  Two birds with one stone.  He gets to share his story and get some work out of his captive audience.

Jesse was already up and running with the drilling and was happy to show Mary  Ann and Jerry the routine.  We had to make some changes to the setup because Ron cut down his support tree.  It was in the way of our new tent.  Ron was keeping himself doing busy work, anything to keep him out of the real stuff.  Getting this or that, suggesting what someone else could be doing and just chatting.  You know, the kind of stuff a supervisor might do.

With the additional workstations Ron built, we now could have double the work going on.   Josi and Jo set to work with the inoculation and Don and I did the waxing.   Then the logs were loaded into the wagon to be hauled across the stream.  Big improvement over last year when we left all the logs stacked up and waiting until later when Ron, Jo and I did the moving.   The extra help we had this year made this step part of the process.  Huge relief.

Ron’s friend Shelly was back again this year.  She had been here last to help with the pawpaw and elderberry planting.  Doing the mushroom logs would be much easier work.  No digging in our rock filled dirt with this project.  Just a lot of bending and lifting.

My friend, Lynne was also back this year.  It is always a good thing to have experienced workers back on site.  She brought her sister, Lori Jo with her and they took over the waxing process.  We really have to come up with a better plan for having melted wax ready to go.  We used the double boiler again, but had to watch it carefully.  A couple of time we let all the water boil away and that caused a delay.  I stacked two of those foil baking pans together and put them onto the grill with wax chunks in it to melt. A good plan that worked well, until it was time to move the wax.   Then it was precarious.  Having heard the tales of the tripping hazards out of THF, you can picture me moving very slowly with my wobbly pan of hot wax.

We had two more newbies this year.  Another friend from work , Jessica and her daughter Zoey.    Once they escaped from Ron’s introductory talk, they jumped right into the work flow.  We had lost Jo by this time.  She had to head off to her “real job”, but the logs continued to move out of our tent and across the stream.

No one wanted to work the grill so Ron had to assume that job.  We all took a break for lunch and a good stretch.  Discovered that Miss Zoey does like her sweets. A girl after my own heart.  We have learned that as long as you provide lots of good food and some serious yummies, you can con almost anyone into working for you.  Good conversation and laughter, especially at Ron’s expense kept the day full of fun.

One disaster for the day.  Both of our grinders lost their set screws.  I borrowed a magnet first from Jerry and then from Jesse and somehow managed to find one buried in the wood chips and sawdust piled up on the workstation.   Decision was made to just keep going and see how it went.  Took awhile but the grinder that was still missing the set screw finally had it.  Jesse and Ron tried to get the sheared off drill bit out, but no luck.  The drilling went on with just the one.

By 2 pm we were just about done with the logs and could see the promised rain in the distance.  It was a great relief when the last log was drilled, inoculated, waxed and loaded into the wagon.  And just in time as the rain started to come down heavier.

The last thing we had to do with pack up the food to take home and store all the supplies in the tent.  One last laugh as Josi found the bottle of back and body pain pills I had on site.   Last goodbyes and everyone headed home.

With Jesse’s help I loaded all the food into my car and the Transit.  Then I went home.  There I put away the food and sat down on the couch.   I was still feeling the effects of my fall last week and my right shoulder was aching big time.  Blast Ron.  I couldn’t have my glass of wine until he was safely home.  I always have to be ready to zip back to THF and rescue him.  Sometimes he can be downright dangerous.

The tent disaster lasted much longer than it should have.  As I told you all before, Ron located what he thought would be the perfect tent on a Canadian company’s website.  He placed the order and then waited for confirmation.  Nothing.  He waited a week and then called them.  They finally acknowledged receiving the order  but still did not sent an email confirming the order was being processed.  Another week went by and Ron called again.  Not sure I buy their story of having email troubles.

Finally last week they advised Ron, after a few more phone calls, that the order was being processed.  We should expect a call soon from the shipping company to arrange delivery.  The call did come and we made plans accordingly.   Of course,  our plans did not work out so well. Ron got a call at 11 am telling him that the tent would not be delivered.  It was still in New Hampshire.  If Ron wanted to pay $460 more for “expedited” shipping they would get it to us sooner.  Of course they also wanted him to sign a form agreeing not to hold them responsible for any damage, sight unseen at that.   Thank goodness we have unlimited calling on our cells as he spent quite a bit of time on the phone.  Both with the tent company and the shipping company.

On Tuesday he finally agreed to be at home at 2 pm the following day as there was no way they could guarantee arrival after 3:30 pm.  Annoyed but resigned. No way for him to win this one when he really needed the tent.

The truck drive was the same one who delivered the pawpaws and elderberries last year.  But he didn’t arrive until almost 5:30.  So much for Ron needing to take an hour off work so he would be there in time.  More annoyance.

Ron and I loaded it onto our trailer and then headed to THF to drop it off.  We would all meet after work on Wednesday in order to get started putting this thing together.  When we got home, Ron was immediately on the phone with nephew Jesse and brother Don.  Jesse is expert at putting things together so he was much needed.

On Thursday Ron headed out to THF after work, Jo met him there and I was the last arrival. Of course, Ron called me just as I was leaving work and asked that I head to the house instead and pick up the chainsaw.  Apparently they needed to cut down a few trees. They were in the way of our new tent.

By the time I arrived, they had the entire frame set up.  Of course, Jesse was not happy.  The first part of the instructions suggested the tent be set up on slab.  No mention of the best way to set it up on a forest floor.

The decision was made to wait until Friday to get the cover on.  Both Ron and I had taken the day off.  While we were picking things up, I decided to try and damage myself again. I tripped over a tree root and went crashing to the ground.  Smacked my hands, knees and head pretty good.  Ron made me sit down and drink some water until he was sure I was alright.  He wanted to take everyone to dinner, but I was not up to it. I headed home to take some aspirin.

The next day, Ron and I head out to the farm with a full load of supplies, including his newest toy.  A jackhammer.  He bought this in order to plant the lavender starts we ordered.  You all know just how many rocks we have at THF.   We are so over dealing with them.  And wouldn’t you know it, Jesse got to try it out for the first time with our tent setup.  We were supposed to set anchor points in order to hold the blasted thing down.  Of, course no amount of sledge hammer use was getting the job done.  While the jackhammer busted through the rocks like magic, the blade was just not long enough to do the job.  We will have to get back to that part of the process.

Getting the cover on was actually the easy part.  Then we had to lace the ends up.  You can see the grommets on the right hand side.  They were on both ends and went up sides, across the top and down again.  This was the hardest part.  It was a struggle to get the strapping under the frame, all the while keeping it from twisting.  We were all so happy when it was finally done.

We cleaned up the area and headed home.  Still had quite a bit to get organized at home for tomorrow.  Have notes all over the place to make sure we don’t forget anything.  Like the mushroom spawn.  That would mess up the whole day.

After a beer for Ron and glass of wine for me, we are done for the day.  We really need to get a solid night’s sleep tonight.  A lot of work tomorrow, but with lots of friends and some family on hand, we will get it all done.  For those of you who cannot make it tomorrow, we will be planting lots of lavender mid May.  Will be looking for volunteers then too.