A week ago I got the awesome "triple-bagger" grass collector for my garden tractor. I hope to mow and collect the chips from encroaching blackberries, then deal severely with the chips in a manner not yet decided- perhaps mulching the "good" blackberries that are growing where I want them to.
After a couple days procrastination and a couple days' struggle I got that bad boy put together, and then yesterday I tried the dump trailer which had previously mounted on the place where the grass collector was. OK, then I will improvise a new mount off the triple bagger mounting bracket. A hole was bored in the bracket for the clevis pin attachment and the tow bar mounted, but then I found during the road test that the handle of the dump trailer for using it without a tow vehicle had interference problems with the new mounting bracket, so I began to remove it, when I realized that I needed a new set of bolts to hold the trailer together that were 1" smaller without the handle. A trip to the hardware ensued, after which I was benighted and had to quit until morning, putting the garden tractor away in its stable.
Morning dawned, and after the usual morning chores, I spent my morning walking the property with MM and figuring out garden locations, and trying out the pick and eye-hoe to prepare one test location for tree planting. I had a curved piece of crabapple trunk to serve as the base for a combination fish-scale semicircle and a midget hugel mound, filled with the wood chips we made cleaning up the old crabapple tree.
Then I proceeded with the reconfiguration of the dump trailer and after solving a couple problems the trailer was finished. I went and got the garden tractor but couldn't figure out why it was leaning to the left. Turns out one tire was flat as a pancake.
After a time trying to find a lug wrench, I located a socket and ratchet combination that would serve if assisted by a well-directed kick, and removed the wheel, washed off the caked mud, and drove with it to the local tire place, were they found a puncture the size of a rebar, plugged it, and I brought it along with my new lug wrench back home and got it remounted. All the time it was raining, so I ended up soaked and chilled before I could get the tractor under cover and myself inside, where I lit a fire and changed my clothes. And that was the day. So now I have a working garden tractor and a towable dump trailer that has not actually been road tested.
On the plus side I have a new lug wrench and a better plan for garden plots; and I have found that for removing sod, the eye-hoe is better than the horizontal pick blade. I estimate I could plant up to 4 trees a day in the style I learned last Sunday.
As usual I collected a few battle scars- bruised a rib when I lost my footing traversing a rain-slick clay bank, aching arms and legs from the eye-hoe and pick work- but I guess I got ahead a bit after all.
No comments:
Post a Comment