Posted by Ben on September 16th, 2009 — Posted in Posted From the Ranch, Progress
Tags: Progress, refrigerator, solar, trailer
Well, I know it’s been ages since we’ve posted any progress… Things have been on a kind of status quo hold for the last few months vis a vis the ranch itself.
We have fixed up the trailer a little since we got it. We replaced the roof vent with a functioning one, replaced the glass in the two broken windows, and installed crank handles on all the windows. We bought 2 new propane bottles and installed a new rack for them, after painting the tongue to look new and white. When we got the trailer, the oven didn’t work right, but a little tweaking has it running spot on temp, and we can even cook pizzas in it without too much drama.
We took the trailer out with us to the SLV Fest in Monte Vista, and things went well, but we ripped off the door on the way back into the ranch. We really need to get the new easement graded, if we ever get the money to rent a tractor for a month, and the production surplus to use it.
We then fixed up the door and took the trailer with us to Sock Summit in Portland. This trip went well, despite one of the old tires delaminating on our way into Oceanside, California. While in San Diego, we “borrowed” my brother’s 8 solar panels.
Over the following month or so, we built a jerry rigged rack for 4 of the panels (the charger he gave us will only support 4) and bought a single lone deep cycle battery (which will eventually find itself a permanent home on the trailer tongue). We tried to use this setup to power our 12v thermo-electric cooler, and it worked fine, except the cooler does not have a low voltage cutoff, so on a cloudy day it drained the battery dead, and the charger turned off, never to come on again, and our food all melted. I jump started the charger, and installed a cheep low voltage cut off on the cooler, and the cooler turned off when the battery fell to 10.5 volts, never to turn on again until I unplugged the cord and plugged it back in. Again, the food suffered.
Then we went and borrowed an inverter from Chris at Brandywine Woodworking and then bought a “refrigerator” from Target. This seamed to work the first night, but in the end (after another day) we discovered that this thermo-electric unit was horribly inefficient and didn’t’ even manage to keep the inside below 50º. So we returned that one to Target and went to Sears and bought a real 2.7 cu-ft refrigerator, and have been using it for a couple hours now, and have already had to readjust the temp setting back from 28º. 
This one also seams to be a lot more efficient, and should last longer on the battery. We will see come tomorrow morning.
In other ranch news, the shed is about the same as it was, but we have added stairs to the front, and have been using it as our wood shop for winder production for several months now. It is a bit cramped, but it is working out well. We have slowly upgraded the workspace by adding some built in shelves to organize router and drill bits, and adding more extension cords to have easier to reach plugs for all the tools. We recently replaced the 2 600w flood lights with a couple standard fluorescent shop lights. The new lights are way brighter, and a whole lot cooler. Not to mention easier on the generator, especially when one of the big tools is turning on.
The propane generator that I was using stopped working well, so I had to buy a new generator a couple months ago, which is gas powered, and has worked flawlessly. After a while of letting it sit, I decided to try adding a real pressure regulator to the propane generator’s supply line, and it has worked flawlessly ever since. We have been using it to power the lights in the trailer up until now, when we just got the inverter for the solar system. We will still use it at the trailer when the days are cloudy and the battery is low.
The animals all seam immensely happy here at the ranch. We built a little animal run off the trailer and they can all go outside. The cats, especially, are much softer and cleaner looking than they have ever been.
Well, that’s all the news that is the news. Hopefully we will have some more progressy progress to report over the next couple months.
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Posted by Christy on May 18th, 2009 — Posted in Progress
Tags: trailer
Thanks to the magic of Craigslist, we are now the proud owners of this “new” trailer. It’s a 1969 14 foot Forester. It’s in good enough condition, and we towed it all the way to the property with just a few issues going up a few of the hills.
All in all, our Element is a good car. We love the Element, and have asked it to do things that it wasn’t spec’ed for … like towing a 14′ trailer up a hill through the dirt.
Trailer from the side
Trailer from the front
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Posted by Ben on April 24th, 2009 — Posted in Visits
Due to boredom and people coming to see the house again we drove down to the ranch to play. We decided to take the scenic route, and went down 115, through Florence, Wetmore, Fairview, and Rye. It was a very pretty drive, which I wouldn’t mind doing again. From Rye we took “Highway” 181 down to Apache, from which we took CR 660 to Lascar (CR 650) to the farm road to the ranch. Along CR 660 we saw tons of Prairie Dogs, and several different birds which we failed to identify.
Once we got to the ranch we immediately got out the tree frog colored kite we bought earlier at Target and promptly launched it into the air. It flew great in the gentle breeze. Christy flew the kite for a while and I went around with the camera and the bird lens trying to find good pictures of birds, plants and wildlife. I finally found some meadowlarks on the far south side of the property, and I had to cross an arroyo to get a good shot of one, and it stayed on the bush until I got back up the other side.
After some more random pics, we started to leave, and I decided to try and find the bush that held the Loggerhead Shrikes last time. So I was walking around, and saw a Loggerhead on a bush. As I was trying to get a good angle on it, and move closer I spotted a pile of animal droppings, which isn’t unusual since there are tons of dear and pronghorn tracks all over. I was about to step past the dung when it caught my interest that it was remarkably well spiraled, rather like in a cartoon. This gave me pause, then the dung wiggled it’s tongue at me, which made me stop dead for a fraction of a second, before stepping quickly backward. I got some shots of said “dung” and then got an ok shot of the Loggerhead.
On the way way out I spied a birdie, which I didn’t get a good picture of, but later identified as a Lark Sparrow. We also saw some huge black and orange furry bees, about twice as big as a bumble bee, which I haven’t ID’ed yet.
Posted by Christy on April 24th, 2009 — Posted in Visits
These cows are FAAAR away.
This cow is small.
This cow is also small. And coy.
Posted by Ben on April 17th, 2009 — Posted in Visits
Tags: birds, flowers, plants
Juvenile Loggerhead Shrike
We popped down to the ranch yesterday to relax and take some photos. It was nice to visit, but we didn’t stay terribly long. We walked around, took some photos, and chose out an approximate location for the Rental/Guest House on the south lot.
Western Meadowlark
The grass is starting to green up nicely, and it’s starting to look lush. Down in the Arroyos the plants are green and the air was moist. It is apparent the area is getting ready to explode in rich dessert life. It should be a very pretty spring.
Flower Buds on Ball Cactus
There were quite a few flowers hidden among the grass and cacti, most are low to the ground, but Christy got pictures of several. We have identified some of them, but a few I am still not sure of. A lot of flowers were getting ready to bloom, and sometime in the next couple weeks parts of the field will be completely covered in flowers. I think we even have a few wild lilies around.
White Locoweed
We finally managed to get some pictures of a couple of our native birds and positively identify them. We know we have Western Meadowlarks and Loggerhead Shrikes. I think we also have American Robbins, and also Mountain Bluebirds, as well as either Crows or Ravens. I don’t think there is anywhere real close for hawks to nest, but they do occasionally soar over.
Stemless Daisy
In all the dry mud from the recent weather, we saw lots of pronghorn and dear tracks all around the property. As well as some other tracks. A couple may have been wild horse, and some were probably coyote.
We also stopped by our “local” Big-R in Pueblo, and checked it out. It’s pretty nice, and should be a great source for tools and supplies once we start actually ranching. It is much bigger and more fully stocked than the Big-R in Falcon.
We are also starting to plan out our “landscaping” and gardening for the future. There is so much wonderful potential there! One thing we know we want to do is to plant at least one Cottonwood tree, like the ones we pass on the way to the property. We are also dreaming of a fenced garden area, with vegetables, roses, an arbor, bird bath and feeders, and much more.
Redstem Filaree
Layers of Mountains
Cottonwoods Along the Road
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