Water rights

I had a light bulb moment the other morning whilst I was in the shower.

Everyone is concerned about water - or the lack thereof.  Many places in South Africa (and throughout the world) are experiencing semi-to-fully drought-like conditions.  Due to corruption, which leads to "lack" of funds for infrastructure - even the most basic infrastructure which is enshrined in our Constitution - namely, water - is not provided to too many homes in this country.

This results, in some cases, in the residents having to walk long distances in order to collect water in whatever containers they have, and carry those heavy water filled containers home again.  A cleansing, rejuvenating refreshing and soothing bath or shower - those are probably a luxury those residents have probably never known.

Can you imagine going without a bath or shower?  I can't.

Near us is a village called Suurbraak.  It is a small village with a long history which dates back to the time of the London Missionary Society and which has a population of roughly 2 500 inhabitants.

Suurbraak is situated in a valley on the windward (seaward) side of the Langeberg Mountains, meaning their rainfall is higher than that which falls on the leeward side (Barrydale) of the mountain.  They get roughly 450 - 500mm of rain a year - falling throughout the year.  Actually, they get more than we do - we often sit on our front veranda and watch much needed rain falling in Suurbraak and pray that it will come our way.  Which it often doesn't.

As you can see, since I started keeping a rainfall
 record we are averaging over 600mm of rain / year.
 And, it is, mostly, spread throughout the year.

Some (very few) of the residents properties back onto the Suurbraak River from which they can obtain lei water (a pumped water allowance for a stipulated number of hours of river water / week) which is used to water their crops / livestock.  Those residents are sitting in the pound seats as those properties are situated in the lowest part of the village and they also get municipal water provided to them - for household consumption.

Municipal water is also provided to roughly half way up the little valley slope.

But, those who live in the upper reaches of the valley have no municipal water.  I presume they have to fetch their own water from a central distribution point.

They have an ongoing battle with the authorities regarding the provision of water to their homes.  Apparently, it would require the provision and installation of a fairly substantial pump in order to get water up to the upper reaches of the village.  Which costs money, naturally.

Back to fraud and corruption... (sigh)

That is where my light bulb moment comes in to play.

Two of our 8 X 5 000lt tanks which catch,
 and store, rainwater from our roof area

Standing in the bathroom, hearing rainwater plinking into the rainwater tanks which are situated outside the window, the thought just seemed to come naturally.

If, instead of bemoaning the cost of installing a pump, why on earth don't the 'powers that be' provide those residents with 5 000lt rain water tanks, a downpipe and a section of guttering?  Everyone has a structure, no matter how basic, which has a roof which collects water when it rains.  This water falls pathetically from the roof, onto the ground, runs down the streets, and lands in the river.

What a bloody waste of precious water!!!

Every single mm of rain which falls equals 1 lt of water per square mtr of roof surface.  That means a roof area exposed, like Suurbraak, to 600ml rain / year - even a small one of say 48mtrs2 (6 X 8mtr) would collect 28 800 ltrs of rain water a year.

Providing every household with a rain water tank will ensure that at least 5 000 ltrs / household will be captured and can be used (after boiling) for household use.  Thus alleviating the necessity of mainly wives / mothers / children having to schlep heavy water filled containers, and giving those individual households some modicum of self-reliance.

That would also give those households a sense of achievement, pride and responsibility (keeping their gutters clean, ensuring they are in good working order).

It would give them some degree of water freedom.

Surely?

At the moment, the tanks are selling (retail) for ZAR1.00 / lt, so a 5 000lt tank costs +/- ZAR5 000.  If the 'powers that be' had to place a (national) order for 1 000 000 tanks the cost would surely come down - even if only by 25% or ZAR3 750.00 / tank - if not more...?

Plus that kind of order would create jobs.  Win-win in my book.

Surely that would be cheaper than setting up a pumping station for 250 - 400 homes in Suurbraak?

And, for those really rural areas where municipal water will definitely never be a reality, that would be a Godsend!

Why don't people think laterally, instead of letting obstacles get in their way...?

Finding the right spot...

... to house a tractor takes time.

Big, leaking oil, and taking up too much space -
we had to find a new home for the tractor...

A couple of years ago RMan bought a skedonk 2nd hand tractor, and, as the gearbox isn't sealed against the elements, it has to be kept undercover when not in use.  He had built a carport next to the garage - which was meant to be for my car - but, with the acquisition of said farm implement, it instantly became the tractor shed.

But - that is also where we store the alpaca feed.

Which was attracting field mice - not only for the pellets / oat seed which invariably gets accidentally dropped on the floor, but they were also burrowing into the bales of lucerne - nest making.

And chewing the tractor wiring.

Not good.

Also, due to space constraints the genny, which is also kept there, was positioned with it's exhaust aimed directly at the lucerne bales.

Not good again.

The tractor took up too much room, so we had to find another spot for it - well, I say we, but I mean me lol

I was only using a 1/3 of the second
shadecloth structure to propagate cuttings /
grow my seedlings.

We had erected a second shadecloth structure where I was propagating cuttings / starting seedlings, but that certainly didn't take up all the space available.  I suggested to RMan that he covered two thirds of the roof area with IBR sheeting and relocate his tractor there.  Thankfully RMan agreed with me.

It's a slightly tight fit, but it works :)

The tractor is now happily ensconced in it's new home...

The genny was located to the left of the feed
buckets with it's exhaust pointing towards the
lucerne.  Now, in it's new position, it's
(newly extended) exhaust expels it's fumes out of
the enclosed carport.  The sandbags surrounding it
 are there to try and help mute the noise of the 
 genny on those rare occasions when it is in use.

... and the genny has it's newly extended exhaust pointing outside of the enclosed carport area.

The white 1000lt container in the foreground
was sacrificed - by removing it from the support
frame, cutting it in half - and has become a
brilliant mouse-free lucerne bale storage unit 
(because they can't climb the slippery sides, 
and they can't jump that high)

The big bale of lucerne - well, we took one of our 1 000lt water containers, removed it from its aluminium frame, cut the water storage section in half, and we're storing the lucerne in that - the sides of the container are too slippery for a mouse to climb, and too steep to jump into :)  I was OK with sacrificing the water storage container because trying to find fittings in order to use the container for it's intended purpose was impossible - there is nothing that will fit the outlet tap section of these units available in this country.

And my car now has protection from the weather once again :)

Any idea's as to how I can re-purpose/ recycle the frame from the 1 000lt water container...?

Dam fun - part 1 :)

Our dam was dug when we first purchased our smallholding - along with the original incorrect foundations for our future house.  They say that a dam takes 3 years before it will hold water.  We purchased in 2008 - and it's now 2013.  The maths doesn't work LOL as it's held water, but not continuously.

So, in February we had to get the digger loader in to sort our the building rubble left over from the build.  While it was here RMan decided to make our dam deeper.  Oh, dear, does that mean another 3 - 5 year wait?

Building rubble - unsightly and, due to it's chaotic
pile, a potential snake hiding place

The building rubble was sorted in the wink of an eye...

The digger loader made light work of the pile of
rubble

... nice and tidy again :) (I think I'm in love with digger loaders...)

Then, the digger collected all the dry renoster bush we have so far removed from the land and piled it up next to the "rubble" pile.

The renosterbush we removed is now all
in one spot, instead of scattered round
the land

A few b-i-g scoops of clay from the dam were placed on top of the dry renoster bush - hopefully, the renoster bush will break down and create a sort of hugelkulture mound [hint: there are two separate links giving information on hugelkulture - on both the hugelkulture and mound words :) ]

Objective achieved

On the mound created by the building rubble we have thrown a slab, and have sited two 5 000lt rainwater tanks on top of it (with space for another two should we decide to add them).  This is the highest point of our relatively flat property, and, when our lower rainwater tanks are full, the water will be pumped up to the higher tanks, as it is the ideal spot to gravity feed rainwater down to the lemon trees and veggie patches next summer.

The digger loader at the start of the dam
excavation

With that sorted, the digger loader proceeded to dig the dam deeper - at least double the depth to 3.0 - 3.5 mtrs deep.

Dam deepening in progress

You can see from the photo below how deep the dam is - I can barely see the digger loader in the dam from the front verandah.

Can you see the digger loader?

MKids dog, Mandy, thought this was brilliant.  Once the digger loader left, she went to investigate.  She is absolutely moggy about piles of sand - of any size -and a newly dug dam - well, that's just one big sand pit :)  She ran, and ran, and ran - up and down, round the side, up and down - as though she had a skateboard beneath her feet LOL

Mandy - in doggy heaven

In the event of the future global warming drought scenario, we want to be as water secure as much as possible, so together with the 35 000 ltrs of rain water, and a 25 X 10 X 3.0 mtr dam (750mtr3 or 750 000 ltrs of dam water), we should be OK through dry seasons.  I think of it as bulk storage with a difference LOL

A few days later, whilst sitting and contemplating the dam from our verandah, RMan had an idea.

Briefly sketching it out to me when I was busy with something else, and wasn't listening properly, he proceeded with his plan...

Rugby posts?

Rugby posts in a dam.  What?!?!?  I can't remember the conversation...

To give you perspective, those gum poles
are 4.6 mtrs high (less 600 in the ground)

Leaving the cement  to dry round the base of the poles, he visited a Bentonite mine in Heidelberg - just down the N2.  Bentonite is an eco-friendly natural substance with a multitude of uses.

Zeolite inifo

Not only do they produce Bentonite, but they also mine Zeolite. Zeolite is the substance nearer the surface of the ground - Bentonite is further down, below the Zeolite.  (Clicking on the two pages of the phamplett which I scanned, you can see how useful they both are.)

Bentonite info

Having collected a mtr3 of bentonite noodles in our trailer...

Our trailer can hold 1.5 mtrs3 

...which got distributed via a wheel barrow...

One gets different grades of Bentonite -
the finer the more expensive.  We opted for the
cheaper Bentonite "noodles" - hopefully it will
perform as we anticipate

... RMan proceeded to "line" the newly deepend dam with the bentonite...

... more rugby posts...?

He was told to spread it out to 6cms thick and then to mix it with the surface clay - this was achieved with a rake - on a cool day - and even then he worked up a sweat :)

Bentonite mixed with red clay

Obviously, some of the principles from the General Science classes I attended as a primary school child stuck.  I had to try an experiment.

Lumps of Bentonite clay

So - 20gms of bentonite were placed in a bowl, and to that I added...

Bentonite and water

... 42 grams of water.

Bentonite and water slurry

After a bit of a stir with my (unscientific) finger the zeolite became a white muddy mess - well, it is a form of clay - just finer in structure - and white coloured :)  I added more water, and double the amount of red to white clay.

Settling of the clay / bentonite

Separation of the water from the two clays took no time at all...

The Bentonite / clay mix is much lighter
coloured than plain red clay

... roughly about 3/4 hour.  Far quicker than when one mixes plain red clay and water.  Bear in mind that our dam stayed muddy the entire time it held water, and the longest that lasted has been 4 months.

The mix is almost moonscapish in appearance

Not that easy to see, so I placed it into a glass and added more water.  Can you see the surface of the bentonite / clay mix underneath the water.  It looks amazing.  Sort of moon landscapish...

We very happy with this result -
one can clearly see the adhersion of
the red and white Bentonite clay :)

How hectic is that?!  The bentonite and clay soil has "binded" together, and the water is basically as clear as when it came out of the tap.  And this settlement took just a short while - seriously just 35 - 40 minutes.  It bodes well for our first heavy rain when the flood of water into the dam will cause a swirling, mixing effect...

We both can't wait... :)

Judging from the experiment, when, and if, we have water in the dam, and we need to pump the water out in the future, providing that we "scoop" out the upper layer of water, our pump should suffer no ill effects from the clay content.

Pumpkin matters

Rugby rules in this house again, so I have the time (and power) to blog - God bless Saturday afternoons LOL

In South Africa a popular method of storing summer pumpkins is on a (low) roof to harden them off for use them during the winter months. Unfortunately, at it's lowest point, our roof is in excess of 3.0 mtrs above the ground, and at angle of 45°, that is not a solution for me.

I also have limited freezer space (below my fridge), and ditto limited storage space for canned / preserved goods.  So I had to come up with another solution.

And I have.

I peeled the entire pumpkin we were having with our dinner, removed the stringy bits...

Prepared pumpkin

...placed the skin in my worm farm, and put the seeds to one side for use next summer.

Pumpkin peels to feel the worms, and pumpkin seeds
left to dry so that I can plant them next summer :)

The remainder of the pumpkin which we didn't have with our dinner and which I wanted to preserve was weighed - 981 gms.

981 gms of fresh pumpkin

The slices were approximately 1 cm thick and I carefully arranged them on my (cake) rack so that they fitted below the stainless steel food cover.

Protecting my pumpkin pieces

To ensure that flies nothing found it's way onto the pumpkin, I draped a lacy food net over the stainless steel one, and tucked it underneath the rack.

Seriously protecting my pumpkin pieces - I
probably went overboard, but rather safe than
sorry :)

Then I put the pumpkin on the rack on the front patio table - now that winter is on it's way, the sun is falling perfectly on the table for this experiment.

The early morning sun is just beginning to touch
the table. I reckon that the protective black cover
on the table helped the process

This is what they looked like after one day

Day 1 of the dehydrating process

And this is at the end of Day 2

Day 2

Three days later they were perfectly dehydrated.  981gms became 86 grams! A perfect solution for storing the pieces of the 8 pumpkins I have in a large recycled mayonnaise bottle - and just think how much shelf space is saved.

All it took was 3 days to perfectly dehydrate the
pumpkin slices

But - I couldn't resist.  Would they rehydrate properly?  So, you guessed it, a piece went into a small bowl of water, and this is what it looked like the next morning...

I'm happy with the rehydrated pumpkin piece

I reckon that was a successful experiment.

And a perfect experiment to encourage RMan to use the wood we purchased and make me that dratted solar dryer for next summer... ;)

Storage and working space

Time for another peek at the inside of our little farmhouse :)

When we originally started building on our farm, it was going to be a weekend place.  An escape from the rat race for a couple of days every so often.

Then the eco-friendly, self-sustainable bug hit me.  And RMan.  And the farm became a lifestyle choice.

So, my kitchen was planned to handle short visits.  With very limited storage.

This is what my kitchen storage
consisted of:
undercounter open shelves,
the island on wheels, and a
couple of wall mounted shelves.
Now who could store what in that?

I, therefore, had to make a plan.

And, in explaining my plan to RMan, I was assisted by this photo...

http://homesteadsurvival.blogspot.com/2012/08/
nice-office-out-of-wasted-space.html

Oh, doesn't that look nice!  It makes the orderly person inside me glow with delight.

In our situation it translates into...

Wasted space under the stairs, just crying out
to be used...

As you all know, we installed a staircase, to gain access to the upstairs bedrooms.  So, naturally, I'm using the space under the stairs as part of my bulk dry goods larder :)

Cramped, but better than nothing

It not as fancy as the first sample picture from 'homesteadsurvival' as we didn't have the floor space to have a long(er) staircase, and thus deeper understair cupboard (at a much sharper angle), but, well, we are on a farm.  And, with a bit of wood work, I think it's acceptable.

TaaDaa!  The staircase (with cupboard
area inside) as it looks today.
And our antique cupboard looks
perfect in front of it :)

I'm not complaining - at all :)

The final days in town...

I'm taking a chance here.  My internet connection is currently anything from 3.7 - 400kbs (upload) and a whopping 1 - 10kbs (download)...  Not the easiest way to blog, but I'm missing it and I'm missing all of you :)  I am also trying something different.  Normally, with the ADSL line I would just write this online.  Now, I have opened the page, disconnected from my connection, and I am typing it off-line, and I will try and post it when I am finished.  Let's see if it works? :)


Very disgruntled, unable to send out quotes for the business, barely able to check e-mail, too scared of the slow speed to try and even blog, throwing a good portion of my toys out of the cot, and following a call to the service centre, we have had our (new) service provider (Vodacom) send a technician in order to see if we need a booster aerial (duh!).  He came all the way from Cape Town (a three hour drive) - did all the tests - has returned to Cape Town and will give all the data to the network technicians.  He says that they will do the necessary, drive all the way here, install a booster aerial so that I can get a 2Gb edge connection (the best edge connection) - and this service and the booster is going to be no charge????  I will be amazed if that is the case - and I know of at least 6 other houses here who will make use of their service if this is successful.  Clever - marketing with a difference.  Because they know that if it does work I will  take out a two year contract with them - and that is still a plus for me, as it will be cheaper than the only other option available to our area.  It looks like at least one company in this country is cottoning on to pleasing the client - as they do in 1st world countries.


But, all that aside, getting back to the move.  The last few days in town were were hectic - more hectic than even I thought they would be.  For all my "organisation" I felt helpless and out of control.  I guess moving the business to it's new premises didn't help much.  But it's finally all over :)


RMan was a star with his help - he even cleaned the electric oven shelves for me - well, his wrists are stronger than mine, and his thumb pressure - immense :)

As you all know the mover took the bulk of the stuff a week prior to the transfer going through.  

I was amazed at the size of the truck, not
believing that we would fill it - but we did!

They were amazing - it took them just over 4 hours to load everything in the truck - with most of the space having been taken up by our pot plants LOL

6 busy guys - 4 hours - all  sorted :)

As we approached the storage facility, RMan called the driver and asked him if he would be willing to make a small detour - if he would willing to possibly try and drive along our rutted sand road (if you can call it that - more like a dirt track) in order to offload the pot plants - and he agreed :)  But getting that enormous truck in our gate was another thing all together. Never mind - getting to that point was an immense help.  We offloaded all the pot plants and RMan whizzed them up to the house in his trailer.  Even that took 6 trips - just as well the movers accommodated our request - six trips from the storage facility in the closest town to the house would've taken hours! 

The moving truck - all the way down at our gate

We decided to clump the plant altogether - to give them some moral support LOL  Just until we have time to decide where exactly we are going to place them.  Sadly, a couple of my big pots didn't make it - but I will still be using them - I'll show you how in a later posting :)

We piled all the more tender plants
within the circle - to give them time
to acclimatize. 

Then - it was back to the storage facility.  The size of it was perfect - 35mtrs2.  Everything was carefully stored inside, including the boxes - they even had the number on the box facing outwards, so that if I needed to get anything out of one, it would be no problem.

All of this fitted into a 210mtr2 house - and this is
only 35mtrs2 with space to spare?!

So sad to see our complete "past" together packed into such a small space.  I commented to RMan that my de-cluttering obviously worked.  But, even I was amazed at how little space our possessions took.  Never mind, it wont be in storage for long - the builder has said that all the works should be complete within 3 months - weather permitting...

MKid's wellies - where he left them in front of the TV

A week later, after transfer had been confirmed and finalized, we loaded, or tried to load, the very last of the stuff from the town house.  We had underestimated the amount, and the combined space of the company van, RMan's car and the trailer, were not sufficient.  We had to temporarily store some at the new business premises.  The picture above amply portrays the scene at the house for that last week.  MKid was with us for that week, together with his new wellies, and calling him for dinner (eaten on the floor) he leapt up from watching Top Gear, leaving his wellies behind.  So sad and empty - just a shell of the home that had been.  But, I am not heart sore - it was a move we had to make, and it is affording us both a new beginning - with a clean slate.  That is worth more than memories - which we still have time to make in our new home.

After a final clean-up (wiping out the last of the cupboards, the last wipe-down of all the wall tiles, vacuuming all the carpets and scrubbing all the floor tiles), and waiting for the new owner in order to hand over the keys, we finally walked out of the town house door at 3.30p.m.  We arrived at the storage facility at 7.00p.m. - unpacked what we could, and then it was time to finally head for the farm to offload the rest...