Compost

Old leaves, kitchen waste, goat manure, straw, and (because we're building a house) a bag of sawdust. Keep it moist, fluffy, and full of oxygen, and in another month or so, it will be an excellent soil amendment. Don't forget a chimney to get oxygen down into the middle of the pile.

 

This spring's irrigation project

Looking south on a north-facing slope

I’ve been considering what I want to do with my ten acres now that our house is nearing completion at the top of the ridge. The house itself has always been a key part of my overall plan, as its hard surfaces will collect snowmelt and whatever rainfall we get during the year and transport it to nearby growing areas. It would have been nice if the gated pipe had been operational early on, bringing water up to the top of the hill, but between leaks in the system and the unreliability of the pump, that has not been a viable option. Besides, I’d rather not use gasoline just to move water — just doesn’t sit right with me.

Instead, at this point, I want to deal with the water I can access by gravity — i.e., water that will seek its level. As calculated from Google Earth, that level would be the box at my neighbor's place on a nearby ridge, before it travels downhill to our junction, and that sits at 5855 feet above sea level.

On my property, that corresponds to marker (B) T1 (upper right hand corner in this picture), approximately 490 feet uphill from my northern property line. It’s on the pink contour line.

The buried irrigation pipe (the vertical red line on the right) jointly owned by me and my neighbor to the west runs up the gully, and there’s a valve that can send water further up to the gated pipe on the central ridge, close to the power pole (PP 5864 ft). However, the pump is required to push the water to that height, so that’s off the table for the time being as well.

The last time I tried to use the gated pipe and pump, there was a leak from damage about three-quarters of the way up the gully, a leak that got repaired with a valve I could open to flood irrigate a swale I’d dug there. That worked fine, but again it required the pump to get the water up to that height.

What I’d like to do this spring is install a similar valve on that main line lower down (5845 feet above sea level, 350 feet from the north boundary) and run a swale (the white line) on contour over to the other side of the property, directing the flow into a pond.

There would be a small collection/settling pool where the water enters the swale on the west, and a much larger dam and pond on the east. The dam would have a level sill on the east to act as an outlet for the pond. From there, if the pond should happen to overflow, the water would travel downhill along the east boundary of both my and my downhill neighbor's properties and eventually empty into the Smith Ditch. I do not anticipate this happening often, but the water needs to have a place to go and a mechanism for getting it there. All of these areas would need to be armored with rocks to prevent erosion.

The object here is to use my shares of the irrigation water to hydrate the soils along this swale and pond in order to plant trees. In theory, those root systems should hold onto much of that water and stabilize the soil there, and I can plant in the shade provided by their canopy once those trees are established. No trees would be planted in front of or on the dam itself to ensure its integrity, only at the back of the pond and along and slightly downhill from the swale itself.

There may also be an opportunity to use a similar technique on the gully area at the northwest corner of my property. By installing a similar valve approximately 140 feet up from the northern property line (tapping into the pipe at 5825 feet above sea level), I could run water through a series of swales slightly off-contour, and plant a small orchard in that section, letting the water subsequently leave the property and enter into my neighbor's small pond. From there on, it would be additional water for my neighbor's landscape.

Obviously this will require coordination and cooperation, as he is downhill from me — and the water needs to be put to beneficial use on both our parts. If it works as it should, it would also benefit my neighbor to the west, should he choose to participate, as the contours could also be continued across his property as well.