Using All Parts of the Animal

Beneath our thin layer of topsoil is “fill”: inorganic sand and rock, good for building houses on but awful if you want to grow things. At first I hated this, because anywhere that we want a new in-ground bed, we have to first remove the fill. My consolation prize at first was the big rocks we dug up. The I found uses for the smaller rocks. And lastly I realized that the fill was exactly what I needed to construct a path out into the wetland. Now, every time I have a wheelbarrow full of sand, instead of taking it to some useless pile at the edge of the woods, I haul it to the end of this path and use it to make more path.

I would estimate that this little path represents about forty wheelbarrow loads.

I keep trying and failing to get a good photo of this path. It took a dusting of snow to make it stand out appropriately.

To the right of the path is my tiny pond. To the left is a brush pile made of Christmas trees which had been dumped in the swamp by the previous owners.