Team DIY

[mfrench]

Just a general DIY thread with no particular direction intended.

I'll start out with that which just hit the trash bin.
They had this smell funk thing going on. It was getting hard to wash the stank out of my hands. So I re-taped the newer-used backups, and, these were just retired.
Being a rock gardener is sort of hard on things. These weren't that old.

 

[mfrench]

More on my rock gardening,... the reason for the trashed gloves.
My dry creek flowing. And, Bach Toccata and Fugue providing the proper mayhem soundtrack.
Bach: Toccata and Fugue - DryCreekRockEnsemble

This is the first time that I saw this dry creek flowing after having built it; something like 3 years passed,..
There were a few changes made to the desiltation pond at the top (lowered the level to hold less water), and, a large extension at the end has just been added, and is a presently ongoing project.

 

[mfrench]

OK,... I'll just keep plugging away here; maybe it will hook, eventually?

We had an area that was exposed to winter frost kill in a sensitive succulent groundcover. It was thick in thatch, and, non-native grasses were coming up through it. So, I took the scuffle hoe and cut all the junk out.. This left the slope barren.
All the bare soil has just been scraped clean down below the root level.
As of friday:


As I mentioned, I'm a rock gardener. I plant rocks, because they don't die.
I planted many rocks this weekend (well, for a whole lot longer than just this weekend, but for another rambling,..). And I planted some really big ones!
THe slope that you see is sort of our "back way" up to the swimming pool mechanical area. It is just a dirt path, and skirted along the face of that barren slope. In wet times it was slippery. So, I decided to throw many many 200->400lb granite boulders at it over the weekend, rock garden style.

as of this evening, three days later:

There is an odd gap between the first steps and the second pair.It is an unfortunate result of a barely buried irrigation manifold pipe set. I graveled it in, and put a few small stepping stones over it to keep it accessible.


The area at the top is where it starts to level back into the grade; That area is going to be covered in 3/4" crushed rock as a waliing pathway surface. The area at the very base is going to be in 3/4" gravel as well. But, I've got to get more of it.
So, this was a three day pathway project, and is as of this evening.

Now, its been turned over to Sarge to make it all pretty with plants and stuff.

 

[mfrench]

OK,... Does anyone have any experience with DIY Gabion Boxes for stacking rocks in, for use in creating retaining walls, erosion control, etc?

We have an area at our driveway entry where I want to create some retaining wall structure. I'm intrigued with the Gabion theory. I'm thinking about something like the image above. So I'm curious if anyone has done any?
please and thanks.

 

[elcoholic]

My brother in AZ is building a deck using them. So far so good he says.

 

[mfrench]

It is sort of funny that I ask this, as I have actually built a couple of them about five years ago, in a dry creek project that I did here. They are not true Gabion boxes, and from a time before I knew of them.
I was creating a headwall to capture the inflow, and direct it where I wanted it to go. That headwall consisted of a bunch of stuff that I'd gathered from the yard, in cleaning it out, and included concrete pathway steppers, concrete wall caps, and, these scalloped concrete garden edgers.
I hauled yards of soil up to where the headwall was going in, and then I faced the soil with the concrete steppers and concrete wall caps, on one side of the headwall ( the taller/deeper side). On the other side, I used a bunch of leftover 60# bags of concrete stacked two high, in bags. I faced those bags with the scalloped edging blocks, and stacked them with the scallops facing each other.
Both of these headwall structures were then wrapped in chainlink fencing, and, turkey fence wire, to keep the incoming flows from effecting them.

To the left of the shrub at center is the concrete steppers and wall cap face. To the right of the shrub is the concrete bags and scalloped edging face.




The concrete sacks have hardened into concrete block. I attached the turkey hardware cloth with landscaping staples, and they're permanently set into the concrete blocks now.
At any rate,... I sort of had the Gabion theory in mind already, without realizing it. So, I'm kind of keen on doing some real boxes, and see how that works out.

 

[mfrench]

Dang,.. Gabion box kits ain't cheap!
So, I went looking for alternates, like bulk roll materials for concrete mesh; poultry fencing, etc.
Then, I thought I'd drive by this recycling/used metal/ junkyard place, and what did I find??
A $10 dog crate.
Made with similar specs to the gabion boxes ($50->$100 ++ each in a hurry). So, I wired the alternate openings shut, started stacking rocks inside until I formed a perimeter, stuck the old mailbox into it, and backfilled around it.

My first gabon attempt:

This area is about to undergo a huge water district digging effort to replace a huge underground valve. I was just about to do a complete overhaul about 6 months ago, when my neighbor across the street, a water district employee, said that in June, a huge dig was scheduled.
SInce tyhat time, I've been limping the mailbox along, hoping that it would make it through to the effort. But, it crashed a week ago, and became this rock propped ghetto leaning eye sore. So, this is a bit rough, but, will be cleaned up in due time, when the WD dig is completed.