The Great Desert Experiment is coming to an end

After 4 1/2 years of building a home and a community in the northern Nevada desert, we have decided it is time to move on. A number of things in our lives have changed, and we feel the need to be closer to family. So, at the end of this month, we are moving to Maine. We hope to sell our 10 acres with a well, a hand pump and a solar pump, 1 kw of solar powering the 5-room cabin, a 600 watt wind generator, a gasoline generator for backup, the studio building, which could be a guest house, the barn and chicken house, an Old Hickory shed for a workshop, a shipping container, two composting toilets, and an assortment of fencing, including about 2 acres under electric fence for horses. We heat with direct-vent propane heaters, cook on a propane range with ignition powered by 9 volt batteries, and heat water with a 10 gallon RV water heater. Water is pumped into a 225 gallon tank by hand or solar (when it is fully installed), and from there into the house via an RV pump, so the shower, sink and lavatory have fully pressurized water. Our only utility bills are for propane and trash (the dumpster in town). If anyone is interested in a fully off-grid homestead, send me an email at hrpriter@debracthomas.net 

Thanks for following me, despite my dropping off the radar 2 1/2 years ago, when Blogger decided not to let me post pictures any more. We're off to our new adventure here:

 

Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch ....

Our wind sock is currently hanging on for dear life. Must be spring in the desert:

 

 

I intended to update this blog on March 14, the one-year anniversary of our move to Montello, but we've discovered that for some reason, the cell phone (and internet) signal is very unreliable at this time of year. "You *can* stop the signal, Mal!"

 

 

For those of you who have been asking our daughter, "Are your parents still doing that thing that they were doing?", the answer is yes, we're still doing "that thing." We call it homesteading. And I'm happy to report that we apparently survived the worst winter in recent memory. It required more gasoline to run generators than we would have liked, but Serenity's propane furnace and the vented propane heater in the studio kept us reasonably comfortable through a month of sub-zero cold (yes, even in the daytime), and our Simple Pump kept us in water. We were actually better off than our friends in town, who had to deal with frozen pipes and no water for extended periods of time, plus occasional power outages.

 

Here is more proof that it's spring. We planted these Australian Willow trees last year from cuttings, and they're putting on a new coat of leaves. The largest tree is nearly six feet tall already. This is the beginning of our windbreak, soon to be augmented with ten Colorado Blue Spruce seedlings from the Arbor Day Foundation. We now know where the snow drifts, so we're planning the windbreak accordingly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Bunny Barn/Chicken Coop is finally finished, after many cold winter days of Greg installing one board, then coming in to thaw out for a few hours, then adding another. This was built entirely from salvaged materials, with the exception of the hardware and caulking. Inside, you will find this:

 

 

 

When we made a trek to Elko (200 mile round trip) last month, the feed stores had those harbingers of spring, baby chicks and ducks. Of course we brought some home with us:

   





 

 

The chicken house now contains six Buff Orpingtons, six Rhode Island Reds, two Silver Laced Wyandottes and two White Pekin ducks.

 

The bunnies are happy in their new quarters, and hopefully will soon provide us with zillions of babies.



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A passing comment from a friend made me realize I need to clarify something with regard to our Nature's Head composting toilet: this is our second "facility," not the only one. We have a regular RV gravity-flush toilet inside Serenity, so there's no running outside at -15.

 

Another thing I wanted to mention, since we had seen nothing about it in researching off-grid power, is the fact that the solar panel systems and wind turbines one can buy *do not* include the wire. There is no way for the seller to know where your various components will be located, so you must provide your own wire. Once Greg mounted the solar panels, we had to measure the distance from the panels to the battery bank/charge controller, etc., and purchase wire. That required two strands of #10 wire, each 40 feet long. Not a huge investment, but still an unexpected expense. The wind generator was the real zinger: by placing it as close as was reasonable (30 feet from the battery bank, so that if the tower should fall in a gale-force wind it can't destroy anything), it required three strands of #4 wire, each 60 feet long--that cost nearly as much as the generator itself. Just something to be aware of for anyone considering going off-grid. (We had no choice in the matter, as it would cost more than $84,000 to bring electricity the two miles from the nearest power lines. We could power the entire valley with solar/wind power for that much!)

 

 

Oh, yes, remember the Mystery Object?

 

 

 

We showed it to Don one day, and he immediately said, "That's a root cellar." Then he went home and got his copy of "Putting Food By," and showed us the photo in this classic food preservation guide, of a barrel buried in the ground, with root vegetables wrapped in newspaper and straw, and the cover then put on to keep them through the winter. We haven't tried it out yet to see if it works, but we did buy a copy of the book.

 

 I'm waiting as patiently as I can for the weather to stabilize enough to start planting a garden. I have two raised beds ready, one outside the studio window and one beside the chicken coop, both filled with compost and other organic goodies. But it will be next month before the overnight temperatures stay above freezing.  

 

Time to go see what other mischief I can get into. Hope you all have a good spring (when it finally arrives in your neighborhood, I know some of you are having an extended winter this year) and I'll try to keep you posted on progress.



 

They Don't Call it the Cold Desert for Nothin'!

I've had a request from a friend (hi, Pete!) to post some photos and information on winter here at the corner of No and Where. We live in the Great Basin, aka the Cold Desert. Hot and dry in the summer (though not as hot or dry as the Chihuahuan Desert we lived in before moving up here), cold and dry in the winter. We had our first snow about a week before Halloween, although it didn't amount to much and didn't hang around very long. We've had a couple more light snows, which melted off in a day or so. Then, in early December, we finally got The Real Thing:

This snow arrived on Christmas Eve. Some of it is still around, although it's compacted into ice in places, and has disappeared in others due to sublimation. When it snows, the first thing we have to do is check the solar panels. They don't provide any electricity in this condition:

Rosa the Desert Dog is not a happy camper, she prefers to lie in the sun when it's 110 degrees out, but Gypsy was born for snow.

She bounds through the drifts and buries her nose in it, probably in search of her pile of bones.

As the temperatures dropped toward zero, Greg built an airlock around the front door, "the Montello Way," using whatever he could lay his hands on at the time, including dog food bags to cover the gaps. It may not look like much, but it slows the wind down. Gypsy loves the snow, but prefers to not have it in her food bowl.

Two days after Christmas, we had another snow, which added six inches of white stuff to what was already there.



The sun came out, the snow started melting, and then the temperature dropped, resulting in some really interesting icicles and other effects:

We made the rounds at this point, knocking down the overhanging snow and ice so it wouldn't fall on anyone. We haven't had any more snow since December 27, but we've had about three weeks of freezing fog. Sometimes it looks like regular fog, making it difficult to see very far. Other times, it lifts or even burns off, but still leaves behind enough cold to crystallize any moisture in the air. I should mention that during that time we haven't had highs above freezing, and the overnight temperatures have been as low as -15 here. Some folks in town have reported as low as -28. I describe the crystalline air as living inside a snow globe. It's magical. I had hoped to get a picture, but the crystals are so small they don't photograph well. The crystals stick to the snow and icicles, though, and look like this:

The forecast is looking rosy for the next few days--lows above zero and highs above freezing! (That is, 33 or 34 degrees.) We're having a heat wave! Greg has been slowly working on the Bunny Barn, one or two boards at a time. First he has to dig them out of the snow, then cut them to length and attach them. By the time he's done that once or twice, he's too cold to work outside any more. My outdoor exercise has mainly consisted of chopping the compacted snow out of the various walkways to keep them from becoming solid ice. And, of course, pumping water and feeding the bunnies. Indoors, I carve wood, knit, surf the web and plan the location of the garden. We both read and watch Dr. Who DVDs. The two additional batteries we bought this month are keeping us in electricity, with a daily boost from the generator. And we're working on a "by next winter" list of improvements. Serenity has kept us warm enough, although condensation has been an ongoing battle. We've had to move clothes out of the closets and regularly wipe down the windows and the insides of the cabinets. Just one of those challenges (or, as our friend George would say, "opportunities") for improvement next winter.

Keep warm and stay safe.

Blogging in the Gloom

Winter is fast approaching, with three light snows since October. Our power system, now comprising four solar panels, a wind generator and six deep-cell batteries, is being tested--we've had a couple days when there was neither sun nor wind to charge the batteries. On those days, we rely on the gasoline generator we had to buy last summer to run the AC on really hot days. A smaller gasoline generator runs the power tools when we need them.

Catching up is always tricky. Where did I leave off? I'll rely on my photo files to keep things sort of in order, starting with the two large solar panels. (We also have two smaller ones that came with Serenity.)

These two panels are mounted on satellite dish mounts, so they can be turned side-to-side and up-and-down to track the sun. Greg usually adjusts them twice a day to maximize the solar gain. So far it's working quite well.

Since my last post, Greg built a pumphouse, which I call The Monolith, since it's taller than it is wide. The eleven-foot ceiling is necessary for the every-five-year maintenance our Simple Pump http://simplepump.com will require. The pumphouse began like this:

and now looks like this:

We took a short break in late August to return to New Mexico and welcome our second grandson into the world.

We then returned to the never-ending job of building a home. I spent my time finishing the Wash House interior while Greg put up fence posts and dug trenches for wires from the solar panels:

The gothic window and its faux-stone wall separate the Throne Room, which contains our Nature's Head composting toilet www.natureshead.net and the washing machine--a utility sink and a plunger.

In late September, we finally had enough wind-free days to install the Sunforce 600 wind generator and tower we bought from Home Depot.

The tower is thirty feet tall, and required a lot of fiddling to get the guy wires adjusted properly. The tower had to be raised and adjusted by itself, then lowered again to mount the generator. Greg enlisted the help of our neighbor, Robert, to raise the tower with the turbine in place, while I was in town volunteering at the food bank. Of course, as soon as it went up, the wind was nowhere to be found for several days.

With winter approaching, we decided it would be a good idea to enclose the doors to the studio (former bunny barn) and wash house against the wind, rain and snow, so we designed an airlock:

We removed the tall studio door and rebuilt the shorter wash house door, including two-inch foam insulation to keep out the cold. (70s joke: "I have this lovely coffee table, could you make me a hollow-core door out of it?") This modification allowed us to install a vented propane heater into the studio, primarily to keep the composting toilet at the required 55 degrees to function properly. It works so well, we've threatened to move into the studio on really cold days ....

During all this building, digging, etc., we took a Sunday off to go into town and greet the steam train on its way through:

At the end of the summer, we lost BunBun, our Cinnamon doe, to the heat, so when the weather cooled down (finally), we went in search of a replacement. We ended up with several replacements, a New Zealand White doe (we've raised NZs before), two Creme de Argent does, and a litter of Satin babies. This sudden bunny explosion required the construction of a new bunny barn, which is being built the Montello Way--using almost exclusively salvaged materials. It began this way:

As usual, a simple bunny barn wasn't enough, so we decided to add a chicken house and run to the other side, so when spring rolls around, we can get some chickens. Before we had the chance to close anything in, we found out we needed the space sooner than expected, so we started with the smaller chicken side of the building, which now looks like this:

When the weather warms up again, we'll paint this to match the other buildings. In the meantime, it's home to seven of our bunnies, including these guys:

Do I hear an "Awwwww ...."?

If the gloomy weather continues, I'll finally get a chance to actually work in my studio. If not, I'm sure we'll be getting on with Bunny Barn II, the larger side where all the bunnies can be together. In the meantime, we hope everyone has a special holiday season.

 Merry Christmas from our house to yours!



Fauna and Fires and Floods, oh my!

A lot has happened since my last post. It's hard to decide where to begin. I guess I'll start with the Fauna.

When someone offered us a cowdog puppy, we decided it might be a good idea to have a larger dog to keep the beasties away from Rosa the Chewdle, especially since she's never been keen on staying in her kennel, which has consequently now been converted into a replacement bunny barn. (The original now being finished out as my studio.)


Gypsy the Cowdog


"Puppy" was a bit misleading, as Gypsy was about seven months old when we adopted her, and looked pretty much like a dog. She still acts like a puppy, though, much to Rosa's disgust. She has settled in well and now guards us from coyotes, strange vehicles that enter the gate, and the contrails from the jets that fly over from the AFB in Utah.

And speaking of the bunny barn and the bunnies, I finally got some photos of those:






Bunnicula




















New, improved Bunny Barn
(Formerly Puppy Pen)

We believe the rabbits are Cinnamon Rabbits, a mix of Californian, New Zealand White and Checkered Giant, although there's some possibility of a bit of angora mixed in. When the temperature returns to a reasonable level, we'll get serious with the rabbit raising portion of our ranch.

I've mentioned the Wash House, the 8'x8' building we added to the front of the bunny barn-cum-studio. This is where I wash the clothes, using a utility sink and a plunger, after pumping the necessary water, of course. We have a series of hoses connected to the pump through a four-way valve, which allows us to fill gallon jugs, pump water on the baby willow trees, fill the fresh water tank on Serenity, and pump water into buckets for the laundry. Here is Wash House, phase 1:

That's my shadow on the wall. With this arrangement, I had to monitor my water use so I could change the collection bucket before it overflowed, and then carry the water to the trees or some other deserving plant life. Greg has now connected a lot more pipe, so the water flows to its destination without my help. This speeds up the washing process, and saves a certain amount of wear and tear on the Washerwoman. You can see a portion of the Windbreak (aka privacy fence) in the background. The Wash House has a nice faux-parquet tile floor:

as does the studio. Both now have paneling on the walls, as well. The studio is finished except for painting the trim (and the outside walls), but I haven't yet photographed it. I'm still working on the trim and finishing touches in the Wash House.

The Big Event of the year in our little town is the 4th of July. It begins with a parade, followed by a cookout in the park, a pie eating contest and other forms of group entertainment. Greg, having joined the Tecoma Township Volunteer Fire Department in early June, was asked to drive one of the fire trucks in the parade. I took photos from the porch of the store:

Speaking of the fire department, Greg has gone out on three fire calls so far. Thankfully, only  one has been a major fire. That night we had a big fire on the mountains in two directions at the same time. The Rhyolite Fire was the most visible, although the 20 Mile Fire, which Greg responded to, was much larger. The rain (remember those floods I mentioned in the title?) helped the firefighters put both of them out.



Rhyolite Fire



This was the view from our yard, looking toward the east. The 20 Mile Fire looked much the same over the mountains to the west. Because of the prevalence of wildland fires like these, the highways are dotted with billboards that pose the question: How fast can your house run? Being a travel trailer, our house can make pretty good time, providing it's hitched to the truck. Of course it wasn't, that night.

 After several days of flames and smoke, it rained, and we went from fire to flood:





Gamble Road





Section Line River--er, Road







North gate



This used to be the way we went out, making a circular drive, in one gate, through the yard, out the other gate and back to the county road via the section line road. Its current resemblance to the Grand Canyon prevents us from doing that until we can make it back into a road again.

But, as the song says, "And after it rains, there's a rainbow ...."



Double Rainbow





Now I know where the pot of gold is, right over there to the east. Think I'll take a stroll that direction ....