Sunday, March 01, 2015

Bottles at sunrise

Many of the growers around us make use of old mineral water bottles in their vineyard parcels. They cut the tops and bottoms off and fit the bottle over young vines that are replacing older vines in an established parcel. I suppose that this not only protects the vine from critters but also makes a little greenhouse effect, shielding the young shoot from wind and cold. But I'm only guessing.

Water bottles seem to glow in the morning sun.

I cleaned out under our carport on Saturday. It's the place where I cut and store firewood and kindling each year. But not any more. Now it will be home to the old Peugeot as the other car takes its place in the garage. If all goes according to plan, I won't be cutting much wood in the future. We want to replace our wood burning stove with a wider model to accommodate 50mm logs. That length is more readily available from wood vendors whereas the 33mm logs we use now are not (or if they are, they're more costly). That's one of a few summer projects we have in mind for the house. Stay tuned.

7 comments:

  1. I know with pot-plants you cover cuttings with a plastic bag or something like that so that they don't dry out before they've made enough roots to get moisture from the soul. Maybe that's part of it.

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  2. Oooh, ooh, I'll be staying tuned! I'm interested to see what models you consider, and what you end up with. We just enjoyed an evening downstairs aside the wood-burning stove last night, as it snowed all evening and night :) Our lower floor is a sort of finished basement, but it's an atrium ranch, so the family room down there has a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows (two floors of windows), and the open staircase is along that wall. Makes it difficult to keep warm, even though the glass is all double-pane. We've really enjoyed the new cast-iron stove this year. (I know that you use yours for heating, and not necessarily for sitting around enjoying the look of it, but I'm still interested to see what you get!)

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  3. Salut, Walt. Au sujet de la feuille morte sur la photo, je suppose que tu l'as ramassée avec une toute petite pelle?

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  4. Will you have a covered area to store the longer logs?

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  5. that does look like a 'mini-greenhouse' clever.

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  6. autolycus, I know it's a typo, but getting "moisture from the soul" sounds pretty good!

    gosia, me too!

    judy, I'm looking at a brand called Invicta (our current stove is a Franco-Belge) right now, but I haven't priced them yet.

    dean, évidemment ! ;)

    evelyn, I'm thinking they'll go under the balcony on the north side of the house.

    michael, and it's adaptive re-use!

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