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Commenced:
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01/01/2005 |
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Submitted:
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08/04/2011 |
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Last updated:
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16/02/2016 |
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Location:
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Cherokee, Victoria, AU |
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Climate zone:
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Cool Temperate |
(projects i'm involved in)
Project: Fernglade Farm
Posted by Chris McLeod about 10 years ago
It’s been proven true here time and time again, that if you
can’t get to a particular area on the farm, that area simply gets overlooked.
Access to an area becomes all important and access can mean either a path or a set
of stairs into an area.
It was only less than a year ago that I built a concrete staircase
and paths leading down into the bee food (and Chris food too!) mixed flower,
herb and vegetable garden. This is what it looks like today:
| Bee garden - mixed flowers, herbs and vegetables |
Before the stairs and paths were built, that bee garden looked pretty much like this area:
| New staircase below the cantina |
It is a reasonably unloved area of the farm and that area below the cantina shed supported more grass than any useful plants. As you can see in the photo though, over the past few days I’ve now built 4 concrete stairs (out of a total of 11 stairs). Hopefully in another 12 months’ time that area will look as good as the mixed flower, herb and vegetable garden does today!
If anyone is wondering how to go about building concrete
stairs, the process is very easy. At the bottom of the photo you’ll note the
timber formwork that is used as a guide. Formwork is the fancy name for the
timber that gives both the width and height of the stairs. I place the formwork
at the starting point for the staircase, ensure that it is level both side to side
and then front to back and then simply fill the void with cement and rocks. The
surface of the cement can be lightly moistened and worked with a trowel so that
it produces a completely flat surface. A couple of hours later, the stair is
solid and you can then start work on the next stair. During summer, I can build at
least three to four stairs per day, but at this cooler point in the year, I’m limited
to two stairs per day as the concrete just doesn’t set fast enough for more than
that.
It hasn’t all been about stairs this week though. For the
past couple of months, I’ve been digging a flat site – by hand – out of the
side of the mountain. This week, however marked the beginning of the first shed
to be built on that flat excavated site.
For the remainder of the blog post goto: http://ferngladefarm.blogspot.com.au/
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