I Lost 2 Acres of Land + Rebuilding It With Junk

Hurricane Helene decimated acres of our precious lower pasture. Austin, roll that drone footage down through here. You can see it's barren, right? There's no— there's no grass down in here. All down through there, over here, all gone. We have made a lot of progress. Austin, show the drone footage of the damage again. And now show the drone footage of today's, you know, our progress, showing our progress so far. Today we are building back with 3 things people might call waste. Most would. First up, Manure. Look at all this manure they've dropped. Wait, she's really curious. After the cows, we have the pigs. Where's their squats? And we've added pig manure to the equation. The second thing is hay. We've done and continue to hay bomb wasted hay. They don't eat all the hay that covers Mother Nature. She's very modest, she likes to be covered. Adds organic matter And plus we have their nitrogen, and their nitrogen and that carbon mixing together, eventually we're gonna have compost. We're gonna build soil much faster than if we didn't have this system. What sand does is the nutrients are just gonna run right through it. The water is just gonna run right through it. But you guys incorporating in some of that hay is going to help retain some of the organic matter and the water. And you're adding your manure, huh? Huh? You want a pat? You want a pat? You want a pat? Huh? Huh? So they've done a good job of that, surrounding their water. Video. All right, y'all gotta go eat breakfast. Thanks for being with me. Thanks for riding on my back. This motion to roll down the window. He doesn't know it. Should I do this? Hey, that's a crappy piece of hay. All right, that's a, it's a lesser quality hay. I don't, I don't think, I don't think I want to feed it to my youth group. Two of those cows are up-and-coming milk cows for us. They need to get primo hay. The sheep, on the other hand, have birthed, they're dried off, they're not nursing, they can eat less quality stuff. Let's put that here and put the sheep here. Let's drop this one in here and unroll it in here for the sheep. We'll bring the sheep here and then we'll go get a nice one for the cows. He went with it. They waste no time. You guys were hungry. This is our future prized Milk cow right there. Look at that build. Little pot belly, little legs. She's putting all her energy into body build. Keeping Harriet too, but you can see— hey, a little bit of a leaner build, longer legs. That's a Flossie offspring. And is this Phyllis or Honey? This spot, particularly barren, not a great hay bomb. I mean, you can still see the soil or sand. Looks like we have some leftover hay. Pigs could probably help spread this. Even the sheep will a little bit. We have rolled out More hay on both sets. It's light, feels good. If— I don't think you can have too much carbon. Is it too much? I don't think you can have too much. It's starting to rain on this. I think it's supposed to be off and on. We need it for our Western North Carolina fires, for our farms. I do wonder if it's gonna ruin this for eating. We'll see. You see how much better this hay is? Like, you can just see it. It's green, it's leafy. These are all mostly grass leaves. There's very few stems in it. Crappy hay Good hay, crappy hay, good hay. This stuff, it's just really thin. It's like little stemmy stuff. It's probably from poor pasture. Just, you'll see if you don't have a great pasture, it goes to stem quick, it goes to seed quick, and that's probably what's happened. Still good for adding carbon to the soil. And thirdly, we didn't pay a thing for it. My landscaper friend is looking for a place to throw this away. I'll happily take it. It's free carbon. Leaves. Jonah's getting to work with some carbon off farm. Carbon from the farm, not off farm. Off of the— yep, carbon off of the farm. Yeah, you're gonna load and you're gonna drop it. We have a landscaper friend who needs to dump his leaves somewhere. Heck yes, we'll take it. I think you can put a lot more in that. Does he think he's done? Is he just turning around? Normally use the tractor for using the manure spreader. Couldn't get it started yesterday. Jiggle the battery cables while I try it. Hopefully he doesn't think that's full. You put a lot more in that. Why not? I'll fall down the hill. Fall down what hill? The trailer will push the side-by-side down the hill if I load it anymore. How do you know? Because I loaded it too heavy the first time. I had to go around. I don't want to die. Okay, what you doing? Just setting it so that the— engaging the wheels. They said, does it need a PTO? It's wheel driven. All right, it's working to throw leaves, huh?

Yep.

Okay. I'm happy this works with the side-by-side. Yeah, it's way more efficient. What's faster, isn't it? Yeah. Nice having teen boys. By the way, that was Jonah's idea. Hey, we've got these leaves. Let's use that to cover our bare ground. Now, in order to take this to the next level, which— putting more animals over here, sheep and chickens— we need to get our water line going over here. Earlier, just before the rain, I assessed what we need to get. We've literally been running this— these cows and these pigs on a water hose out to them draped over the road. We can't keep doing that. We need to get tapping into our water line, especially if we're gonna have 4 different animal systems over here. There's some things we got to do. It's spring. They've been in the winter. They've been up for the winter. There's always some rejuvenating repairing you've got to do. Get in, it's starting to rain. We need to assess our water line before we're going to get any more animals over here. We've got to get our water line legit going. If we assess real quick, we could go to the hardware store while it's thundering and raining, and maybe, just maybe, if we have a break, we could at least get the sheep out here, if not the chickens. Aim for the impossible. We gotta hustle before you guys get soaked. Camera, uh, okay, so this probably works. We just need a new tee. This is making me nervous, you guys out here. Okay, switching to the 360 camera because it's waterproof. Let's make sure we're getting water out there to the pasture. No, I don't see nothing. We have temporary line up for the pasture. Uh, let's put the old one up, which I know is broke, but I could see it broken at the other end. But we want to make sure it's getting to there and it's not broken somewhere before we see it. Wait, okay, that should— yep, I just saw water spread out. Water is coming to this. We need to mend this. It's got to connect to our black water line here. We'll probably need— maybe we'll need a little bit of line. No, that'll reach. Oh, we haven't tried this since the hurricane. We could have a lot of damage. Oh yeah, I don't even think it's there. Okay, it's there, it's there. We're gonna hope. Okay, so as far as I can tell, as far as I can tell, this one's hooked up.

Woo!

I think I just saw lightning. Let's hurry. See, we have a hurricane washed up right here. Is it still intact? I think so. You can see the debris. We're gonna, we're gonna think that is okay. It could be that our water line is totally crushed or severed where it's been buried over the, over time. We're gonna have to assume that one's okay too. No, there's no T here and there's no line through here yet. Might as well fix it all the way to the end. All right, nothing. All right, let's get back. We have to test. We are officially rained out. You win some, you lose some, and some are rained out. We're gonna keep pressing on. I can go to the hardware store. Hear the rain coming down. I do see some hope. See the, uh, bright skies. I'm torn because I wanted to rain for Western North Carolina and the wildflower. Fires and our overall health of our farm even more than I don't want it to rain. But I don't want it to rain because I want to do this project. I want to save our land. I want to get water to our land so that animals can help heal the land. Hey, can we have the best of both worlds? Keep raining for a little bit while we go to the hardware store, and then by the time we come back, it be done. You can do something. Maybe. What are y'all doing? Hey, hey, be nice to man. He protects the chickens. What you working on?

Nothing.

Just seeing what's wrong with that motor. What is wrong? I don't know. Give up? Yeah. Well, hey, look at you.

I know. I'm in my rest time.

Self-care 101. I don't catch you in rest time. You are training, right? Yes.

I just worked out really hard.

Wee! Good.

So I get my, I get my 1 minute and 30 seconds. I got 10 seconds left.

Other good news, my humidifiers are finally filling up. It's been so dry. Did I say humidifier? Dehumidifier.

Hey, it's hot today.

It's gonna be time to vent this thing.

Well, no, spring's coming back.

So you mean winter?

Uh, it's not gonna be—

no, summer. Yeah. All right.

Do you think that the peas will be okay?

Yeah.

At 30 degrees, we don't have to cover them?

Oh yeah.

What about the onions?

Everything will be okay.

Are you sure?

I think so. Looking nice. Ready for a town day?

Yep.

Pick up some supplies at the hardware store.

Oh God, this is so hot. What is—

you're piping hot. Look, I'm red.

So hot.

Almost there. You know, it ended up— it's been off and on raining. Yeah. Raining is on right now. Great time to go to Lowe's. I don't see any half-inch. Nope. Nope. Hey, can you go out in the back of the Sally's? Some of that old poly pipe. I need to know if it's a half inch or 3/4 inch. Can you measure it? There's a measuring tape in the toolbox. Why do you need to know that? Because I'm at the store, I'm getting supplies. Hear the rain? Just started raining like crazy. Rebecca forgot if it's a half inch or 3/4 inch. If you measure from outside to outside It's 3/4, right? Look how tiny that is. Problem is, don't have any half-inch pipe down there. I am gonna go with— I think it's half-inch pipe, even though that seems so small. What Jonah sent me seems to be a half-inch. Hey, should we get, uh, Gideon and Henry one of these bikes? Chauffeur Rebecca! Chauffeur! When we go to town, we go to town. Gonna go on more errands. Should we do a Lowe's haul? Is that what they call it? Lowe's haul. Tees. I went with a half inch. Hopefully that's it. They look, they look kind of small.

It was wrong!

Rebecca thought it was 3/4.

It's definitely 3/4.

Oh boy.

I thought we had this conversation in the store.

We did, and then I looked at this picture just Jonah sent me and I thought it was a half inch.

We'll go with half inch. We'll see if you can drive back to Lowe's.

Oh boy, I hope not. I hope there's icing on the cake. You can drive. I want to. While I do the haul. I want to eat cake. Is that what they call these things? I have a female garden hose adapter to hopefully— What'd you say? You're gonna eat cake?

Did I want to eat cake?

Who's eating cake? I do.

You said it's the icing on the cake.

Zip ties. We went with the— this is the farmer's best friend. We went with the multi-pack, 4, 8, and 11 inch. A female threaded half-inch union fitting to maybe fix our pig, uh, waterer that's leaking. We got the the female adapter to the garden hose or the, the pipe fitting to put on our ball valves, plumber's tape, hose clamps, and valves for our gravity-fed water system, which we'll be getting going after this at the home. The moment of truth. Did I just waste my afternoon and do I have to go to town again tomorrow, or did I do right? It looks like I might have done it right. Pull that one out, we'll compare it. Oh look, it'll say— it'll say on this half inch.

Yes!

One more test. So all these contraptions are correct. Now this one would just be a bonus because I can— I, I have a roundabout way I can do this. This is a female hose end. So we're going from our, our hose that goes through the ground, under, underneath, and over. This would be the easiest way to connect it to this system. Yeah, I don't think— I mean, we, we can heat that up and try to put that in there, but we have another way. The good news is we have the leaves down. Really good news that these are all the things— icing on the cake. Because that means tomorrow we should be able to mend this line, and that means get the sheep out. That would be the goal anyway. Get the sheep. Maybe, just maybe, the chickens. I get ahead of myself sometimes. Homemade mayo in our future. Deluxe burgers tonight. What are you making?

I'm making Caesar dressing for our Caesar salad.

Thank you very much. I got news, Becky.

Yes, sir. I got the right stuff. You got the right stuff.

It's half inch.

I'm surprised, I'll be honest.

Me too.

Well, my thought was just buy the other one, then you just have both.

I know, but it took me a while to get it all. So today we won. We got icing on that cake.

I want cake.

I should pull what your mom used to say. What? Well, you can go to the grocery store and get one. I know. Grandma, late grandma, offered us— she's— we went over to her house for dinner one night. She said, do y'all want chocolate or carrot cake? And we were thinking, we'll have a little bit of both.

I know, right?

And everybody's getting excited. And then she said, well, you can go to the store and get—

go down to Ingles and get some.

We're so bad.

You can't do that.

All right, happy day. See you tomorrow.