Too many days of rain. Off to the city for the New Year

Many many days and nights of rain.  Water rising everywhere.  No need to water the newly planted vegetation, but that is a job I enjoy, so no rejoicing there.

very old wood

Work slowly progressing.  More rotten beams, but also areas of quite intact very old wood.  A section near the dining room door is particularly old and evocative.  Eventually they will be ready to put up the siding.

Just as I was delighting in raccoon triumphs and not worrying about more bumps in the night--I was awakened by a tremendous rattling and dripping.  Torrents of rain rattling the gutter that was still on the back of the house--and as I discovered in the morning, the removal of another gutter had provided the opportunity for the rain to find its way into the wreckage of the new room.

I had ignored it in the night, but come the dim light of the rainy day, I put buckets and basins under many of the leaks, and watched them fill with wonder.   To clarify, they filled ever-so rapidly with water, which caused no end of wonder.

I called George and he and Johnny soon arrived to put up a tarp which stopped all leaking.  I did some serious mopping before heading into the city for a round of New Year dinners, Buddhist interpretations, major walks and other urban delights.

Success!!

Just a few short hours after setting the trap, the raccoon saga has a happy ending.

As soon as night fell,  I heard a crash.  I was on the phone with Sam and knew that the raccoon had encountered the trap.  I wasn't sure if it was actually caught or had somehow tripped the doors--but there was definitely action.

I could see that the traps' two doors had slammed shut, but as we'd covered it with old towels (to disguise its trap essence), I wasn't sure if the raccoon was actually inside.  George had told me it would make a racket once caught, but no sound was emerging from the shrouded trap.

With Sam's encouragement, I gathered my courage, and with a broom handle lifted the one of the towels.  The trap was occupied, but there was no movement.  Could I have killed the raccoon?  I was not enjoying this procedure.  Eventually, I lifted off the second towel, and sure enough, there was a living raccoon, in a state of shock perhaps, but very much alive.  Of course, I could not remember George's instructions as to how to release it, so I ended the conversation with Sam and called George, who reminded me that I only had to lift the lever off one of the doors and set the trap down in the field in back of the house.

That was relatively easy.  I dragged and pulled the heavy trap into the field and lifted the latch.  Nothing happened.  The poor shocked raccoon made no move to regain its freedom.  George assured me it would eventually figure things out, so  I left it in the damp night air.

When I returned, flashlight in hand, an hour  later, the trap was empty.  The raccoon is free And I don't have to worry about waking up to mysterious crashes in the middle of the night.

I did not take a picture of the shocked trapped raccoon, but it did look very much like this.

the morning after

And--for final verification, here's the empty trap in the morning.

Trap set!

Ok--we are moving right along. George and Rachel came by, a bit earlier than anticipated and we've set the trap by the raccoon's favorite (and only) entrance.  We baited it with cat food, camouflaged it with old towels.  Now all I have to do is wait for the hungry raccoon to find its way back in.  Once the raccoon is safely contained, I'll carry the trap outside and release it back to the wild.
Various instructions say you should take it miles away, but since the house will be sealed tight, and the raccoon is only entering because it has no place else to go, I think I'll be fine just opening the door and letting it find it's way out.

And the raccoon saga goes on

Woken up again around 5:30 am by either the exit or entrance of raccoon.  This time I did not get up, just rolled over and went back to sleep, my head still full of my 3AM raccoon reading.

barely visible raccoon prints

At proper wake-up time, still more evidence of raccoon visitation. Broken glass in pantry, new footprints, decipherable in dust  in upstairs hall.  George arrived around 10 am and agreed that the raccoon had wandered under the house while they were working, slept during all construction, and now, unable to get into the great outdoors was whiling away its evening hours in the house.

What are the options?  All parties agree the only thing to do is trap it and then remove it.  If I'm bold enough, I'll just carry it outside, lift a lever and let it find its way to a more natural habitat.  If I'm too intimidated, I'll call George and he'll do the carrying.  Stay tuned. In the meantime, here are some fine   trap photos.

George will bring a trap this evening.  His brother gave him extensive instructions for baiting, etc., so there is much trapping fun in the immediate future.

I am of course reminded of all the animal refuse that was here when I arrived last year.  This is relatively simple but in addition to reminding me of how far we've come, it is also a reminder that we are deep in a world of many species and anything can happen at any time.  To be continued....

Raccoon!

Uh-oh 3am.  Loud noises downstairs.  I'm terrible at being able to locate the source of a sound.  This is clearest when I call my phone to locate it and can't figure out where it's ringing.

I mention this only to point out that I was fairly certain the noise was downstairs but couldn't swear it wasn't upstairs.

Turned on the stairway light and could see that the raccoon had pushed aside the insulation and the wooden box I'd propped up against the opening.  Had it come upstairs again?  I did not know.

I did a little internet research on raccoon visitations (they often use houses as nesting areas, but this is not the breeding season and usually come in looking for food--generally garbage or pet food).

I convinced myself I had nothing to fear and putting on my shoes headed downstairs to make sure there were no raccoons happily snacking in the kitchen.

I had some vague thoughts of opening a door and letting the raccoon out--maybe I had that thought--I'm not quite sure.

But I think the raccoon might have exited on its own.  When he removed the floor boards, Johnny had leaned the metal baseboard covers from the heating pipes agains the wall.  They had been knocked down as had the fire screen.  That crashing to the floor woke me up and probably sent the raccoon on its way.

I re-stuffed the insulation so I will know if it returns but will have to get this hole closed up as soon as possible.  I'm assuming the raccoon will not be trapped under the house, but will address that question in the light of day.

Hard to believe, but more and more rain and then a raccoon.

The rains have started again.  I suppose this is good for my new plantings, but aside from that, it is just too much.  The ground is completely saturated, the rivers are rising once again (flood warnings everywhere until tomorrow) and of course it is dreary dreary wet and gray.

Ready for siding.  

Yesterday, George and Johnny declared the repair work, the shoring up of house, the cementing in of new bits of foundation,  removal of rotten beams, etc. was finished and they would now be able to finish installing the siding.  This will involve much more debris--the white vinyl siding has to be torn down, and the cedar shakes underneath that. We will no doubt fill another dumpster.  This time, I'll have Keith drop one off.   It will make life much easier to toss everything in rather than the cumbersome two-step we just executed.

The other evening, I thought I heard an animal scurrying about the house.  There have been no animal occupants this year, but since the back of the house had been open for much of the day, it was possible that something had managed to get in. I have been amazed at how quiet the house usually is.  My memories of the house are filled with crackling, heaving, buckling, scurrying noises.  Now, decades later, there is silence.  The noises of childhood were probably winter sounds--steam heat, creaking wood.   When I told George he thought it was unlikely that anything bigger than a mouse could have gained entry.  I wasn't so sure, but was ready to believe the scurrying was a remnant of a long lost memory.

This morning, however, I noticed a series of muddy marks on the edge of the tub.  I couldn't imagine how I'd done that.  Even if my feet were dirty, I certainly hadn't balanced on the narrow edge of a clawfoot bathtub.  Close  inspection revealed raccoon footprints both on the edge of the tub and on the wall beneath the window.  That did not make me happy.

I then discovered that the insulation that was stuffing up the small hall in the wall next to the downstairs door was now lying on the floor, there were bits of dirt around and wonder of wonders I discovered raccoon footprints going downstairs.

It looks like the raccoon came in from under the house, then went upstairs and into the bathroom and then down the stairs and out again.  I think.  I put the insulation back in place, tipped a wooden box against it and hoped it wouldn't return.

Clean-up

Yesterday, as repairs moved forward, and removal of the old siding was imminent, the time had come to get rid of the piles of detritus that had been growing in the back and front of the house for months.

A few weeks ago, immediately after the hurricane, I'd called a guy who rents out dumpsters.  The hope was that he'd leave it here for weeks on end, and we could slowly fill it.  Unfortunately, due to that very hurricane, all is dumpsters were in heavy circulation, so instead of throwing debris into a dumpster, we had a huge piles of stuff resting on the soggy ground.

George suggested that the most efficient (and ultimately economical) path would be to get someone who could just come in with a truck, load up all the stuff and take it to the dump.  Sounded easy enough, but going through the Yellow Pages and making many calls was mostly futile.

pile 1

This morning I re-called the original dumpster guy and wonder of wonders he offered to come over this afternoon to see what could be done.

pile 2

Loaded Truck

Keith Hamm, proprietor of Hammy's Clean-ups and Container Rental (if I had known that was the company name I would have called him immediately), showed up with his assistant and the three of us (how could I not join in this grand activity--so reminiscent of all my work last year?) worked for hours.   At first glance, the 15 yard dumpster looked enormous.  Once we started loading it, I was certain we didn't have nearly enough debris, even with our two piles and assorted junk in house and garage.   Oh--I certainly don't have an eye for assessing how much debris can fit in a 15 yard dumpster.  It's true I threw in some added junk from the garage and new room and even got rid of one of the broken toilets, but once we worked our way through those two piles, the dumpster was almost over-flowing.  The fully loaded dumpster pulled off carrying centuries of discarded siding off to the dump.

no pile 1

no pile 2

Woe is me--I can't train the pictures to go to their proper places in the narrative--but a careful observer should be able to figure it out.

In addition to all this clean-up, the repair work on beams is just about done but I will only muddle matters if I try to include that picture--so on to the next post!

the rains stop (for a moment).

another rotten beam

Rain is forecast for the entire week, but at the moment there is a bit of sun.  Rain is expected this afternoon but right now George and Johnny are continuing to work on that oh so rotting floor.

The beams have been destroyed by leaks, though there is also evidence of insect damage.  The insects do seem to have left the building, so we don't have to worry about getting rid of them, but the floor does have to be shored up before we continue.  This beam is under the hall, near the staircase.  The beams under the dining room and alongside the windows have been dealt with and that part of the house is now just about ready to be wrapped in its gray plastic siding.

Oh so many things to get done:  plans for bathrooms and kitchen--some kind of scheduling, clean up the mounting piles of debris in back and front of house,  gutter on porch--might have to get driveway fixed before truck can drive in carrying 40 foot long pipe...and that's just a bit of it...

More progress...then...more rain!!

On my return on Monday morning, the first view of the house was transformed.  I can’t even remember the crumbling concrete stairway and collapsing chimney that had been there for the past fifty-five years.  Alex came by to pass on some watering and maintenance instruction.  With all this rain, it's hard to believe that these new plants will lack water, but it will take the roots 6-8 weeks to establish, and until then, they should be well-watered every other day.  Since the plumbing is so sporadic at the moment, I had to go to Lowe's to buy another fifty feet of green hose.  With a hose long enough to wrap around the house, I happily watered my new pine tree,  hedges and grasses.

After weeks of rain--progress!!

French Drain

By the end of last week, the rains stopped (for a bit) and there was a grand flurry of activity.
George and Johnny continued their rain-delayed work of clearing out the rotten beams in the back of the house, adding new beams to hold up the house, and to frame the windows.  The landscape guys showed up and worked at break-neck speed, installing a French drain, and adding  mulch, rocks and plants to  hold the earth in place through the next round of storms and winter.  Chris, George's son, stopped by after school for some serious weed-whacking and mowing. 
It was a day of great progress.   

moving earth

After weeks of being essentially alone through earthquake, hurricane and torrential rains, I had made plans to go to the city for the weekend.  Though it was a delight to see some glimmers of transformation,  when I left at around 5pm, the landscapers were still at work.      

House straightening up. Rainbow

I am not engaged in some fundamental house cleaning.  That will come later.  This straightening is more fundamental.

The house, like many aging creatures, has developed many unattractive sags and bulges.  On his first walk-through, George descibed the rooms as having "marble floors."  He was not referring to grand flooring material; a marble floor, in this case, is floor so well-sloped that a marble will happily roll from one side of the room to the other.  We accepted this as a basic condition and have only been considering appliances and furniture with legs that will adjust to the different floor levels.

We still might need those legs, but the discovery of those very rotten beams, as noted on Monday has changed things a bit.

sky in hole

Progress was made as the sun shone Monday through Wednesday,  but it is raining once again today so....another halt.  Too bad.  I was hoping to once more look out of my dining room windows, but the tarp is back in service, though the house is no longer jacked up as it was earlier to gain access to the rotten bottom.  The light at the top of the picture is the sky illuminated by that rarely appearing sun.  Later in the day, the hole provides a fine view of the almost leafless black walnut tree.  George finished the stone
work on  the foundation---the old falling apart stones are now neatly cemented together, providing a base for the new beam that has taken up the load of the old rotten one.  The wood framing the windows has also rotted out; they are now surrounded by strong new wood.
Fluffy white insulation is packed around everything--eventually,  all will be water and air-tight for the next two centuries.

A good sign.  After hours of rain and gusting winds and a sudden drop in temperature,  the sky filled with a strange light--followed by the appearance of a rainbow making a complete arch over the house.   I scrambled through the knee high soaked  grass across meadows and up hills in a futile attempt to capture it, but my poor little phone just couldn't take it all in.  

full moon rising over lake

And the work goes on until it rains....

Busy with my bears thoughts (as if that's my excuse) I haven't been doing that much work on the house, but after two months of postponements and bad weather, there is some progress.  Today, to celebrate the first morning of sunshine I did a huge laundry.  Managed to do it early enough so that all clothes were dry before thunder rumbled the sky around 3pm.  

Much of the work, alas, is deeply remedial.  This isn't exactly  a surprise, but it is a bit worse than we'd thought.   The crumbling foundation under the dining room has been re-built and cemented and supporting beams put in place on each side of the rotting floor beams.   This should level the floor some--though I assume it will still be slanting.  I don't think anyone realized what terrible shape those beams were in and assumed they'd last another couple of centuries.  Now that they've been shored up, the floor will be much more level--an unexpected bonus, I suppose. 

Karl, the plumber, showed up.  There was lots of conversation about routing of pipes, etc., but I did not participate.   In addition to speaking, they also removed more bits of wall and put in some pipes.  I busied myself taking a picture of Karl's truck. 

Alex, the landscaper  I've signed on to get the side of the house in order showed up as well, though I did not think to get a picture of his white truck as well.  (The truck behind Karl's is George's).  For starters, he sprayed orange paint lines on the grass.   Although my phone camera does not do it justice, I did document it before the rains began.  Will the paint out-last this downpour?  We will soon find out.

Johnny and George did manage (I think) to get most of the openings in the wall closed off.  Oh--we do not need more rain--and it is coming down in torrents. 

BEARS! BEARS! BEARS!

Whew--

Zoom in for bears

Maybe I only want to write about bears.  I had seen bears when I first arrived in June last summer, and spotted a bear on the day I got here this year, but assumed that my presence and activity around the house was keeping all bears at bay.  The rains and flooding all around might have changed this.   My first bear-sighting on Thursday (pictured in the last blog but I'll post it again here--as it is (so far) as fuzzy as it is the only bear picture I have.   I was out walking mid-day as I'd decided to walk to the nearest mini-mall to pick up a copy of the New York Times. I mostly read it on line--but it does make me happy to have a hard copy once in a while.  The  deli in the tiny mini-mall is one of three surviving stores--the others are a barber shop and a Verizon outlet.  There are four "For Rent" signs.
The half-mile between me and the deli is clogged with traffic due to detours from nearby flooded roads, so I decided it would be a fine time to walk, rather than drive the short distance.  Walking on the side of busy highways is not fun, but the walk was thankfully short, and I successfully made my purchase.

tree on trail

Rut on road

I didn't return along the road, but on a bit of the Paulinskill Trail that was a bit flooded,  but negotiable thanks  to my high boots.  Trees had been knocked down--but nothing completely blocked the trail.  Until I emerged on 94 where workers were repairing a downed power line and traffic was backed up for miles, the trail, though packed with mosquitos, was delightfully car free.  On my return, I was busy documenting the latest very deep ruts on my very long  newly repaired dirt driveway from this last round of rain, when, almost in front of my house, I saw a big black bear with two cubs.  They were poking around one of the trees that was downed by the storm.  I took many pictures--but alas I have a new phone and didn't figure out how to zoom until it was too late, so they are barely visible.  But they were indeed there!!
How splendid--buying the New York Times and spotting an entire bear family within a half mile and a half hour.

On Friday, bears again. Same place.  No picture.    Saturday, driving towards the house, just past the gate, one of the cubs raced across the road in front of the car.  This did give me a fright.  What if the mother was right behind?  Would she barrel in front of me? I'd never heard of bears as road kill.  I don't think they make a practice of running into cars, but this is surely not my area of expertise.   I slowed down, drove slowly, but no bears in sight.

Undeterred by that bear sighting, I headed towards the lake for that now very truncated stroll.  As I approached the water I suddenly heard a series of snorts -- I'd startled the mother bear and cubs who must have been poking about in the water.  The little I remembered about human-black bear relations was that the only moment to fear a black bear is if the mother feels her cubs are threatened.  Uh-oh.

At that point we weren't facing each other--the bears hurried off along the shore and deciding to give up my evening stroll I practically ran back to the house where I caught up on my black bear research.

For future reference:  Most bear human protocol (at least as recounted on the internet) deals with face to face encounters on trails.   It's a good idea to wear bells or bangles, talk to yourself (or your companion if you have one) and generally make your presence known.  Last year, I remembered this rule and was often singing or carrying on.  This year, I forgot, and also was more interested in surprise sightings of birds, deer, and yes, I have to admit, even bears.  I will now change my ways. If you do meet a bear head on you should both make yourself look as large as possible while also informing the bear that you are a harmless human --talk pleasantly, raise your arms, whatever.

None of these instructions were particularly relevant for me at the moment of my encounter---I was not crossing paths with the bears--we were just very close to each other--so my ignorance of proper behavior led to no harm.  But now I know.

There were also instructions for residents of bear country--I don't think they were addressing New Jersey, but black bears are black bears.  Some of these rules--like not putting any garbage outside, etc., I already adhere to.  I had not previously heeded (or even been aware of)g the danger of a dirty bar-b-que.  My excellent grill had amassed a good deal of gunk.  So much so that it had flared up quite impressively just last week when I was grilling chicken with Margaret and Marla.  I did not seize that moment, but after my close encounter with the bear family, I plunged into serious grill cleaning --an awful endless process involving the removal of many layers of thick black grease from many surfaces--but now that is done.  The bears have never shown the slightest interest in approaching the house (at least to my knowledge)--but if they should, the grill incentive is now removed.

Wild waters, wild animals

There has been a run on de-humidifiers at Home Depot.  The pile of old newspapers is a damp pulpy mass--just from the water absorbed from the air.

Streams and tributaries everywhere have over-flowed.  Basements are flooded, roads are closed--the rising waters did not cease after the hurricane--and everyone is in disaster mode.


My exulting over the creation of great swaths of paths between here and Hyper Humus--providing me with the perfect terrain for long, uninterrupted wilderness walks came to an abrupt end when route after route got swallowed by the rising waters.

Still, if the water isn't seeping into your house, flooding your basement and soaking your rugs, there is something thrilling about land covered with water--trees rising in the middle of lakes, startling juxtapositions of vegetation and water.  Surprises everywhere.  Triumph of nature over all paltry human efforts.
Here's some of the flooding that's blocking all my usual walks and providing general excitement.

5 turkeys w. rusty bar-b-que

All this new water and fallen trees must have re-routed many of the local animals (it might also be the opening of some hunting seasons, though I remain blissfully ignorant of those complicated schedules).  A group of six deer regularly visit the fallen apple tree (they might have stripped it of all apples by now).  Five very large turkeys are frequent visitors.  They don't look big in this picture, but large they are.  And most exciting of all--in the past two days, I have had two!! sightings of a mother bear and her two cubs.

They are barely visible in this picture--but if you try hard--and do some enlarging--you should be able to make out two of them around the second fallen tree.  I had seen the mother (or one of her friends) the very first week I was here--at the end of June--but this is the first time I've seen the whole family!

Rain, rain and more rain.

Suddenly a bit of blue in the sky,  more rain is predicted today--but it doesn't seem likely.

The house has born up well--but there is flooding everywhere.  Roads are closed, water is high.  Everything is soaked soaked soaked.

open flooring

On their last day of work, after the hurricane, but before the latest round of devastating rain, there was lots of demolition and cementing.  The task was to replace the crumbling stone foundation and rotting beams under the house.  To get to it all, it was necessary to remove several feet of flooring in the dining room.  This was done with impressive precision by Johnny who was able to neatly remove most of the boards without damaging them (those boards are much newer than the wide very old planking on the upper floors).  The removed boards are now resting in the wreck of a new room.  The floor was now wide open to the elements and all critters who might seek entry. 

plywood cover

By the end of the day, the floor was covered with plywood and a black tarp was hung, stretching from above the windows to the ground.  The goal was to pick out the representatives of the animal kingdom, but a side effect was to create a dark dank cave of a dining room.  I am sometimes astounded at the inconveniences I'm willing to bear during construction, but this darkness,except for quick     forays into the kitchen,  effectively kept me upstairs.