Black Dirt

At 4:00 this afternoon R.J. backed his huge dump truck up my driveway and dropped a load of dirt at the southeast corner of the house.  This is stage one of the finish grading work, which will mostly involve the south and west sides of the property.  We have to raise the grade at the steps from the guest bedroom and bathroom so that there are only two steps instead of three (three steps require a handrail; two don't).  Eventually, these steps — at least those from the bedroom — will access a deck.  However, that project is a couple years off.

R.J. brought a good quality clay loam.  It will serve as the "base coat" for this operation.  A layer of topsoil will follow.  The dirt he brought today is heavy mud at the moment, due to all the rain we've had over the past week.  It slid out of the truck quite slowly!  R.J. had to scrape the mud off his truck in order to get the gate back in place.

R.J. raises the box on his dump truck.  The dirt made a
resounding "plop!" when it hit the ground.

R.J. scrapes mud from the lip of the box in order to get
the gate to close properly.

R.J. will give the dirt a week to dry (although rain is forecast for Thursday and Friday) and then he'll bring his dozer and spread it around.  As noted in earlier posts, I've been raking out the original load of soil he brought, picking up not only nails, but also lots of sticks and roots.  Alas, this new load of soil also has lots of roots!  Look carefully at the second photo below.  I'll have to rake all over again!

My mud pile!

If I don't rake out the roots, I'll have all kind of "volunteers"
putting in an appearance.

I've also been moving rocks, especially on the south side of the house.  As I have often noted, I'm living on a rock pile.  Quite a few large stones were brought to the surface during excavation.  If I don't remove them, I'll keep bumping into them whenever I want to plant something.  Trust me — these puppies are heavy!  My back is lecturing me tonight. •••