Displaying the most recent of 41 posts written by

Russell Shilling

Dry Stack Stone Retaining Wall

I have a path in the back near the railroad that is below ground level on one end. I built a dry stack stone retaining wall with the native basalt I had dug up throughout the yard. First I established a string line to define the edge, and picked the “best” stones for the foundation. […]

Snowpocolypse

Sunday, February 24th A heavy, wet snow began falling in the afternoon. Sometime after dinner (yay!) the power went out. This is unusual, but not a huge concern as it typically comes back after an hour or two. We retired to bed for the evening. Monday, February 25th I woke in the wee hours, as […]

Garden RGS Construction – Part 2

Survey and Layout Now that I have gotten closer to civilizing the yard, I started to lay out the garden railroad. I started by putting in stakes every 20 feet to correspond with my plan. Using ground marking paint, I painted lines between those stakes. Here, the yard is more under control, and I have […]

Garden RGS Construction – Part 1

I have been working for a couple of years to get a long-neglected part of my yard in shape to build a new garden railroad. About three years ago, I began to use herbicide to eradicate the massive amount of ivy that had taken over a couple thousand square feet of the yard. This is […]