Work begins!

This weekend was the beginning of two weeks off work for both Kyle and I. Two weeks of what we hope will lead to basic infrastructure on the property.

Most of Saturday was spent shopping (heavy duty pants, welding visors, lots of stuff from the tip), during which we resist the feeling that we are haemorrhaging money and try to remind ourselves that this is what we spent so long saving up for anyway.

Sunday was a trip to the site. We knew we weren't going to get very much done on this trip (the first when we actually own the place - we took a brief trip out a day before settlement and did some blackberry clearing, but we figure that doesn't really count). The purpose was really to talk over what happens next and get a better feel for the place. Early on we realised you can't really skimp on the time you spend talking it over before you start - a constant process of revisiting and reclarifying and making sure you both have the same vision in your heads and the same idea of what steps happen when.

So, we explored a bit first...

There are several areas we have started calling wombat villages:

But also lots of smaller holes here and there that are probably echidna's, or various other burrowing crawlies:

There's also one particular tree on the far side of the creek that had three birds nests:

Last time we were at the property the creek had obviously flooded a little while before, up perhaps a metre or two. I've checked the weather data and it looks like it floods that much quite regularly but the catchment area isn't big enough for it ever to go higher.

The water is quite clear, though, and trickles pleasently:

We went further up the hill on the other side of the creek than we have before - technically the property boundary is the creek itself, but when the property was subdivided from the very large cattle station surrounding it the creek was too hard to fence so they put it on the top of the ridge. This means we have an extra 20m or so all along the creek of very steep south facing slope with lots of scrubby trees. So we went all the way up to the ridge to take a look along the fence line.

We found evidence of past bushfires, though obviously from quite a while ago:

There's a quite lovely spot with a bit mossy rock in the shade:

And the inevitable two or three spots with a large thicket of blackberries - this one is clinging around some large rocks, and it looks like some of the wombats have made tunnels through it to get to burrows underneath. Kyle tentatively leaned over the edge to take a look from the top:

At the top of the ridge we looked out over the neighbours property, a little greener than ours as it had obviously been grazed whereas ours has had the grass dry out over winter then regrow so it looks a bit brown from a distance.

Then we stood in the middle of the ridge and looked back up at our place. You can see a bunch of trees at the top, but only 3 of them are actually on our property.

After exploring we had an extensive discussion about what we want to achieve over the next two weeks. We've talked a fair bit about this before, but it's different when you're standing there and can see the scale of it and where things will go.

We bought some stakes with flags on from the tip shop ages ago, thinking they'd be useful one day, so we staked out where our outdoor kitchen will go (this is where we'll build the barrel oven). It will have a roof over the top, but otherwise be quite basic, at least to start with. You can just see the brightly coloured flags in the picture below. We've put it beside one of the trees right at the top of the hill, as we think that's a nice spot for entertaining - you can see pretty much everything from there.

A somewhat less definitely permanent composting toilet block will go a little way over on the other side of the tree.

Then we really got to work. We wanted the first thing we build on the property to be a little veggie patch. Nothing big enough to distract us from the build for the moment, but just something to say "we've started" and to begin as we mean to go on.

We staked it out pretty basic, with a few bits of wood we had lying around from ages ago that weren't going to be used for anything else much. We cleared the grass, and turned over the soil:

The neighbouring cows were fairly suspicious of us at first - they had lots of calves among the herd, and all gathered together staring at us. But eventually they got used to us, dismissing us as just odd humans I suspect.

So, first days work and we have a veggie patch!

A long way to go, but we definitely feel like we've started now!

Settlement Day

We are now officially the new owners of 25 acres of grassy hillside, and a rather sensibly sized mortgage. We're pretty chuffed about this!

And, as a bonus, we found out on Saturday when we went for our pre-settlement inspection that we have several resident echidna's in the immediate area. Here's a close-up of one we passed trundling up the road about 500m from our driveway:

He wasn't feeling very photogenic at the time. We saw another one a little later down by the creek. So now we have confirmed echidna's, wombats, kangaroos, blue-tongued lizards, native bees, and possibly a platypus!

Grey water plans

Reusing our grey water on the garden is a no brainer in our situation. However, for the purposes of being thorough and establishing what assumptions/constraints lead us to that conclusion let's unpack that a bit. For any new dwelling Council's require details of how 'waste' is to be managed on the property. What they usually mean by this is "pay us several hundred $ to connect to the sewers". Since we have no intention of connecting to sewers (they're miles away for a start, but also we'll have composting toilets so why bother?) we are left with the issue of how to manage greywater. Given the effort we'll go to to catch and store water for drinking, it makes sense to be just as strategic about where it goes to next.

We are aware that by and large most grey water systems do not 'save water' overall. That's ok with us, as our goal for the system is the strategic use of what would otherwise be waste in a situation where we have little alternative. Anywhere we go from just letting our waste water trickle down the hillside is a positive.

So, how? Our requirements for any system are generally that it's cheap, complies with regulations (usually the hard part), and can be made and maintained by us with minimal help.

In our initial meeting with the council it was obvious that their opinion of grey water reuse systems was less than positive. Extremely reluctant, I would say, certainly not enthusiastic. Grey water was the one aspect of this build that has been met with the most reluctance, on every other aspect of our project the people we've spoken to in the Council have been hesitantly open-minded. But with grey water, the boom gates really came down. It wasn't an outright 'no', but they were very clear that we'd have to have our documents very much in order to get this through. It does make us wonder what has happened to make this Council so reluctant to deal with grey water systems. We'll probably never know, but we can hope that we'll be part of turning that attitude around.

Firstly, the regulations. In NSW greywater diversion systems can be installed without needing council approval provided they comply with certain conditions which we won't meet. Local council approval is needed for a diversion system from bathroom/laundry - so far as I can tell the same SepticSafe form we'll need for our composting toilet applies to any proposed waste water system, with the section below listing the expected supporting documentation:

And they say Australia is an over-regulated society...

For kitchen waste water the story is a little different. We'll need a treatment system that is accredited. This was where the plot went from thickening to curdling for me. The Australian Standards make it very clear that local governments are not permitted to approve grey water treatment systems that are not accredited by the Health Department. However, I keep finding accounts of people who have managed to get various systems approved by council even when they aren't accredited, either just by that particular State's department or at all. It does seem, though, that for this first house project a DIY grey water treatment system may be one battle too far.

On my search for an accredited system I had a few requirements. Early searches found many systems with pumps and vent fans and all sorts of other contraptions that required electricity to run, this seemed like a completely unnecessary strain on our electrical system. I also found any number of systems that retailed for upwards of $10,000. Since this is almost half of what we hope our entire house will cost to build it, again, seemed an entirely unnecessary waste. Any system we choose will be simple and cheap. The third requirement is for limited maintenance. The various systems on offer that require a registered plumber to service them every 3 months are, to me, completely foolish and to be avoided at all costs. If we can't maintain it ourselves we're not really interested.

After quite a bit of searching I found a useful table that confirmed a lot of what I'd read already - that two particular models (EcoDesign's Greywater Reuse System, and EcoFlow's Nature Clear GWS10) fit the brief in being on the cheaper side, needing no electricity and limited maintenance, and had the added bonus of producing compost periodically. Seemed perfect, except they're both only accredited in Qld and 'parts of NSW'. We'll try our luck, I think.

One final note: We are aware we are designing a system that will not be able to handle substantial contamination with human waste. We also know we want kids somewhere in our future. This will inevitably lead us to a choice, down the track, about nappies that has a bit more weight to it than the convenience vs environment dichotomy that plagues most of our friends. Though a quick search found these, which would appear to solve the problem.