Weekend Water Project

I'm not real energetic about mowing the grass.  It seems like a pointless, time-wasting exercise to me. Running the weed-eater is even worse to me.  Mostly I like to put the temporary fence up and create different paddocks in the yard and let the cows eat the grass.  One downside to not having a manicured lawn is that sometime the grass gets a little tall.  We have water hoses running from the house out into the pasture to fill up the animals' water troughs and also to water the garden.  Water hoses will be stretched out in all directions for a hundred feet.

Water hoses in the grass

Tall grass can completely camouflage a water hose and the picture below shows evidence that when we have mowed, sometimes we don't see the hose in the grass and run over it with the mower.  Never a good thing, but that's what hose splicers and hose clamps are for.  Not a big deal.

It's not quite a 50 foot hose anymore

I have had a project on my to do list, though, for quite a while to run some underground PVC pipe out to the pasture to eliminate the hose in the yard.  It is would be one less thing to pick up.  Having never done this, I got some advice from a friend who has extensive knowledge of running water line and he gave me some pointers.  But before we get going, right by where I was going to be working, I noticed a cactus blooming that I've never seen bloom before.  This cactus is growing in a terra cotta frog.  We kind of forget about it and it just continues to grow.  Here is the frog cactus:

Cactus in Bloom

I tried to get a close up shot.  Very pretty flower on it!

Yellow cactus flower

On to the project.  The length of the pipe run was exactly 53 feet.  The biggest job is trenching.  I used a shovel to do the work and have the callouses to prove it.  I'm getting soft in my old age.  My materials including pipe, cleaner, glue, and all fittings totaled $59, so it is costing me (excluding labor) about $1.11 per foot.  It took no time to cut the pipe, clean and glue it and assemble everything.

The trench looking north

Once I have it all together I'll move the big water trough back out into the pasture.  I just trenched it about 6-8 inches deep.

Trench looking south

At the end of the run, I just barely came out of the ground and knocked some concrete off of a 4 x 4 fence post so that I could secure it snug to the post with an old leather belt.  I don't want the cows OR GOATS breaking the line.  A shorter segment reduces the opportunity for breakage.  In cold weather, I learned that if the segment is short, you can just pile up a mound of dirt on top to insulate during freezing weather.  

I'll put a "Y" connection on the faucet and make a short, flexible hose to run to the water trough and connect the water hose to the other connection for watering the garden and running water further out to the barn.

The end of the line

Now all I need to do is allow the glue to dry, pressure it up and see that there are no leaks.  I only had to tighten up one fitting to stop a drip, but once that was done, we deemed the project complete and began to fill in the trench with dirt and pack it down.  In no time the grass will grow over it and you won't even be able to tell that work was done.

All is Good!

No more moving water hose in the yard and now that we realized how easy it is to do this, we'll eventually run both water and electricity to the barn.