Draining the site

Two posts ago I showed the puddles that have formed on the site after 7/10ths of an inch of rain. Some of that water has evaporated and some has sunk into the soil, but most is still sitting there. Today I scraped a small trench across the future bedroom, hallway and kitchen to get the water to flow out on its own.

The trench runs past the pile of dirt on the left and off down the hillside. It seems to be working. The water level is already falling.

The site is still very muddy, but not as bad as just after the rain.

Tracks

Since the hillside has been partially removed and a huge pile of dirt and clay is covering a lot more of it, one or more of the paths that deer have probably used for years is no longer there. This has caused at least one of the deer, and a rather large one by the looks of the tracks, to adjust his daily route to below the large pile on the hill and onto the part of the trail below the house site that has been raised with some of the dirt from above.

Here are prints laid down over two days, one track each day. They lead off into and through the middle of the larger, lower new pond. There are also tracks in the mud at the house site. I hope the deer will still pass below the house frequently after we move in.