Greenhouse Update 2 - "Dirt Work"

Before we put up the sides of the greenhouse, we are building the inside boxes (raised beds), and hauling in dirt for them.   It's a lot easier that way - no walls to deal with!  Harold got some dirt from a wooded hillside with his tractor/loader, and we also brought in 2 pick-up loads of manure/dirt from a neighbor who used to have beef cattle about 15 years ago.   His pile of rotted manure and pasture dirt is so well rotted, it is pretty much beautiful black dirt.  He has more if we want it.   Shoveling dirt into buckets and emptying them is hard work.   I sure wish I was about 30 years younger!   We can't use a wheelbarrow because it won't get over the side boards and is too heavy and unwieldy anyway.    Harold and I emptied dozens of 5 gallon buckets full just for the first box.   Today he is building the middle raised bed box, which will be  about 4 feet wide.   That will take an enormous amount of dirt!  We quickly discovered that the gnat season is here in Minnesota, so any work has to be done before 8 p.m. or you can't stand the gnats! So today and tomorrow will be pretty much taken up with the middle box building and filling.   If we need more dirt, Harold will fire up his tractor/loader and get more base dirt from the woods, and then we will go over to the neighbor's house and he will fire up his tractor/loader and get more of that manure rich dirt for the top layer.  My neighbor teased me that he always gives me "s#*t" about stuff, and  now he can really give me some "s#*t" !  It IS beautiful top soil, though.........

Harold gets soil from a hillside mound that was bulldozed years ago  when Harold farmed this land years ago with his Dad.  They got rid of some trees to make a cornfield.

One bed is finished and we are working on the middle.   One of our pick-ups filled with dirt in the background.

Measuring off a space for the middle box.  We are using old re-bar cut into pieces for box supports.

We filled our other pick-up with more manure dirt.