I moved into the Yahala, Florida studio. Most everything is still in boxes but My Disney Feature Animation desk is partially set up and running, so I can sit down and write.
This is a sketch on the side of the property. Hurricane Milton ripped through Yalaha and knocked down about 4 trees. Thankfully none of them fell on the house. All of them fell to the south. On the north of the neighborhood, a few blocks away is Lake Harris which is huge. The winds from the north blew over the lake with no obstructions and then slammed into Yalaha. Since I moved in work had started in cutting the fallen trees. This particular tree was cut into about 5 foot sections and those huge logs were moved to the roadside. It is hoped that they will remove the logs before the job is done. They will be returning to work on the other slightly smaller fallen trees later in the week.
Also visible in this sketch behind the tree is a composing station. This station had 3 stations of hay. Because this big tree was cut back to the roots, there was room to work on the compost pile. The primary composting area had gotten cold and so the compost was no longer breaking down. Also the wood palates that separated the sections had broken down and so it had to be reconstructed. While I broke apart pallets for the wood, Stella worked on rebuilding the bins. The sin set as we were working. I managed to kneel down on a rusty nail. Luckily I knelled down on the head of the nail so I didn’t draw blood. By the time the sun set we had two sections reconstructed.
Stella added new hay to the first bin and dug a hole down to the ground. She compressed the hay out to the outer edged of the bin and then filled the new hole with food scraps. There were lots of scraps since the refrigerator held food that was purchased before Hurricane Milton hit. A whole chicken was added to the composer. I didn’t realize meat could be composted.
With everything inside. Stella spread hay over the top of what was added. A metal mesh was put on top of the pile and held down with stones so no critters could get inside. The final touch was a thermometer to see how the compost was heating up inside. After a year, the food scraps should break down and then they will be added to another bin. Hay will then be added to the first bin and the process starts all over again.