We have been working hard to fence our little plot of land. The goal is to protect this patch of forest from overgrazing by goats. Despite the frequent visits from neighboring animals the the big trees persist and the fencing has resulted in a huge increase in the native vegetation that can grow here and a population increase in pollinators!
For the most part we used wooden posts and chainlink to fence the perimiter with a base of rocks and cob to keep out dogs too. There were a couple of sections where a giant rock made this type of fence impossible so, we have created a rock wall with cob as morter.
All the supplies were collected from the nearby creek and carried in buckets to our work site. The cob material of clay and sand came from the creek too and we bought a bale of straw to complete the mixture.
The evening before every work session we created the cob mixture.
And the following afternoon got to work assembling the wall. The entire project occured over four differfent work sessions over the course of a week.
The final layer of rocks is much wider than the rocks bellow them. We hope that these flat rocks form a little roof under which the cob mixture is mostly sheltered from the rain. But, of course, this wall will be exposed to downpours, storms and wind. It may need some maintenance in a few years and that is okay, that is natural. Maybe one day we will change this rock wall into something else entirely! That is the beauty of natural building. By using rocks, clay and sand the work is quite forgiving and very solid too.