Pecan Grove (www.pecan-grove.net) Pecan Grove and Senior Residence

The builders finally notified us they weren’t going to have the building ready by January 31, as they had promised at the beginning of December.  That was becoming obvious as we watched the progress.  Now they’re saying it will be the last week in February.  A lot of things are happening and it’s easier to see what the end product will look like.  The following pictures show some of the interior work.

The stonework at the driveway entry is now complete.  The sewage system passed inspection on Friday and has been covered in since this picture was taken.

The lakeside porch roof had some “issues” and is being fixed.  This picture of the fishing pier out into the drained lake is a week or so old.  The pier is now complete, with a set of stairs going down into the lake at a special sandy swimming area.

Three bridges are being built around the lake so a walking track can be built.  The track will be about 1/2 mile long.  This is the foundation of one of the 2 small bridges.  The third 90 ft long bridge should be started this week.  Dredging of the lake and rebuilding of the dam is now complete.  The drain pipe that was keeping the lake drained has been plugged.  So now the lake can fill again.  We’ll need some serious rain to fill it up.

We can always find work to do.  Mike has been pruning the pecan trees.  It takes a lot of time to prune over 900 trees!  He’s less than half way done so far.  We bought a shredder, and yesterday a group of use shredded pecan branches into mulch.  We could probably sell more mulch than we did pecans, but Kathy’s planning on using it for gardening.

Ken

The Pecan Grove sign at the entrance from the road has been installed.  It isn’t complete yet… but here it is without the stone pillars on the sides.  It’s somewhat hard to see the words Pecan Grove around the Texas star due to the trees in the background.  If you click on the picture to enlarge it, the words are easier to see.

The senior residence is progressing.  Now they are spraying on texture and starting to paint the interior.  The following pictures show the texture spraying, and both the street side with the eagle on top of the cupola and the solar panels for hot water.  There is still a lot of dirt, but the cement curbs are in place that define where the driveway will be.  The sewage system is currently being installed (not shown).

Dredging of the lake is complete, but the piping that will be used to control the level of the water in the lake hasn’t been installed yet.  Once it is installed, the pipe through the dam will be plugged and the lake will be allowed to fill.  Fishing is still good in the lake that is left!  One of the pictures below shows the senior residence from the lake side.  Another picture shows the small “spring house” being built down next to the lake with the pallets of stone around it that will be used on the walls.  This spring house will house the electric irrigation pumps which water the pecan orchard, and the control system for the fountain in the middle of the lake.  A large propane tank and generator are in place.  This will allow us to be self sufficient in case of another hurricane like Ike!  The propane is also used for heat, cooking, clothes drying and additional hot water (if the solar hot water is not sufficient) in the residence.

It’s winter now on the farm.  The following 2 pictures were taken of the same bird house, one yesterday (when it was 80 deg) in the “winter”, the other back in the spring.  Today the temperature dropped to the 50’s… a lot cooler.

Terry and Kim Hoffman invited a bunch of folks for a pot luck yesterday evening at the farm.  These pictures were taken at that time.  It’s been awhile since pictures of the barn and farm house (where the Hoffman family lives) have appeared in this blog.

Dad and Mom moved to the house beside the farm a few weeks ago.  In a previous post there were pictures of their house before they moved in .  Here are a few pictures in the house yesterday.

Ken

A lot has been happening at the pecan grove!  First, an update on the senior residence.  The builder has given us a date when they’ll be finished… January 31, 2009.  Later than we’d hoped, but realistic.  The brick and stone are being laid now. The electrical and plumbing are well along.  It should be ready for insulation and sheet rock in a few weeks.  The 7 acre lake in front of the senior residence has been drained down so we can dredge out silt that has built up over the years, so it’s ugly now!  We have a very disappointed beaver somewhere.

We have one (of the possible 10) apartments spoken for already, and we’re receiving significant interest from other possible residents, so hopefully we’ll have some several moving in when we open in February.

Our neighbor, Glynn, finally agreed to sell us his place, so Jack and Leona will move into Glynn’s place in November.  This reduces the number of houses we need to build. Glynn is a master gardener, and has a very nice garden, which Kathy and Kim hope to maintain.  Here are a few pictures of Glynn’s place.  We’ll make a few changes before Jack and Leona move in.

Awhile back we were able to purchase the 10 acres in the front center of the property, so now it is all one piece.  The picture below (taken before we purchased the place) shows the boundary of the property in red.  The yellow lines are overhead power lines.  The light blue is the road into the farm, senior residence and Mike and Ronda’s place.  The dark blue will be a driveway over to Jack and Leona’s place.

Good progress has been made on the house for Mike and Ronda.  Here are some pictures.

Finally, the pecans are in!  The steps in the pecan harvesting process are:

1. Shake the pecan tree with a shaker causing the pecans (and sometimes squirells) to fall to the ground.
2. Use a harvester to pick the pecans up off the ground
3. Use a cleaner to separate the leaves, sticks, etc. from the pecans
4. Dry the pecans by spreading them out on a drying table (or drying them in bags)
5. Crack them in a cracker.
6. Separate the meat from the shell in a separator
7. Separate most of the shells from the meat in a blower
8. Run the meat across a vibrating table while people pick out remaining pieces of shell
9. Sort the meat by size – full halves and broken pieces.

Pictures of some of these machines and some pecans are shown below.