I really hope that we don't have to sheet mulch over this nahiku patch again, but you know, I wouldn't be suprised...

And this would be without the tree.

This is before the java plum is cut down.

Yesterday I randomed about the place. Pulled weeds in the pineapple/peanut patch above the house, and in general took stock of the situation thereabouts.
Sally was feeling sick witha bit of hay fever or something. It is possible that she breathed in some gas from the green waste the day before, I guess. I told her to take the day to rest but even so she surfaced in the afternoon and had a go at cleaning out the nursery. Even cleaned the mulch from the Sesbania off the roof. Not sure what she did with it, but pretty good initiative, and now the nursery has some more space for her/us to propagate loads of peanut and legumes.
I tried making another barrel of biochar, but started the fire with just split bamboo from part of the old chicken fence that had blown over, and without a couple of solid logs the fire actually didn't stay alight. I guess I could have put less wood shavings in there. Anyway, I put the half charred barrel into the Knox Fort to soak up the chookshit.
In the evening I started sheet mulching the grasses that had regrown along the fenceline in the citrus orchard.
Continued that process this morning and actually used the whole 9 yards (probably it was closer to 6 or 7 yards) of mulch and a bale of cardboard I had brought back last week just to cover the fenceline area... Still, it really had to be done, since the grasses if not suppressed will invade the peanut areas... In the end there wasn't quite enough mulch to cover the cardboard as thickly as I had wanted to, so I took down the Java Plum that was going to come out sooner or later anyway, and used the brush to hold down the rest of the cardboard...

Finally got some rain out of the Kona storms. An inch all at once. I got some peanut cuttings in as it was coming down and while it was still overcast in the afternoon and the next morning. It was nice to have the stockpile of mulch there to be able to mulch them as they were planted... Sally helped for a while, and then when the rain stopped I took her to show her around. Almost everywhere I went I was shocked at how badly the winds had whipped us. Lots of leaves were whipped off the young trees. The Mammee apple was snapped off just above the graft. (we stripped off the leaves and planted the cutting, sort of hopefully). The Langsat, though still intact, had been pretty badly ravaged. One of the Salaks was sort of blown over, but I was able to mound up the soil around it and stand it up again. All this in the very bottom of the gulch, where I would have thought they would have been safer. I guess they are really young, and perhaps turbulence down there is pretty bad... The plastic killing off the grass on the lower terrace there was really messed up.
One of the largest gliricidias by the upper pond had snapped off at the base, and most of the crown was in the water. We cut it up and pulled it out of the pond before the wind gouged (worse) holes in the liner and made cuttings out of the best truncheons, put them in a bin of water. Threw the twigs on to the cardboard by the brandisii hedge. Took some pallets down to the big pond and rearranged the plastic to keep killing off the grass.
Seems like Marshalls tarps have held out so far so good.
Last night we went into town to a free showing of the incontinent truth, (Lichen and I chased sandpipers and quails outside, because we are all too well familiar with the potential for global disaster) and saw our ula lena side neighbour, Becky, in there. She said she is buying a new machete to clean up all her blown down bananas, and that we are supposed to get some respite for the weekend and then another kona wind is supposed to rear up. Bring it on!

January 31st on which I dropped Brad off at the airport and then went out to the Green Waste dump to see a spontaneous combustion of green waste. Several water trucks were called in to put out the blaze. It smelled quite like biochar... A guess the heat of the massive pile had been stoked by the 50 mph winds and there it was...
So, they asked me to come back in a few hours when they had things under control if I wanted my mulch. I went back into town and waited for the Sears warehouse to open. Read some Mimamsa philosophy while I waited for the forklifts to get cranked up...
Unloaded the cardboard back in Huelo and then headed in, this time got the load of mulch before going on to class. Almost fell asleep under the fluro's once or twice, and even though I had to keep it under 45mph most of the way home because of the crazy winds and wet roads, I made it home. A long day...
Lorinda reported that Marshall's Costco garage tent had imploded in the near hurricane winds. Ace was able to borrow tarps from Jim to save the day, though on refelection, with worse winds coming, perhaps Marshall should have taken Lorinda up on the offer to shelter in the barn with us until the storm blows itself out and then replace the tarps. Anyway, we'll see. Apparently it was one of those scenes of human cooperation the face of diversity with Greg Jones and several others who just happened to be here at the time helping to get it tied down...
Dorothy, my history teacher says that in her 45 years on Maui, she has seen it blow this hard a few times before, but not in such a sustained manner. Interesting...
Guess I better go unload the mulch so I can head back to the airport to pick up Sally. This will be my 5th visit to OGG in 8days. (!)