Mad Scientist Blog

Not having a farm to tinker on has given me more time for work, and time for smaller shop projects. A few months back I designed and built the world’s first portable digital map for tabletop roleplaying. It’s pretty awesome.

I’m going to try to get back into blogging. Wish me luck!

Folks who stumble across my blog might wonder where I’ve been. The short answer is this: we lost the farm. The economic turmoil of late 2008 reduced business income to the extent that maintaining our house and farm proved too large a burden to bear. We fought for almost a year to hold on, but ultimately the worsening business climate eventually forced us to admit defeat. Thankfully, we did not lose the farm to foreclosure. Apparently, the old adage is true; If you owe the bank a little money, it’s your problem. If you owe the bank ALOT of money, it’s their problem. And so it goes that we were able to avoid foreclosure, by selling our farm to the bank. Our debt was forgiven, and we have moved on with our lives.

We moved off the farm in May of 2009. We moved into a leased home in Roanoke, Virginia. It was a handsome little house in the Hunting Hills golf course community. A good place to clear our heads. Soon, however, it became clear that Roanoke wasn’t the place for us. The entire area lacked large horse boarding and training facilities. When we had our own place it was easy to forgive it it’s warts; after all, we fell out of our house and landed in the barn! It was very convenient. However, we were boarders now, and Roanoke just didn’t have any good boarding facilities worth paying $500/mo for. So, since I run NewHorse.com, which has surprisingly grown into one of the largest equestrian resource web sites, I decided to do some research. I exported my horse farm geo-data and created a heat map of the U.S., to locate metros that appeared to have lots of horse farms to choose from. This is how Raleigh, North Carolina appeared on our radar.

Fast forward to August, 2009. We move to the Cary, North Carolina area. We’re boarding our horses at an awesome nearby horse farm with full-size indoor and outdoor arenas. Yes, we’re living in the ‘burbs, but it’s a gorgeous area, with many lakes and parks. We’re just 5 minutes from daily shopping, 20 minutes from downtown Raleigh, and 15 minutes from the center of Cary. We’ve got lots of friendly neighbors, and the girls are in a great public school that is just a 7 minute drive from home. Things could be alot worse.

Business has been good as well. Not the Halcyon days of 2007, but I can’t complain! And with a full 40+ hour work week dedicated to my business (instead of whatever time I had left after maintaining the farm), I’m pretty impressed with what I’ve been accomplishing.

I’ll be posting new blog entries from time to time, but I’m afraid I won’t be documenting farm projects! I’ll try to keep the posts interesting, though. That’s all for now!

90 posts and 200 80–pound bags of Quikrete later, and I’m ready to hang fence rails! Yay! I’ll try to be finished up by Friday, and post some After photos. The arena area is looking a bit scruffy since I haven’t bothered to mow the perimeter or rake the footing in a while. But as soon as I’m done the fence, the outdoor ring will be back in service! 

And so it begins. Our first ever selective timber harvest is officially underway. Earlier this year we hired Gary Long of Ridge Runner Forestry who expertly guided us through the entire process. Gary orchestrated a very successful sealed bid timber auction. If you own wooded acreage in the SWVA area and have pondered selective timber harvests, you will find no better professional to work with than Gary Long.

Planning to retire? Looking for a beautiful, accessible, wooded hilltop setting for you, as well as some open acreage for your horses? Dreaming of mountain and valley views? Hoping for an easy 25 minute commute to Carilion or downtown Roanoke?

My wife and I own Oak Hill Stables (www.oakhillstablesva.com), and we are moving forward with the sale of 30 of our 130 acres. This land sale represents a rare opportunity for the amateur equestrian to build their dream home right next door to one of the finer riding facilities in the Roanoke area. The proposed 30 acre tract would have +/- 5 acres of sloped open pasture, a small year round creek, and several potential home sites. Chief among the potential home sites is the 1,420′ summit of a hill that offers gorgeous northern views of Cahas Mountain, with peaceful southern highland views. The hill itself has an established logging road, thereby reducing the investment required to build a private drive to the desired home site. We are working with a surveying firm to subdivide the 30 acres into two +/- 15 acre tracts. We will accept offers of $300K for both 15 acre parcels; however, sold individually, the asking price will be $180K for each parcel. Interested parties are invited to ask for more information by email, or by calling me (Sean) on my cell (540-521-7819, before 10pm EST please).

Within 1–2 weeks I’ll be listing this property in the MLS. Buyer’s agents are invited to inquire. If you have a client that has been on the lookout for Franklin County land close to Roanoke with true horse farmette potential, with significant viewshed potential, then this may be the ideal property.

Gorgeous ridgeland buffer:

Potential home-site on summit of 1,420’ hill (labeled “Bunker Hill” on old maps, and in Google Earth as well). If desired, the hilltop could be cleared and would then offer +/– 2.5 acres of open land, with superb 360 degree views:

Pictured below is one perspective of the +/– 5 acres of open land. It begins at the fenceline (labeled with a ‘B’), continues outward and fronts our private road at left (Steeplechase Lane) for over 500’. We recently installed a $10K 32×14 double bay run-in shed with an 8×14 storage room. The run-in would convey, unless the buyer has no use for it. Near the run-in is a Bar-Bar-A automatic frost-free waterer. This would not convey unless under special arrangement with the buyer; we would be happy to convey the waterer and negotiate a fixed fee for the continued use of our water supply for the buyer’s horses while the buyer coordinates their own supply. Labels ‘C’ and ‘D’ illustrate how the small year-round creek travels through the property. Approximately where ‘C’ sits, the logging road begins, which travels up and around the ridge to arrive at the summit of “bunker hill”.

Cahas Mountain is one of the most beautiful and untouched mountains in the Roanoke area. This is only a small slice of the overall view potential from the prime potential home-site:

Last month we had the pleasure of visiting Cass Scenic Railroad State Park in West Virginia. What a fantastic family trip!

We rented one of the many restored company houses in Cass. The entire town of Cass was purchased by the State of WV in 1976, fifteen years after the state purchase the railroad. Staying in the company house was a neat experience for the kids.

It also offered creature comforts for the adults. I am pictured below attempting to acquire a wireless signal. A fruitless endeavor, I would later learn. Apparently Cass is a stone’s throw away from Green Bank, WV, home of the largest world’s largest fully steerable radio telescope. Therefore, there are no cellular towers near Cass.

In desperation the first evening, I jumped in the Prius and high-tailed it to Snowshoe Mountain about 25 minutes West of Cass. For the record, you can’t get Verizon wireless internet service anywhere near Cass. Even on the top of Snowshoe Mountain. Even if you’re standing, in your socks, on the top of the car. Let that be a lesson to you. You can, however, smoke the brakes of a Prius if you double-time it back to Cass. Just watch out, that last S-curve back to town is a poor mistress when your brake pads are on fire. Note to self, it’s a Prius, not a Porsche.

Our train took us to Bald Knob, the second highest peak in WV:

Regardless of the lack of wireless internet service, the trip on the Cass Scenic Railroad, and our time in the authentic company town, was well worth the three hour drive from our home in Boones Mill, VA.

As we approached Labor Day weekend, Nancy and I planned for the arrival of a Hollins College student who will be living with us and working part-time with Nancy at the barn. Since the girls’ playroom was going to be converted into a college student’s bedroom, Nancy asked if I wanted to paint the room and make some improvements. That was all the encouragement I needed

Last week, our playroom looked something like this:

Everyone pitched in to relocate the playroom into an area of the basement. Then I got to work:

First of all, anyone who has ever lived in a house with base, chair and crown molding – and plenty of casing – can appreciate the time involved in painting such a room “correctly”. Prior to rolling on paint, you have to “cut” along each side of molding and around all of the casing with a good quality brush. It is very time consuming. I cut two coats to get proper coverage and it took several hours. Time was, I’d use blue tape to isolate trim to help prevent overpainting, but I’ve found that I do a better job – with less frustration – without tape. I don’t sweat any imperfections in the straightness of my lines when I’m cutting on the wall along trim. I simply make sure that I apply an even coat and lines are – more or less – straight enough. And since I paint walls before I paint trim, I tend to overpaint trim ever-so-slightly. That way, when I paint the trim, I can make really smooth and straight cut lines with the trim paint.

After about *censored* hours, this is what I ended up with:

For the curious, the wall paint is a Valspar (?) satin (Stratosphere) and the trim is a Valspar semi-gloss (Overcast). The ceiling paint is an off-white semi-gloss with a hint of a very small hint of yellow. I also re-waxed the floor *twice* to restore the finish. I removed the shelving from the left closet and installed a clothes rod. This room project turned out really well, and the next step is some drapery and furnishings.  

While I was cleaning the register duct I found a 30 year old Milky Way wrapper that was presumably left behind by a contractor who helped build our home. Nutrition Facts did not exist back in 1978 but I did note that Milky Way bars are approximately 35% heavier now than they were 30 years ago. Just like most Americans.

Hey, as of July 15^th we’ve begun to get ourselves in gear to sell some land. And not just any land, mind you! If you’ve ever dreamed of being our neighbor (haha) then here is your chance. It is +/– 32 of the most diverse acres in the county. Approximately 8 acres are open and in pasture, with the remainder being wooded ridgeland. The ridgeland rises to 1,420’ and is one of the highest vantage points in the immediate area, promising some pretty spectacular northern, eastern and southern views. Asking price is as of yet to be determined but if someone were to offer $10K/acre before September 1^st we might be tempted. I still need to do some more research on comparables. Furthermore, we are also planning on subdividing the 32 acres into at least two separate lots. One lot would consist of at least the 8 acres of open land, and the second lot would enjoy the 1,420’ hill summit and be at least +/– 15 acres. In this case the price would be closer to $12K/acre. We’ll see.

Anyway, here are some photos to get the ball rolling.

Survey approximation. Black and red line is existing logging road. Black dots are proposes home sites. Shaded area is our farm. You can see our house and our barns, etc. We own all of Steeplechase Lane, which heads eastward to Dans Road (public road). The only other house with access via Steeplechase is visible in the top right section of the aerial. So ultimately, at most, there would be only four homes on our private 2,000+ foot drive.

Looking West. The proposes property line is at the white gate. Land to be sold would be this side of the gate, extending to the left (Southward) to a hollow on the far side of the creek. So this is roughly where a driveway might enter onto the land for sale. Steeplechase Lane ends at our barns visible about 1,800’ away.

(E) is the creek. (C) is the proposed lot line – the land for sale would be on the near side of the line from this vantage point. (A) is our outdoor riding ring – not for sale but neighbors could access it for a small fee. The same goes for our (D) 20×40m indoor riding arena. (B) is the summit of Cahas mountain.

View on the land looking East. (A) is a run-in that would be relocated to our land – or we could negotiate a price for it to the seller. (B) is an existing partition fence that could be removed when the buyer redesigns their pasture(s). (C) is the entrance to the ridgeland via existing roadbed. (D) is the creek, it runs E/W at the bottom of the pastures.

View on land looking Southwest. (B) is roadbed to ridgeland. (A) are mature ash trees in pasture. Ignore the bedraggled fence. This would be replaced by the buyer when they redesign their pastures.

Aforementioned creek. Except during severe drought this little creek runs year round. We currently keep grazing animals out of the creek. It’s better for the environment. We may add a restriction to the deed that would force the buyer to do the same. We’ll see.

Logging road along south side of creek. Currently you can ride along this road all the way to our outdoor. It’s a beautiful spot!

Road up ridgeland.

Highest point on ridgeland. We’re currently preparing to selectively timber the ridgeland and during this project, we’ll be opening up some views along the ridge. They are sure to be amazing. Cahas Mountain will be in full view from this vantage point.

That’s all for now. More details later!

If you’ve ever visited our place it goes without saying that there is an above-average level of upkeep required to keep things in order. We’re into our fourth year on our horse farm and – with respect to landscaping chores – I’m almost to the point where I think I might actually know what I’m doing. Before we moved here the only piece of landscape equipment I owned was a push mower. I barely even knew how to use that. Today, I think I’m actually getting the hang of landscape maintenance and improvement.

We’ve got three purple plumb trees that are struggling to survive. You might be able to make them out behind the parked van. Originally there were purple plumbs snaking all the way to the foreground of this photo. In all likelihood they died of old age and/or neglect long before we bought the place. Nancy and I are not sure what trees we will plant to replace them. At this point our short list includes apple trees (I’m becoming interested in the edible landscape movement), purple plumbs, or crepe myrtles. We love the idea of apples and plumbs but we’re pretty heavy already on spring flowers. Crepe Myrtles are attractive and would provide more summer flowers but would otherwise be useless. We’ll see.

Cahas Mountain is crisp and clear on this sunny summer day. Those who enlarge the above photo might catch a glimpse of the second house being built in Boones Mill’s Cahas Green subdivision. The third has also gotten started, as evidenced by the trail of smoke from the smoldering debris pile. I believe those two homes are built on five acre lots. I understand a few more are on the drawing boards by homeowners who also happen to have horses. It’s good to have more horse folks moving into the area.

Today I mowed the four fields pictured above. It was a gorgeous sunny morning and as always my earmuffs were dialed into either NPR news or my favorite country music station, so the time passed quickly. Tomorrow I’ll be mowing the two large pastures to the left (East) of these fields. Mowing is a good break from fence building; I’m building about 725’ of rail fence around the outdoor riding ring (visible in the photo, to the right of center). After digging 90 holes and setting about 30 posts I was ready for a short break. Most of the postholes were drilled into some pretty tough clay hardpan and I ate up two full sets of teeth on my 9” bit digging those damn holes! I’ll be back to building fence by Thursday and I hope to finish the fence by the end this month.

As part of our plan to reduce our acreage to +/– 100 acres, we’ll be offering about 32 acres for sale shortly. The acreage is partly visible in this photo; it consists of most of the ridgeland visible, and flows to the left (East), accessible by a well established logging road that continues East until it bends North and downward, over a small creek and into +/– 8 acres of sloped open field that rises up to our private road. The buyer could build in the open field for a more semi-rural feel that provides very pleasant small valley views; alternatively the buyer could build on the ridge that rises to 1,400’, approximately 80’ higher than the location of our own home, providing what will likely be a wonderful northern view of Cahas Mountain and also quite possibly a southern view of the Piedmont highlands. The property would have easement access from our private gravel road. If you know anyone who may be in the market for a diverse piece of land in Franklin County with some great views, and open land for horses, that adjoins a very nice horse farm providing affordable access to our indoor arena, outdoor ring and trails then have them send me an email to sean@digitalspinner.com. We’re 25 minutes door to door from Carilion and downtown Roanoke. Pass it along! I’ll have more details and photos later.