Lots of Stuff Happening Today

Originally, only Sam was going to come today to clean out the garage. Then Chris said he would stop by to discuss the work on kitchen cabinets and the garage repair and reroof. Then this morning I got a call from Mike the plumber, he sent Leslie over. And when I was waiting for Sam to show up, Kai from Aikane Nursery showed up with James to start the work on the tree removal and retraining. So let's start with the person who arrived first, Kai from Aikane.

Kai and Aikane Nursery will be helping me get the fruit trees in the back yard more productive and shorter so harvesting is easier. He started with severely pruning the lychee tree back to good, strong branches; he also took off about 10 feet of height so it will be easier to harvest the fruit; though we will get nothing this year. They will be chipping all the branches, then later spreading them out as mulch under the trees where needed. I'll have to let them know I could also use it around the anthuriums.

James, getting the equipment ready for all the work.

Working on the lychee tree.

Lychee done, avocado and much more to go.

Controlling the lychee will give the orange and mountain apple trees more sunlight. Which will help them to produce more fruit. The poor orange tree was having to reach beyond the branches of the lychee to get sun. The mountain apple shot up behind the lychee to get to the sun; now Kai will be able to top the mountain apple and train it to grow more laterally so the fruit are easier to reach. The heliconias can now also be seen.

The orange to the left of the lychee had to reach for the sun; the mountain apple behind went up to get sun.

The higher branches of the mountain apple get more sun so they have more fruit.

I think this is Heliconia rostrata.

There were so many banana plants you couldn't eat bananas fast enough to keep up with them; there were perhaps 20 or 25 that were removed. One of the plants removed had a bunch of bananas, they saved those for me. After Kai & James cleared the excess plants out they found a dwarf Samoan coconut and a bunch of green ti leaves.

You can actually now see the pasture on the other side of the property line. There's a lot more light and good air circulation in the area now.

 

The panax hedge by the persimmon will be removed, most likely tomorrow, that will allow the persimmon to grow more over into that direction. The persimmon will also be shortened to allow fruit to be picked easier, the portion of it over the garage roof will be removed so that it does not shade the solar panels.The timber bamboo will also be thinned and trimmed back from the garage to keep it from shading the solar panels.


Finally, the avocado tree will have to be cut down. It has a large rotten spot in the center of its trunk; it's too hazardous to leave it up. There's a small avocado nearby that will be trained and kept low so fruit picking is easier.


Leslie showed up next; she is from Cullins Plumbing & Fire Protection. Although Leslie was raised primarily in the Bay area, she spent summers here in Kohala with her grandparents who lived in the Hawi area. She and her husband moved here a few years ago after deciding to leave the traffic jams and stress of living in an urban area. She said the rest of the island thinks North Kohala is the rural part of the island and it is! Leslie replaced the old house regulator, she said it was nice that it was so accessible.

New house regulator.

She then fixed the leaky bathroom sink. She also showed me that the control part for the lever to close the sink drain was not really what was originally there for that type of sink; water would continue to leak around it and down the hole to the floor. She said she would have to look in her catalogs to see if she could find something workable, if so it might take several weeks to get the part.


Because the enamel is also flaking off the sink and allowing the metal underneath to rust, Leslie said another option would be to replace the sink and get appropriate fixtures at the same time. I found out they are also certified to install & repair the Rinnai demand water heater that I have.


Sam owns and operates Kohala Royal Services; Jessie said he is her go-to guy when she has little odd jobs that need to be done. He hauled away one trailer and 2 pickup truck loads of junk for me, plus swept all the leaves and miscellaneous small rubbish out of the garage; he charge me $150, I gave him $180 since he was so fast and pleasant. He did a great job.

Before.

During.

After.

Here is a look at the clean-up of the seating area at the foot of the back stairs.

Before.

During.

After

I onl got photos of the first and last loads of junk leaving. And not even very good photos so you can really get a feel for how much stuff left. I also missed the great photos of the ants swarming out of the old refrigerator. Or the 2 very large (> 7" long) centipedes. Or the 2" long cockroach. I was too busy doing other things when those things happened.

Transfer station Trip #1,

Transfer station Trip #3.

After everyone left , Chris came by and we talked about the next phase of repairs. Chris will be giving me an estimate on repairing or replacing the kitchen cabinets and repairing & reroofing the garage.

I started out the day with breakfast at Kings View again. This time I tried the Makapala Omelet.


I invited Lem over for dessert this evening and also asked Jessie and her brother to join us. Since Jessie's brother Ray lives across the street I had wanted to meet him. Unfortunately Ray was unable to join us. I tried the Holy's Bakery Aunty Mugs Pie, which is a blueberry-type pie.

Before baking.

I had Lem check on how well I did the salted limes. He said I did good, now I need to put them in a sunny window to help keep the mildew away.