Dry stone walling – Day 7

I have started working in the top corner of the orchard.  On Day 6, I dismantled what was left of the existing wall and it is amazing how much stone can come out of such a small section of wall, particularly when many of them are deeply embedded in the ground – they must have fallen off the wall many years ago.
 

 

So Day 7 started with digging out the foundations.  This involves removing all of the stones down to the subsoil – you can tell when to stop because the soil changes colour.  All dug by hand with a pick and shovel. 

I established the route of the wall by using a line along the existing part of the wall.  You can just see the yellow line in photograph above.  Once this is worked out, I put up the two end frames that define the angle (referred to as “batter”) of the wall – 600mm at the base of the wall and 300mm at the top of the wall.  The wall is 1 metre high (well, when measured from the other side of the wall that is lower.

Once the foundations are dug, it is time to build the wall – one layer at a time.  At the end of Day 7, the first metre of wall is up and the coping stones are now placed on top.