Hi Ludi,
Great stuff! I'm really excited to see the projects going on right here in Central TX. Judging by your photos, you seem to be more SW where as I am E of I35. I've got heavy clay and no limestone. Anywho, i've had some thoughts while reading through your thread that i wanted to share. I am new to the
Permaculture scene, i have been practicing this stuff for a couple years based off my Rangeland Ecology degree, but i had no idea of this whole community until just this last month! I'm very excited! We have a 10
acre homestead and lease another 65 acres for
cattle, i hope to start my own thread this spring to share some photos with you (as I dont want to post any on your thread

).
1.) With the way water moves in our area, i feel that you shouldn't beat yourself up over the placing of your projects in relation to the water movement across your property. In the rocky loam that you inhabit, water infiltrates and moves laterally across the limestone bedrock in its attempt to replinish the aquifer. Good luck capturing that stuff! If you want to do anything to improve your water situation, I would start by removing every cedar tree from your property. Just check to make sure that you are not in Black Capped Verio or Golden Cheek Warbler (endangered species)territory as regulation is inplace to protect their nesting sites, which are constructed with mature cedar bark. These trees capture ~75% of the water that falls within their canopy's radius, have 30+ foot taproots, and consume an estimated 20+ gals of water per day each! They essentially suck the life out of everything in the vacinity. And they make excellent
fence posts! PS Im in the same "manual labor boat" as you with no heavy machinery and these can easily be done by hand.
2.) Love the HK's! I plan to replicate your methods with the buckets, as we have had many native cedar elms die from the drought(s).
3.) Have you considered a moveable
chicken coop? I constructed my own out of $5 tires from Harbor Freight, an old dog pen, and laying boxes made from scrap lumber and have had excellent success (I too am on a $1-2k annual budget for improvements). It is light enough for my wife to move. I have layers that i leave locked up until about 730 AM, and they all do their laying by then, they free range all day, and go back to their coop with a small cup of supplemental
local organic grain (toot toot). They are good to avoid the coyotes and hawks as we only lost 2 all of last year. We have 15 layers of various breeds. The swale area seems like a good area to move them on, or even the abandoned asparagus garden. Its a great way to integrate them into your garden and it avoids the fixed coop model which quickly becomes a "moonscape." I really feel that my gardens (veg and flowers) have benefited since i integrated them in to the gardens.
Good luck and sorry for the long post, i've got a lot of ideas/thoughts rolling around up there
PS i am open to any information that you (or anybody really) have that contridicts my statements. Everyday is a learning a day and i want to make sure that i'm not creating rumors. Thanks all!
NJ