We're Lineposting!

The time is finally here! We are putting in our line posts. We have had our trellis material since late June of 2013 soon after we put in our vines (it's coming up on the 1 year anniversary of our vineyard planting!). This is a photo from our Landini. I am sitting in the driver's seat because it takes two people to put in a line post. Actually, three would be ideal, but two works. This is what we fine tuned this task to be: we first marked where the line posts would go with spray paint around the perimeter of our vineyard. We put in line posts on the 4 corners of the vineyard as well as the

mid point on the north-south row and then strung a string from one post down one row and laid down all the line posts on the east side of the vineyard. My husband taught me how to drive the Landini and work the hydraulics while he positions the line post and uses the hydraulic pounder to drive the line post into the ground. Here I am in the Landini, taking a photo of the mirror looking back at my husband checking our work.
We were getting the hang of it and finished the first row when the whatyoumacallit that you put on top of the line post to allow the hydraulic pounder to pound in the line post snapped! It didn't break at the welding joint, the metal broke! I have to admit it was a nice break (for me), and when we went home, we ordered 5 more just to have spares around.