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Haji posted:guinea fowl Before you corrected me I'd been parsing that as that he needed to release guinea pigs to eat the ticks. drat you for ruining my much cuter dream with all your actual and useful information. I already have Lyme Disease so if I ever move out to the family farm I'd be irresponsible not to buy some of these birds. What's a fair price for them? If they start to over breed are they tasty? Dr. MonkeyThunder fucked around with this message at 01:01 on Jun 21, 2013 |
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Jun 21, 2013 00:53
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I don't know how the birds themselves taste, but their eggs are extremely good. Small, very hard shells, but totally yummy.
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Jun 21, 2013 13:40
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Guinea fowl is good. Like a darker, gamier kind of chicken. A bit like pheasant.
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Jun 21, 2013 16:29
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Actuary X posted:Oh my god you have no idea how much wood is lying around rotting. Yes, it is a very important part of the ecosystem, but lack of rotting wood is in no way a problem here. (Sixty four acres of land, about one acre is cleared, the rest is forest.) Alright well yeah, fair enough then. TerryLennox posted:If you are a believer in naturopathy you could try what we use for hunting trips in Panama. There is a tree called Cedrón (simaba cedron, also known as bitter cedar or bitter bitter) which produces very bitter seeds. After drying them in the sun, you scrap some of the seed into hot water, let it rest for a minute as it cools down and then drink it. Its bitterer than aspirine and will take at least 8 hours to start acting but I find it very effective in keeping insects away. You may repeat the dose the next day but you should be careful as it is also used as antipyretic and has many other uses. It always worries me when people propose using plant sources as medicine, and then provide extremely vague and imprecise recipes for their use. I don't want to pick on you especially, but for example, you did not specify how much seeds or how much water or how much is one dose. Additionally, plants with active and complex chemicals in them have varying potency from one plant to the next. It is quite possible to overdose on almost any drug and that certainly includes drugs from natural sources. I would not recommend that anyone follow your instructions, especially since there could be an allergy, drug interaction, sensitivity, etc. that could be dangerous to an individual. On top of that, it's misleading to claim that medical companies do not spend enough investigating folk remedies, since plant sources are the primary origin of the majority of pharmaceuticals created in the last century. (Animals are also a primary source, such as the toxins produced in the skin of amphibian species.) Drug companies spend billions of dollars annually investigating the active chemical ingredients of plants which have been used for centuries by indigenous cultures worldwide. You don't have to be a "believer in naturopathy" to recognize and acknowledge the validity of folk remedies; but one major advantage of modern medicine is the ability to carefully control dosage, study and identify dangerous potential drug interactions, and give accurate warnings to patients about potential side effects. Essentially all this boils down to being fully informed about medicine before using it, something that folk remedy peddlers simply cannot provide, even if they think they can. So, while I think it's super cool that you found a plant you can boil and drink to keep away ticks, my personal recommendation is to not drink weird plant extracts without at least consulting with a physician first.
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Jun 21, 2013 17:02
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If you have dedicated workclothes for outside, you could soak them in permethrin. This is an insecticide commonly used by campers, hikers, hunters, and is even applied to horses. You could soak a pair of pants, a long-sleeve shirt, and your socks in the solution and allow it to dry... voila. Ticks won't die instantly, but after crawling around on you for awhile they will die (absorb the permethrin through their legs). Kills skeeters and other undesirables as well. You can get pre-made permethrin soaks or buy veterinarian grade concentrate which you can dilute yourself (much cheaper) as a soak. I was very skeptical about this until I used this to treat clothes I use for wilderness canoe camping trips. It's pretty kick rear end.
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Jun 23, 2013 18:17
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MaakHatt posted:If you have dedicated workclothes for outside, you could soak them in permethrin. This is an insecticide commonly used by campers, hikers, hunters, and is even applied to horses. You could soak a pair of pants, a long-sleeve shirt, and your socks in the solution and allow it to dry... voila. Ticks won't die instantly, but after crawling around on you for awhile they will die (absorb the permethrin through their legs). Kills skeeters and other undesirables as well. Do not do this, EVER, if you have cats around your place. Permethrin is hellishly toxic to them and grooming after brushing against somebody's permethrin-soaked clothing will kill them in less than 24 hours from liver failure. Don't get it in the stream either, it's fairly efficient at wiping out aquatic life as well. Particularly the parts of it that form the base of the food chain. Pyrethrin is relatively safe to use around them, but Permethrin is bad, bad news. The why is that their livers are fairly weak (not too many toxic compounds in your diet if all you eat is meat), and don't have the mechanisms to deactivate as wide a range of compounds as omnivores or herbivores do. Permethrin is relatively safe to use around dogs as a result(omnivores), but I would still ask a vet about dosage and exposure times before you go soaking your work clothes in fairly efficient neurotoxin that your pets are pretty much guaranteed to rub up against. Not to be all  POIZONS!!11! here, pesticides can be good and useful when applied in the correct context and manner. You just need to know what you're doing with your chemical of choice so you don't accidentally ruin something you treasure, which spraying poo poo willy-nilly on the (good-natured) recommendations of strangers on the internet is almost guaranteed to do.
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Jun 23, 2013 19:24
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I feel like this is the greatest discussion of bug dope/guinea fowl that has ever taken place on the internet and hopefully it never stops, because I don't have any updates for you right now. apatite fucked around with this message at 18:46 on Feb 16, 2016 |
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Jun 24, 2013 15:39
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The Hairy Bikers (UK TV chefs) recently did a series on the best of British food. One of the recipes is Honey-glazed guinea fowl with pomegranate and pineapple. The video probably won't load for non-UK people but it looked drat good. As for tool sperging... Pick mattock (pick on one end, adze or adz on the other)  Cutter mattock (cutter instead of pick)  Pulaski (big axe head and adz)  I love my pick mattock for digging in the yard since there are plenty of old tree roots and huge rocks in heavy compacted soil.
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Jun 24, 2013 16:30
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Guess I have a "Cutter Mattock" then? (we don't even use the word "mattock" here that can't possibly be it) Thanks for lying to me my whole life, Pops! This is like the whole calling a ruffed grouse a partridge or a quaking aspen a poplar thing all loving over again 
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Jun 24, 2013 17:29
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Just marathoned this entire thread instead of doing work. Holy loving poo poo you're awesome. The other guys doing similar things and saying casual poo poo like "Oh, just gotta rip off the entire back end of my truck and then weld a loving bus to it" is pretty much insane to me. The things you are doing and taking for granted are just so far beyond my abilities that I barely understand what is going on half the time. Your copper pipe wrapped around your furnace heating pipe-thingy is somehow gravity fed and then somehow forces the water UP and out of the faucet is basically magic to me. I have a door that is all rotted to poo poo on the backside of my garage. This thread has made me decide to rip that fucker out and replace it this weekend. I worked in construction building a house or two for one summer about 11 years ago. This should be a real loving treat, especially since the blocks that form that part of the wall seem to be sort of crumbly near the door and I'll somehow need to replace it and I dont even know wtf. I'll probably just pour quickcrete into a makeshift concrete form, then hope it somehow magically attaches itself to the concrete floor and/or wall.
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Jun 24, 2013 21:20
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angryrobots posted:I think they do exactly that, in some log homes. Many people who go through the expense of building a log home want it to look like a log home on the inside as well, though.  My family used this style when they built the cabin, works good if you don't have a bunch of long straight trees.
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Jun 25, 2013 19:09
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InterceptorV8 posted:
That's a sweet cabin, any pics of the interior? P.S. always loved your threads, grew up in a family of truckers P.P.S. THE BLACKBERRIES ARE COMING  
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Jun 25, 2013 20:48
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Blackberries? MORE LIKE GREENBERRIES!
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Jun 27, 2013 20:02
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apatite posted:That's a sweet cabin, any pics of the interior? Why thank you! No inside shots that I have, but family lives there year around, I'll have to get some the next time I'm over.
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Jun 27, 2013 21:44
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apatite posted:That's a sweet cabin, any pics of the interior? Oh no you'll lose all of your soccer balls 
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Jun 27, 2013 22:36
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Parting shots     P.S. it still rains here every day... apatite fucked around with this message at 18:46 on Feb 16, 2016 |
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Jul 1, 2013 21:40
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Last night we went for a walk, and I was gonna take pictures of all the mushrooms and fungus along the way to make a sort of photo-essay for ya'll internet folks. Then after 50,000 pics in 20 minutes I remembered we live in a rainforest and stopped taking them. We'd not even covered half the intended route. I'll just dump the pics here and skip the whole photo-essay thing... Of Fungus and Things           TOADally cool little dude      Fawn or something had been sleeping in this hollow portion of the tree  These little guys were all over in one spot but hard to take a pic of at dusk with crappy camera   Not as cool as rotor's banana slug but pretty big for around here  Found this chainsaw bar&chain oil jug wayyy back in the woods, something thought it was tasty but that seems hard to believe   Indian Pipe       Wait for it...  BAM, toad. Love the optical zoom on this camera, best that could be bought in a point and shoot at the time... apatite fucked around with this message at 14:49 on Aug 21, 2015 |
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Jul 2, 2013 19:06
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OK that didn't go over so well apparently. No more posts entirely made up of fungus pics, I promise.
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Jul 9, 2013 18:51
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apatite posted:OK that didn't go over so well apparently. No more posts entirely made up of fungus pics, I promise. I enjoyed the show and tell! I enjoy all of your posts, and I especially enjoy living vicariously through you from my apartment in the city. I'm always amazed at the natural diversity in the U.S.
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Jul 9, 2013 19:00
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I like fungi, and I like your fruit-picker. Looks a lot better than the one we had when I was a kid. We lived in the suburbs, but we had a lot of fruit trees in the yard and some were pretty tall. Someone ended up making a fruit-picker by cutting a notch out of a tin can and attaching it to a metal pole. Worked great, except the can was only attached by one screw, so it wobbled and shifted around all the time. 
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Jul 10, 2013 00:01
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The wire basket type is OK but beware the prongs will probably poke a number of apples and they won't keep very long that way. I got the Twister Fruit Picker last year and it works pretty well. It's pricey at $40 but I'm sure you could improvise something that worked the same way given enough time.
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Jul 10, 2013 00:19
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apatite posted:OK that didn't go over so well apparently. No more posts entirely made up of fungus pics, I promise. No worries, we were all waiting for the next slideshow like the passive audience we are. Besides, you are living the dream in the woods, for sure you don't need validation from the internets?
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Jul 10, 2013 13:28
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turing_test posted:I enjoyed the show and tell! I enjoy all of your posts, and I especially enjoy living vicariously through you from my apartment in the city. I'm always amazed at the natural diversity in the U.S. Thanks  We do have some crazy bio-diversity. The Mrs. is working through a biology degree, maybe I'll force her into some kind of species index/cataloging...Mizufusion posted:I like fungi, and I like your fruit-picker. Looks a lot better than the one we had when I was a kid. We lived in the suburbs, but we had a lot of fruit trees in the yard and some were pretty tall. Someone ended up making a fruit-picker by cutting a notch out of a tin can and attaching it to a metal pole. Worked great, except the can was only attached by one screw, so it wobbled and shifted around all the time. Notched tin can. Man why didn't I think of that!! Next time, fruit-picker, next time. Cpt.Wacky posted:The wire basket type is OK but beware the prongs will probably poke a number of apples and they won't keep very long that way. I got the Twister Fruit Picker last year and it works pretty well. It's pricey at $40 but I'm sure you could improvise something that worked the same way given enough time. OK "Cpt. Fancy Pants" have it your way... Space age polymer fruit pickers, I see how it is  Do you think it would work to put some automotive rubber vacuum port plugs or electrical heatshrink or even just some tape or plasti-dip or something on the tines? I could bend them out of the way but got the impression that they were there to help pull the fruit off the stem or something. Keetron posted:No worries, we were all waiting for the next slideshow like the passive audience we are. We all need a little validation once in a while  Plus there are people like turing_test that are trying to live an exciting vicarious life. If you're living vicariously you don't want it to be boring, right? apatite fucked around with this message at 15:05 on Aug 21, 2015 |
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Jul 11, 2013 15:52
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apatite posted:OK "Cpt. Fancy Pants" have it your way... Space age polymer fruit pickers, I see how it is Anything on the tips should help. It's common on some of the more expensive wire basket pickers to have a plastic covers on them. The proper apple picking motion is to lift and twist the stem so it breaks off cleanly without removing the spur it's connected to. The twister picker helps with this because of the grip on the apple. You can sort of do the same thing with basket picker where you get the stem in between the tips and lift, then the apple falls into the basket. I'm sure most people just try to hook the apple and yank down with them though.
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Jul 11, 2013 22:19
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As a Condo dweller, you cannot fathom the envy I have. Sure you've put in an extremely large amount of effort to get where you are, but to be able to live in the middle of nearly untouched nature, it looks completely worth it.
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Jul 12, 2013 07:11
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apatite posted:
quote:Will spare you all the pics of torn apart motorcycles as that's all that's happened recently. On the upside we should have a decent "cash-infusion" soon which will mean finishing the water system and the insulation/windows/siding for the addition. In the meantime will probably work on orchard fencing and cutting firewood and such (or maybe just ride motorcycles and swim in rivers it's hard to say really). Ended up riding about 125 miles yesterday, around the mountains, with stops for ice cream and a dip in a lake. Then to a dinner party. It was an amazing day. I now have enough wood up for winter, I think. Well, maybe one or two more trees, but it's hard to avoid cutting down a tree now and then, so no worries. Speaking of excitement, we are planning out a deck and so needed to drop a tree to get it out of the way. Not a big tree, didn't seem like a big deal. We even had a rope on it to be safe. But the stupid tree didn't understand what I was telling it and decided to drop sideways onto the roof of the cabin. Eventually we dragged it off the roof, where it dropped on the ramp up to the door, breaking off the railing, and then onto the garden, where, as my lovely girlfriend put it, turned out tomatoes into summer squash. Ah, well. We had a good time telling the story to our logger friends at the dinner party. No major damage, no injuries, so we count it as a success. Desert Bus posted:nearly untouched nature
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Jul 14, 2013 13:54
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A neighbor invited me to come over and help slaughter chickens 
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Jul 22, 2013 15:44
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apatite fucked around with this message at 15:07 on Aug 21, 2015 |
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Jul 22, 2013 16:55
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Please don't turn that yammie into a rat bike. All it needs are mufflers, side covers and some cleaning and paint to be a nice old-but-taken-care-of ride. If you're going to hack something up, let it be the SL125.
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Jul 22, 2013 20:09
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Sagebrush posted:Please don't turn that yammie into a rat bike. All it needs are mufflers, side covers and some cleaning and paint to be a nice old-but-taken-care-of ride. If you're going to hack something up, let it be the SL125. 
apatite fucked around with this message at 18:47 on Feb 16, 2016 |
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Jul 22, 2013 21:21
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The junk-tire garden in our driveway is doing pretty well. There are a couple different kinds of tomato, a couple kinds of peppers and some broccoli.        Also got some firewood split last night, thanks to Actuary X for reminding me. We have enough wood for the winter but it needs to be split and stacked still. Cash-infusion hasn't happened yet, will need to keep focusing on the things that only cost time rather than money...
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Jul 24, 2013 17:40
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I learned to ride on an old XL100 that looked identical to that SL. Before I got to ride it we my old man and I spent the winter rebuilding the engine even going so far as to bore it out since the cylinder was so barrel shaped. Where I grew up we had lots of bush to ride in and I found that much more enjoyable than riding on the road with a proper bike nowadays. Mushroom pictures were great. I liked the ring of green bits growing around the small tree very obviously a single colony cohabiting with the roots.
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Jul 27, 2013 17:52
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apatite posted:The junk-tire garden in our driveway is doing pretty well. There are a couple different kinds of tomato, a couple kinds of peppers and some broccoli. First let me say, this is an amazing thread and as a city slicker I am so jealous. I've always wanted to just live on a mountain with a bunch of dogs. Are you worried about petroleum by-products leaching into the tomatos/peppers? I thought it was a bad idea to use tires near food because of the vulcanization process. We had a tire playground at my elementary school, but they tore it down because it was poisonous or something. I was 6, so I don't really remember. Also, to chime in about Permethrin, I was deployed to Thailand for jungle training in the Marines and we had to spray that on all of our clothes. Your clothes will be stiff as a board for a week, then your sweat will soften it, at which point you'll get a weird rash. Then in 2 weeks the stuff wears off and you'll be eaten alive by bugs anyway. Granted, this is in 120 degree 95% humidity jungle, so YMMV.
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Jul 28, 2013 22:20
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red19fire posted:First let me say, this is an amazing thread and as a city slicker I am so jealous. I've always wanted to just live on a mountain with a bunch of dogs. quote:Are you worried about petroleum by-products leaching into the tomatos/peppers? I thought it was a bad idea to use tires near food because of the vulcanization process. We had a tire playground at my elementary school, but they tore it down because it was poisonous or something. I was 6, so I don't really remember. Honestly I'm not too worried about it, but maybe should be?? Even on "organic gardening" forums there are differing opinions, plenty of people say go for it, others say they wouldn't do it... helno posted:I learned to ride on an old XL100 that looked identical to that SL. Before I got to ride it we my old man and I spent the winter rebuilding the engine even going so far as to bore it out since the cylinder was so barrel shaped. Sounds like you need a dual sport/"enduro" bike so you can ride on or off road! Not much for mushrooms lately, we've had a terrible dry spell. That's how the weather goes around here, rains for three days then is dry as can be for two weeks, then rains for a week, rinse&repeat
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Jul 29, 2013 15:49
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Yikes I clicked this thread without realising how old it was. SO. MUCH. WORK. but man it looks so worth it, that place looks beautiful.
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Jul 31, 2013 12:07
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930.1
apatite fucked around with this message at 15:08 on Aug 21, 2015 |
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Jul 31, 2013 15:55
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I'm jealous of your cooler, wetter weather and your fungi and ferns. However, we just finished the second wettest July on record, so our fungi have gone crazy. (And everything's still green!) This one's about 10 inches across. This is what we did:  It fits perfectly into 1" PVC with a coupling. I don't know if you could make use of it, but we've had some success in building cheap covered animal/gear shelter by using cleared trees (we've got plenty of cedar for the uprights, which should last forver)  (the rafters interlace so they're self-supporting) and burlap painted with cement+sand+mistinted latex paint covering for the roof.  This one's doing fine at 2+ years, and I've used the same roof material on a more traditionally framed workshed. I really enjoy seeing pictures of your land/flora/fauna. Please keep it up! joat mon fucked around with this message at 17:25 on Nov 26, 2013 |
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Aug 2, 2013 20:12
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Sunday we spent most of the day riding around adventuring with a friend finding cool new places, and also picked 2quarts of blueberries 
apatite fucked around with this message at 18:47 on Feb 16, 2016 |
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Aug 5, 2013 16:37
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apatite fucked around with this message at 18:48 on Feb 16, 2016 |
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Aug 7, 2013 15:31
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apatite fucked around with this message at 18:48 on Feb 16, 2016 |
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Aug 9, 2013 15:43
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