[near horse]

Hey dlskidmore,

Another route to go is to build a shop first, live in part of it while you build the house. I wish I would have put up a shop BEFORE doing the house. It would have made things so much easier (storing material, dry, windless warm bugfree place to work ….) It’s hard to sell to the family when they’re itching to get into a decent living space and you’re wanting to build a shop.

I know of some folks who parked a travel trailer (camper) in the shop – a self-contained bedroom/kitchen AND all the extra space of the shop.

Good luck. You need to recognize what can suit your needs and budget best.

[near horse]

Hi Donn,

So are you keeping Leo or do your friends want him back ….? He looks pretty mellow in the mower picture. AND – please tell me that was taken in May/June not recently. That much green grass this late in the summer just isn’t fair! I guess you all pay for it with humidity but dang, that sure looks nice.

[near horse]

Nice, Carl. You give some of us hope when you show these cooperative logging operations!

Scott – I heard a story on the radio that the demise of whitebark pines was due to infestation with bark beetles – that never used to be able to survive at the elevation WBP’s grow (near 8000 ft, isn’t it?). Do they also get blister rust? Western white pine used to be the cash tree here in Idaho 100 yrs ago and the University maintains a whitepine seed lot(?) – to produce seed considered more resistant to the rust …

Sorry about hijacking the thread. Just seemed to fit.

[near horse]

Nice, Carl. You give some of us hope when you show these cooperative logging operations!

Scott – I heard a story on the radio that the demise of whitebark pines was due to infestation with bark beetles – that never used to be able to survive at the elevation WBP’s grow (near 8000 ft, isn’t it?). Do they also get blister rust? Western white pine used to be the cash tree here in Idaho 100 yrs ago and the University maintains a whitepine seed lot(?) – to produce seed considered more resistant to the rust …

Sorry about hijacking the thread. Just seemed to fit.

[near horse]

When we first lived on our place here in Idaho, we lived in a 700 sq ft 2 bdrm house (an old Montgomery Wards kit house I think) w/ 2 kids. Advantage – easy to heat quickly due to small size. Disadvantage – no “personal space” and storage is an issue. Guests – ha! Beter if they can stay in a hotel or rent a motorhome and camp in the yard. Good luck.

[near horse]

@bivol 19899 wrote:

similar to the potato cannon?
LOL i’ll keep that in mind in case the situation here cooks up again:D;)

Yep – like a potato cannon but not the ones that use an ignition propellant (like hairspray). Just charge the rear chamber w/ air from your compressor, insert potato, aim and open the valve btwn rear chamber and barrel -whooosh. That potato is now a “spudnik” – okay that was a BAD pun.

I built one for a HS physics class I was teaching at the time – hey, maybe that’s why I’m not teaching physics any more!!

Check out a book – Backyard Ballistics. Has some pretty neat stuff to “do” at home.

[near horse]

I too broke down and swathed my hay (until the swather broke down yuk yuk). We have bedstraw and ventenata (wind grass) mingled in with our orchard/brome/fescue mixture – those stinkin’ weeds really are a pain when cutting – in fact the ventenata will shake the header of the swather even at the slowest ground speeds – knocked out my wobble box! I don’t know how well the horses would have done w/ that crap mixed in.

On a plus side, everything baled nicely (a rarity) and after putting up all I needed I was deluged with folks wanting to buy hay – all sold and gone now. NOW THAT has NEVER happened!!!

It is still incredible to me that you can mow on one day, tedd the next and rake/bale on the third day!! That seems impossible unless you’re in AZ or something! I am impressed.

[near horse]

Okay – I’ll bite. What in the world is a “Prepper”? Like Dr. Prepper:)

[near horse]

@bivol 19873 wrote:

guess you can make (toilet) paper out of them…. or chop or rough mill them for bedding for pigs or poultry… i’m worried about knobs abbility to retain moisture:confused:. since chicken manure has lots of nitrogen, lots of potassium in the knobs should make it a bomb-shell manure.

stuff them in between plank walls of an open field pig house, for isolation. newspaper could do well, but i guess knobs are more weather resistant. i haven’t tried all these things up, but i guess they should work.

hard-to-break-down mulch. sounds good to me…

How about using them as projectiles in a homemade air cannon?

[near horse]

@Joshua Kingsley 19679 wrote:

A grass board can be made from a piece of pine, the stick can be a dowel that is cut on an angle and bolted to the board. If you need some measurements I can try to get them off from my JD #3.

Joshua

Broom stick works good for the grass stick. I wouldn’t try mowing w/o a grass board – seems like destined to plug the knife.

Richard – great looking mower. How can you bring yourself to get it dirty?!:)

[near horse]

@mitchmaine 19717 wrote:

just my opinion, but all the extension agent does is go from farm to farm distributing spores from other farms and spreading blight. if you have to know take him a plant. otherwise spray your copper and hope for the best.

We had a potato wreck a number of years back. Everything was fine, plants up a foot or two then started to turn yellow/brown from the top down. Thought it might be water related, so watered more. Eventually every plant looked like seaweed and they died. Spuds were alright (I guess) but the growing season ended for them in July – early. I never got a definitive answer but wondered if it was phytophora(sp) rot. It was fast and complete.

If you decide to take a plant to extension, make sure you bag it first.

Good luck. Farming/gardening can be a humbling profession.

[near horse]

@OldKat 19712 wrote:

All thing being equal I’d go with the 24′ used, because $1,500 is $1,500 (and 25% of 6k) & the extra 4′ might come in handy more often than you might think.

The height of the 24′ trailer might concern me a little. I have an old 20′ stock trailer that I built in 1976 and which has been sitting unused for at least 10 years. I think it it is about 6’6″ H and even with my shorter mares (17hh +/- a hair on one, 16.2 +/- on the other) that is a little too short. I have been toying with the idea of cutting the top off and adding a foot, because I can’t justify buying a whole new trailer when I have one sitting there just collecting rust. I think 7’6″ would be more than enough for my size mares, but not sure 7’0″ would cut it for horses as tall as you have.

Are the tops solid on these trailers, or are they pipe with canvass? That might make a difference.

Hey Old Kat,

Thanks. Tops are solid. Nicely built trailers – Corn Pro brand out of Indiana.
The reason I ask about the 24 vs 20 is some friends who haul cattle a lot have both a 20 and 24 (Featherlite aluminums) and they hate the 24 – say it’s just too long to manuever easily. Also, if I’m going to spend the money, why not get the height needed (7’6″). I should say that the used trailer is the one that brought my team out to Idaho from Michigan – so they have been in it many a time already.

[near horse]

@OldKat 19705 wrote:

Hey Geoff. I agree with you; corporate interests do have too much say in our government. Just curious what your take is on union involvement in the political process; specifically the AFL-CIO and the SEIU?

I’d like to see paid/hired lobbyists banned – regardless of who they represent. Wipe the slate clean and start over. It’s like the lobbying cold war – who’s gonna blink first?! They both need to cease and desist. The union(s) did serve a needed purpose but morphed into these monsters with high paid leaderships and political aims. Too bad. They did some goood stuff for the poor working stiffs back in the day. I worked for a non-union shop that paid profit-sharing to keep the union out – when they thought the shareholders weren’t making enough $$$, closed the plant (I was gone by then) and everyone was laid off. Even my neighbor who started with this company (Steelcase) when they were a fledgling compny with a handful of employees – cold. No recourse for anyone. Who is SEIU? That was thrown up on RH and I don’t recognize that acronym.

[near horse]

@Scott G 19630 wrote:

Hey Geoff,

I was contemplating jumping in on that one but didn’t have enough facts/background to back up my statements other than my own personal opinion. The reason I don’t have the background is due to the fact I can’t stand listening to the guy, or most of them for that matter. When pundits start to rant all well reasoned discussion goes out the window.

I think you handled yourself extremely well and did an outstanding job of researching your responses. Frankly, I would have lost patience (and probably composure) way before that…

I believe Joe was patient and was right to shut it down when he did; not long ago he would have shut it down immediately.

What worries me is how extremely polarized this nation is right now. We could really use (IMO) some well reasoned middle ground right now. Not sure of the solution for that one…

I think severely restricting for-profit corporate lobbying would be a great start. A good dose of reality & education for the masses wouldn’t hurt as well…

BTW, I’m unaffiliated (independent) and have completely become disenchanted with both major parties. I vote every major election and the candidate(s) I vote for are the ones IMO, and after a bit of research, that are the best ones for the job, and have the greatest potential to keep their party at bay. If anything, I lean slightly Libertarian with the major exception that my belief for a severely limited government is that the focus and funding should be for social issues and infrastructure. Taking for-profit major corporate influence down about 100 notches wouldn’t be a bad thing either…

I am a firm believer in the process and that everyone should vote. Unfortunately ignorant ranting (often by those who don’t vote) and corporate influence have almost completely hijacked the whole system…

Thanks for your comment, Scott! While I don’t expect everyone to agree with me, I felt like a pretty small voice on RH in that debate.

The corporate power in our gov is out of control and was made even stronger when the supreme court ruled that corporations are afforded the right of “free speech” under the Constitution – they are considered individuals. Wow.

To bring it closer to home, I’m heading down to deliver some petitions to the Idaho Transportation Department regarding permitting giant loads of oil processing equipment to travel a scenic byway along a world-class fishery …. The best part – ITD used federal stimulus money to make upgrades to the highway to accommodate ExxonMobil Canada’s overlegal loads. If you want to see these things, check out http://www.fightinggoliath.org
And you, as a US citizen (US hwy 12), can comment to ITD at their website. http://www.itd.gov (I think) (closes tomorrow). Gotta run!!

[near horse]

@mitchmaine 19572 wrote:

geoff,

i went to a reg. gear 9 cause my old mares walked up so fast. that team with a high gear mower, felt like the mower was going to explode. can’t imagine it behind a tractor where you couldn’t hear or feel how it was going. they made a trail mower that was meant (i think) to be trailed behind a tractor. it had wider wheels. must have had stronger guts too.
when something is designed for a horse and pulled by a tractor, something has to give, i think.

mitch

Exactly my point. Here what mowers you find usually have had the tongue shortened up to pull behind a tractor at some point. I think Lynn Miller mentions that can be a death sentence for most HD mowers if they’re run at those speeds long enough.

I’ll tell on myself here – many years back i salvaged an old McD #6 from a shed and decided I could use it behind my 8N Ford to knock down some grass in Sept or Oct – I was dirt poor and had no other equip and it was really gonna be cool. Mower did fine ’til I got a piece of driveway gravel wedged tight btwn guard and knife. Locked up the wheels but I’m thinking keep going and it’ll just “pop” out (or the wooden pitman will break). Wrong and wrong. The external cast drive gear just shattered in 4 places – ouch. I eventually replaced the gear but dang – stupid is as stupid does.

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