Thekla McDaniels

Ok, can someone please help me out here, what is a cut and carry system!?🤔

A local wood turner might LOVE to have some wood … they could make round things:  bowls cups lamp bases etc

I bought a redwood salad bowl with a crack in it.  The man told me dry wood was stable wood.  I was skeptical of that but bought the bowl. That was 30 years ago. I still have that bowl and that crack has never changed shape.  The man didn’t lie

Sometimes I need to precision bend the bars of galvanized livestock panel.  Or 6 6 10 10 (it’s in rolls, used for reinforcement in concrete slabs ( like garage floors, also can be cut and bent into lovely trellises).

I use a small diameter pipe.  If you have a vice, or some way to stabilize your tool, a metal sleeve might be helpful.  The pipe-sleeve allows you to exert the bending force on a very specific location… as opposed to the bending being spread generally over the whole piece of metal, and I find a lot easier than pliers.

Go to a welder, fabricator, blacksmith type person!  Someone who routinely works with metal.  It sounds like it needs to be heated, which then involves tempering.  

Or buy a new one if you can’t find someone to fix it for you or wants more money than you can afford to spend.  Not so much the permie way I know, but there is the part about being realistic and practical.  You still need a pitch fork, and you wouldn’t spend the rest of your life eating off a half of a broken plate or bowl would you?

And cut off that wild tine and discover what the newly configured tool is good for.

Sorry, those are my best ideas

To slow the drying process, you can use beeswax to coat the ends.  It is the fast loss of water that makes the cracks.

I had an apricot orchard that supplied me with a lot of “wood too pretty to burn”.  I got teased about that!  And wood that had bending shapes which had curving grain..

I made towel racks and coat hooks out of curved apricot wood

If you slice it lengthwise you can get some beautiful wood.  You could make small boxes or a mosaic or any small wooden item.

Small pieces with extraordinary grain could be jewelry.  Slices of ~1 inch sticks could be buttons.

You can just keep the pieces with the most potential for later!

I missed the description, what is a skipper loom

I have a prairie dog town , and I am giving much thought to how to discourage them, or rather encourage them to move on.

Today I discovered they have seriously and literally undermined half a dozen fence posts.

I was on my tractor, so I put dirt down those holes.  If they are using the filled holes, the prairie dogs will just re-dig.

I have plenty to do without refilling every few days.

What do others do?  

I’m considering putting visual barriers up, since prairie dogs’ quality of life includes a sentry at the door, surveying all directions for approaching predators.

I have tried putting pallet boards down their holes but it hasn’t worked.

I don’t even want to eradicate them, there are just too many!  (Imagine the prairie dog’s answer:  “look who’s talking.  It’s a case of the pot calling the kettle black!”

What do others do to seriously discourage them?

I’m not familiar with the hardware you are talking about.  All I can say is hanging it on the wall is not adequate for earthquakes.  Over build!  

In my mind earthquakes are more like “shake and bake”.

Is your art a flat item, like a painting or mirror, or is it more three dimensional?  If it’s really precious to you, you might want to consider it as an engineer would, considering loads and forces in various directions.  

Of course maybe you already have!  Maybe that’s why you are naming specific hardwate.  What ever you decide to try, good luck!

Letting a hen raise the chicks is a thousand times easier than the box and heat lamp etc.

Some things I like about the hen hatching chicks it that the flock stays younger.  And I get old stewing hens, which are great for canned chicken.broth.  As well as young cockerels.

I can cull the chicken individuals that go against the “farm policy”.  That is to say they don’t cooperate with my preferences.

And I can keep my favorites, I can have a whole flock of favorites.

I will admit though, I hate the slaughter process, with a passion!  I have to meditate or say a prayer or center myself, or whatever you want to call it before each one I kill.

I don’t believe the hens whose eggs don’t hatch are depressed or emotionally distressed.  I theorize that a hen just feels like it, and she gets a broody patch, and if the eggs don’t hatch, after a while she doesn’t feel like it any more, and walks away🤷🏻‍♀️.


Definitely, letting hens brood is part of chickens.  

Can rhubarb be dehydrated?

I am repairing my green house.

I have begun weeding for a small scale market farmer.

It isn’t a formal arrangement, but I will probably get imperfect tomatoes and small garlic.

An idea for people who have a growing season shortened on the spring end by  infrequent freeing nights.

Plant in a wagon, and pull the plants into sheltered space when temperatures are going down.