John Wolfram

Trace Oswald wrote:

John Wolfram wrote:Those redbud trees cost all of thirty cents each.

Do you have a source available?  I would love to put in a lot of Eastern Redbuds.  They are pretty great trees for pollinators, and for feeding birds, as well as just being beautiful trees.

Here's the link to the Indiana state nursery order form. http://forms.in.gov/Download.aspx?id=5318 $32.50 for a pack of 100 redbuds.

Since not a fan of planting trees that A) don't grow large enough to provide shade for a house and B) don't produce fruit/nuts,  I'd probably just give it away and stick with the original plan.

Large bare root redbuds are cheap and plentiful. A few years ago when I was putting in a bare root order at the Indiana state nursery a neighbor of mine added a packet of redbuds to the order. Compared to the pawpaws and persimmons I was getting those redbuds were massive, on the order of 5 feet or more from the top of the tree to the bottom of the roots, and trunk with 1/3 inch diameter.  Those redbud trees cost all of thirty cents each.

Trace Oswald wrote:Are new elements hard to believe?

While I don't doubt that new elements will be created, Tennessine (atomic number 117) was created less than a decade ago, useful new elements is another story. Seaborgium (atomic number 106) has been around for over 40 years, and it still does not have a useful application (outside the study of Seaborgium).

Given enough time, I think your plan of taking cuttings, rooting them, and then grafting would work. However, it would take a long time to get an orchard full of apples.  By spending $100 on root stock, you could probably cut two years off the timeline since. Spending another $200 to get already grafted mail order trees could shave another two years off the timeline. I'm a cheap SOP, but since I figured I'd easily get more than $75 a year worth of fruit out of my trees the choice was easy (not even factoring the amount of work I saved by not having to protect the young trees for an extra four years).

Su Ba wrote:The past 15 years we have have lived with vog....volcanic acidic air, and acid rain. And for 3 months lived in the volcanic output of an active eruption, basicallyl super vog. Everything metal on our farm suffered, including the roof. Now that the volcano has shutdown and appears to be in a pause we plan to take the opportunity to replace the roof. What will we replace it with? The exact same system.

Why not the hidden seam roofing mentioned here? For one thing, it costs a lot more. That's an important issue. And we haven't seen a problem with the screwed down method. No, it doesn't leak at the screw heads. No, we haven't had to tighten down the screws every five years. No, we haven't had to apply roof tar to the screw heads. And we can install it ourselves, a major plus. We will save thousands of dollars using this roof type and doing it ourselves. Frankly, we don't have thousands of dollars to just give away to others.

This is a great example of putting in the right system for the environment. Here in the Midwest, I would expect metal roofs to last much longer than 15 years, so I would expect exposed fasteners breaking down to the main point of failure for the roof. However, if the metal was going to be worn away in 15 years, then I probably wouldn't spend the extra money on hidden fasteners.

Also, I wonder if the consistent temperatures in Hawaii help to maintain the integrity of the plastic fasteners. Having a ~130 F  operating temperature range can't be good for plastics here in Indiana.

Don't waste your money on that. Spend another ~$3 and have your soil analyzed by pros.
https://ag.umass.edu/soil-plant-nutrient-testing-laboratory/fact-sheets/sampling-instructions-for-routine-soil-analysis

I wouldn't worry much about this year. The trees had a major shock so it's probably best that they aren't spending energy fruiting this year.

Travis Johnson wrote:I could be wrong, but I think the best thing to do here is incorporate into an LLC which might eliminate the need for insurance. Anyone who sued (which is not likely) would thus not be able to get your home and property, which is what could happen if you weren't.

An LLC can help, but only if the strict formalities of running a business are followed. My guess is that a good number of single member LLCs formed via LegalZoom do not have annual meetings or keep records of those annual meetings. When I sold fruit at a farmers market, the annual insurance was about $250. That may sound like a lot, but keep in mind that LLCs also have fees. For example, in California there is an $800 annual fee to have an LLC.

Jarret Hynd wrote:My science/math teacher had told us that once in awhile some investment groups would buy every combination of tickets when the lottery prize had accumulated after not being won for several weeks. I'd say that's the only way to stack the deck in your favour when it comes to the lotto, and it's not really achievable with individuals.  

I would also add that drawings where an investment group can actually do this are few and far between. It did happen at least once back in the 90s:
https://www.nytimes.com/1992/02/25/us/group-invests-5-million-to-hedge-bets-in-lottery.html

The main problem is that the jackpot has to be significantly more than the odds of winning in order to make a return. For example, if the odds of winning were one in a million, the jackpot would probably need to be $4+ million in order to be worthwhile since A) taxes have to be paid on the winnings, B) there is usually a penalty if you want the jackpot all at once rather than over 20 years, and C) there is a significant risk associated with having to split the jackpot with another entity.

This coming Sunday, March 25th is the annual Indiana Fruit and Nut Grower's Scionwood swap in Indianapolis. In the few times that I have gone, there tends to be an abundance of Persimmon and Pawpaw scion wood, and the speakers are usually pretty interesting too.

Indiana Farm Bureau
225 S. East St., Indianapolis, Indiana 46202

The doors will open early for us at 9:00 am
Pitch-in Lunch will be at 12:30
Speaker at 1:30
Business meeting 2:30 - 2:45
Auction 2:45 - 3:30