J Hillman

Maieshe Ljin wrote:Some simple tongs I made. Except that they seem to bend out of shape easily if I try to pick up anything too large. Maybe there are ways of changing this? Hardening the metal more?

I like the tongs.

Instead of a simple bend at the back to of the tongs you should try making several full circles to make more of a spring.  That way they should deform less when picking up larger items.

If you care about the barn at all you should reconsider not using a heat lamp.  Around here whenever a barn burns down it is usually caused by a heat lamp.

What is the coldest temperature your area sees in an average winter?

Zeolite can also be use to build a solar powered air conditioning or refrigeration.

Take a closed system with two separate compartments connected at the top, one compartment is filled with water, the other is filled with dry zeolite.

The zeolite will absorb any humidity in the system, that causes the water to begin to evaporate and cool.  That causes humidity and the cycle continues.

Once all the water has evaporated the compartment with zeolite is heated by the sun to drive off the moisture.  And the other compartment is cooled and the moisture driven off the zeolite condensed in the tank back into a liquid so it can start cooling again.

It could also be used in a open system where the water from the heated zeolite is vented into the air and new water is poured into the water compartment.

Some of those slow growing or no mow mixes just grow and fall over, If you want to keep them short year after year you still need to mow them on occasion.  The problem is it takes one heck of a strong mower to do it because there is so much material laid down that just twist up and  tangle in the blades.

There is a apple orchard near by that the owners tried only mowing just before harvest to save time,equipment maintenance, and fuel.  They ended up with lots of  what they assumed was mice and rabbit damage to the base of the trees.  I would imagine all sorts of insect pests would also like to live in that tall grass.

I do think no mow grasses can be useful.  But you have to plant it in the right area.  As an example I wouldn't want no mow right up to my house.  That attracts mice and bugs like misquotes and fleas.  But I wouldn't mind mowing 20 feet around my house then having a no mow mix for the rest of the yard.

I would suggest cutting them back to level with the ground.  Then mow and weed wack around the house weekly during the growing season.  If they aren't allowed to ever grow the roots will die.  If the stumps are two inches in diameter that suggest the previous owner let them grow uncut for alt least a full summer and probably 2 or 3 years.

Josh Warfield wrote:

Anne Miller wrote:

. I'm not even vegetarian, but I do feel a little weird about slaughtering calves (or lambs or kids). Especially if I went to a lot of trouble to bring those calves into existence.

Seems strange to even consider this when it is so easy to sell the calves.

Right, I could sell them, but if the person I'm selling to is taking them straight to the slaughterhouse, then it's the same thing to me. I'm not just saying I'm squeamish about killing and processing an animal; I grew up hunting so I crossed that bridge a long time ago. What I am uneasy about is this process of knowingly producing more babies than is feasible to raise to adulthood, and then more or less immediately killing some percentage of them (or having someone else do that for me, all the same). That just seems like a bridge too far, somehow. And what I'm wondering is if that's truly necessary, or if it's only necessary from the perspective of turning a profit, which is not my goal.

If I sell them to someone who does intend to actually raise them, I can't help but think that I'm just postponing the issue. A couple years down the line those people are going to have calves they need to sell, and maybe they sell to a third person who will also care for them well. But if every year more babies are born than adults die, eventually all the like-minded people in the area would have as many animals as they can handle, and then we're collectively in the same position that I individually started out in.

I guess I was hoping to hear that it's hypothetically possible to only make babies at replacement rate, and still get some amount of milk beyond what the calves drink. I don't think anyone so far has said that's actually impossible, but it sounds like almost nobody is even trying to do it, primarily because of the money side of things. Is that an accurate summary?

In my experience, anyone buying calfs plans to raise them for at least a year, and possibly several years before butchering them.

Your idea of all like minded people having more animals than they need isn't that big of an issue.  If the calf is to old for veal, anyone who buys it plans to raise it to gain weight until it is full size to butcher.

I haven't read all the responses so someone may have already suggested this.

Raise the calfs as steers or heifers until they are ready to butcher or ready to be bred.  You can treat them well while you have them then have them slaughtered on the farm.  That way a bull calf only has two bad days: when he is castrated and his last.  Most animals dont have it that well.

You also have to have a plan for what you will do with your milk cows once they stop producing.  You can butcher her or sell her at a sales barn to be transported to a feedlot and then butchered.  Butchering her yourself is probably the best outcome for her.

Unless you are very wealthy and plan to feed every animal until they die of old age, having dairy and eggs mean someone has to kill animals.

Instead of lye I have used hydrated lime(calcium hydroxide) to get hair to slip on a hide.  It is sold as type s  next to cement in hardware stores.  A 50 bag costs about $14.

It has lots of other uses around a homestead as well.

Do you plan to run your system in the winter?

If so:
Do you plan to bury the pipe deep enough to not freeze?
Does the bottom of the creek stay open all winter?  It is common here for small streams to freeze solid to the bottom, then water to flow over the ice.  sometimes that will happen several times causing the creek to be flowing on top of ice several feet above the creek bed and sometimes even elevated above the surrounding ground level.

Will you have a way to prevent debris washing into the pipe or blocking it?  If so the method has to work winter and summer.  It is much harder to keep it serviceable in winter.

Even if your pipe is buried below the frost line it eventually  has to come out of the ground at the end.  How will you keep that from freezing up?

Small hydro is great in the summer, but it can be very difficult to keep it working in deep winter.

You may want to look into saddle ac units.

Some are just window units in a new form.  But some are minisplits that also offer heating built into the saddle shape.