P. Pitcher

So firstly, I feel pretty strongly that soaking the beans is necessary! It definitely helps with the flatulence, and makes them easier to digest. And agree with everyone who cautions not to season or salt them until tender, it changes the osmotic situation and your beans take longer to get cooked.

As for recipes, I humbly present the best bean cookbook I own - straight from the bean queen! It's not hard to find online, but in addition to soups and casseroles it has plenty of finger foods, dessert options, and even bean based beverages. (Please someone make the doughnuts and tell me how they are, I dare not attempt a deep fry at our altitude.) and of course there's a jello dish or 3, it is of the era.

The book isn't hard to find, I believe ebooks are even offered nowadays!

Harrisburg looms are nice! And they do have some free resources in addition to the paid classes.

I would look around your area for a weaver's guild or other fiber group. I'm the president of our local guild (despite being heavier on other fiber arts) and many of our members are delighted to come help a newby set up and get started. You mentioned you have books? Many a person has learned from books alone before the internet, and I still find them a valuable resource as they aren't trying to sell you anything (as you presumably already paid for the book).

Also look at Ravelry.com - it's a fiber arts forum, and the folks there are very helpful with questions (not to mention many useful searchable threads)

Suzette Thib wrote:
We are hoping to get one of these. Maybe not a hose solution but can it be connected to a hose?

We actually have one of these that we use to move water from barrels on the far side of the house to barrels on the garden side. Works, but it is slow as molasses... (I put that on the honey-do list)

Rad Anthony wrote:You don't have enough head to push out enough pressure when the tanks get half full. You will need to put in a fairly size bladder pressure tank. The air bladder will give you enough of a push. Even with the head you're still pushing water out about 150 yards. Gravity can only do so much.

You could also plumb in an air release valve(aav) on the highest point near the tank. Will need to know more about the system, either you're getting air in somewhere or not completely bleeding the air before you open the valve to water, or the lack of pressure is causing air to back feed. Hard to tell unless I know more about the system and what all components you have.

If you don't want to put a pressure tank you can try smaller orifice to when watering plants. 20 feet of head is roughly 8-9 psi, with a garden hose you're not going to get much flow.

I work in a water plant, we have a tank on top the mountain, with a 10" line, 150 feet of head down the mountain, comes out at about 150 psi,we reduce the pressure down to 65psi so no plumbing gets blown out. Lol. Just to give you an idea. even though your water traveling horizontal it still will slow down due to friction and losses.

If possible run your line above the hoop house, a long the grade of where your barrel are laying...then have it drop down after that 150 to run up, if that makes sense. You will probably need more hose though.

Oh! This is excellent info. There is some "extra" hose length, sounds like I should switch one of the hoses to a shorter one to take up the excess? From the sounds that I hear in the hose I suspect the air is back feeding uphill. So as a smaller orifice, you mean the hose end tool?

The hose is standard garden hose, and I think the two hoses together are 150yd or so? The bottom of the barrel is above the TOP of the hoops of the hoop house, so I'll estimate at least 20 ft. of head. Possibly more.

Hey there!

I have a catchment system with some big blue barrels around the house. I've double up each barrel with a buddy and a short hose, and everything is slightly raised. My hoop house is a few hundred yards away, and quite a bit below. When the barrels are full I get good pressure, but I have to wait a LONG time for air bubbles to clear and water to flow continuously.

But when the barrels are less than full, even at 50%, the wait is interminable, and sometimes the water just dribbles and never sprays. There should be more than enough head, the tops of the barrels has an opening for air flow, the hose is pretty direct without loops and kinks.

Any ideas on how to make good use of every drop from the rain barrels?

Hi there! I live outside of Rosita, on the other side of the Sangres from you.

In general all rainwater collection is legal in Colorado. There are limits on how large a storage container one is supposed to have, and permits are needed above that. Of course, no one has ever noticed that I have a system, and I'm not sure they would know who to call if it were too large...

I'm wondering if anyone here has a good source for how to spot a potential infection in your flock? My quick search across the net shows lots of "bird acting unusual" which is awfully vague and unhelpful. We tend to keep some older birds around at bit past their prime as I'm often too busy to harvest them, and right now there's a sad sack bird in our flock that is on culling priority, but she seems to be garden variety bottom the pecking order unhealthy, not any sickness.

Timothy Norton wrote:I have taken to incorporating my tomatillos into my tomato sauce processing. I tend to keep an almost 80% tomato to 20% tomatillo ratio and I find the end result to be just as good as straight tomato. You probably could increase the amount of tomatillos by quite a bit before you might face some tartness but I haven't experimented that much.

My next batch might involve roasting the tomatillos before I put them through the food processor. Give it a bit more flair.

THis this THIS!

40 years ago my mother planted two (2) tomatillo plants in the garden. We have never again actively cultivated them, but they still run wild around the edges of the beds, and some have followed me into the mountains, presumable in soil that came with another plant. As a teen I was hard to sell on Salsa Verde, but was desperate to have a cabinet full of canned tomatoes, so I would usually make a mix of about 50% tomatoes and tomatillos. Once they are nicely ripe and bursting from their husks they are agreeably sweet and don't seem to diminish the tomato sauce in any way except that the color shifts from a rich red towards a yellowy orange.

I live at 9,000 ft. in the Rockies, I keep a shade cloth on the greenhouse starting in about July and usually don't bother to take it down until the end of the season (I have it just over the apex of the hoops, so once autumn hits the sun comes in under the side). I feel that it doesn't change the temp in the greenhouse all that much, but we get lots of sun scald up here and it gives the plants a little respite from that.