Marianne McCoy

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since Dec 01, 2010
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Recent posts by Marianne McCoy

I'm late to the party but found the topic interesting. 

Friends close to retirement are currently living in a looong single wide that they bought for less than $10K, put it on 14 acres and have been living in it for 6 years while they build a really nice home.  Because of county restrictions, they cannot move into the new home until it's completely finished.  It's a pay as you go project, so will take time.  They are brick masons, have remodeled several homes, knowledgeable about building.

Their plan when they retire is to sell the nice home, buy a couple of big lots in a dinky town around here, build a nice building to house equipment and camper - and put another mobile home on it.  Low taxes, neighbors to watch the place if they go traveling a bit, space to store stuff they want to keep, an area for a nice garden and a few hens. 
They added on to the existing mobile home to have a wood burning furnace and will do the same on the next one.  Their cheap existing home is nice, it works for them and we may do the same. 
BTW, we're in Kansas, lots of wind, cold winters, etc.  Their highest heating bill was $79 using the wood furnace.  They've had a few repairs to do, but nothing major.

13 years ago
I pick off what I see which is just a few and spray with soapy water.  Worked for me last year, but I caught them early. 
13 years ago
Ya, I'm with you on this one.  I hate those things.  Soapy water doesn't do anything for my variety of squash bug other than give them a shower.  I tried several things the past couple years and the bugs won.  Chickens aren't interested in them, either.  Aghhhh.

I was planning on getting Neem this year.  And I better get it fast as I saw one on a potato plant yesterday.  Maybe it was just confused.  Last year they wiped out pumpkins, all squashes and were even on the rhurbarb.  It's war....
13 years ago
I read somewhere about hanging a wet towel in front of an open window for a low tech swamp cooler.

Summer humidity is a problem here.  There have been a couple times that we have run the dehumidifier at night and kept the windows closed.  Despite the low heat that it throws off, the room was definately more comfortable in the morning.
13 years ago
Thank you, thank you!
13 years ago
Interesting....  This is good to know.
13 years ago
That's a different plan for the pop bottle greenhouse than I had seen, thanks for posting the link.

Now I'm hoping Flaja can get the plans on one of those fancy greenhouses and share them...or come to my place and build one!   
13 years ago
Wow, I had to google the palm houses, too.  Aren't they just too impressive!
This thread just brings out the builder in me.  I think you could get some of the shapes that you want with just about any material, but the problem is going to be the roof area.  Most of us know it's pretty hard to grow edibles long term next to a window in the house.  The bulk of the roof is going to have to be a material that lets light through.  When you bring all those wonderful curves into the picture, you have a challenge.  Plastic sheeting would work, but would be temporary.  Harder plastic type sheets might fill the bill, but I don't have any experience as to how much bend they have.  Curved glass would probably be cost prohibitive.

Some kids build a small greenhouse using cut plastic 1 liter bottles threaded on bamboo rods (or something similar), and actually it looked better than it sounds.  Wish I still had the link, sorry.  But that would be something that you could curve and might hold up fairly well.

Could you round the corners of your structure and not have glass there?  Then for roofing, have a more typical, easy to build shape with a fancier facade on the front?
http://www.flyingconcrete.com has some great ideas for moveable forms for barrel vaults, but it's concrete.  Might give you some ideas, though.

I think a lot of the folks on this forum don't have engineering and building skills of this magnitude to offer much advice on how to build that roof, but hopefully someone can help.
13 years ago
Could you just moisten her current food with a little warm water?  If you give it to her right away, she might just lap up the water, then go back in a bit and nibble on the softened chow.

I did a fair amount of research on homemade pet foods, made them for a few months.  The cats, all or a couple, turned their noses up and walked away, no matter which recipe I used.  My ancient cat that has had a couple teeth removed seems to like chicken broth with bits of meat, rice and chopped green beans.  But because it doesn't contain all the vitamins and minerals they need, it's not the perfect long term diet.  I supplimented with kitty vitamins for a time.

I finally opted for the easy way, and just added a bit of water to her dry chow.  Success.
13 years ago