Thursday Open Thread 8-31-2017

"Life is a slow process. You just need to start."
Zephaniah Phiri

Morning, I hope today everyone safe.

Been enjoying Steve Solomon publications on gardening. RandtnTx suggested his book Gardening When it Counts: growing food in hard times as a good reference in comment a few weeks ago.

I have located some additional resources.

Gardening Without Irrigation: or without much, anyway

Organic Gardener's Composting

A recent interview on general gardening and a little on marijuana cultivation.

Understanding of water and its movement

Major drainage systems in the US

A new way to look at water control - Water Harvesting After watching this I am ready to tackle the flooding problem that cropped up 2 years ago during fast snow melts. Also some good ideas for dry land farming.

Several of the concepts used in the water harvesting video can be seen used in a large scale application in Lessons of the Loess Plateau suggested by Eyo a couple of weeks ago.

Farm Report
Been inside whenever possible due to the heavy smoke from Forest fires.

Improvised drinking fountain. When in the field this cow simply puts her mouth over the sprinkler heads for a drink.
soe drinking.jpg

The nights have been cool enough I was able to catch a couple of praying mantis. They take care of the spider mites that show up every summer in the sun room.
soe PM2.jpg

This one almost disappeared in the greenery almost immediately.
soe PM 1.jpg

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Raggedy Ann's picture

Thanks for all the great links. I'm anxious to watch the one on water harvesting, since we only get 11-12 inches a year. We already harvest water, but are interested in as many techniques as possible!

I always love your photos.

Have a beautiful day, everyone! Pleasantry

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"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11

studentofearth's picture

@Raggedy Ann
considered rain water a crop he needed to plant into the ground. Interesting viewpoint and vegetation he grew is impressive.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

lotlizard's picture

Chairman Mao: “Can the people eat their fill?”
Us [ordinary Chinese in 2017]: “There’s so much to eat they’re dieting!”
Chairman Mao: “Are there still capitalists?”
Us: “They’re all doing business overseas now!”
Chairman Mao: “Do we produce more steel than England?”
Us: “Tangshan alone produces more than America.”
Chairman Mao: “Did we beat social imperialism (the USSR)?”
Us: “They dissolved it themselves!”
Chairman Mao: “Did we smash imperialism?”
Us: “We’re the imperialists now!”
Chairman Mao: “And what about my Cultural Revolution?”
Us: “It’s in America now!”

http://www.unz.com/article/selling-democracy-to-china/

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dervish's picture

@lotlizard

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"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."

studentofearth's picture

@lotlizard
effecting government policy.

Have been intrigued watching the lives of individual Chinese improve over the decades while ours are deteriorating.

Coincidentally, in 2005, The Carter Center began transferring America’s democracy know how to China. Today, China’s democracy is bigger, faster, safer and cheaper than ours and runs entirely on Chinese intellectual property. There’s a potentially huge market for an improved version.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

Arrow's picture

All ways wonderful to get the morning 'farm report'.(beans are up and bellies down in light trading)
Good to see you found some nice girls to take care of the mite problem. (Guys tend to get their heads bit off.)

Between your reports from the farm and mine from the beach, I think we pretty much have it covered..
Have a good one all...

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I want a Pony!

studentofearth's picture

@Arrow
sounds good right now. Have a good one. Smile

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

Another great video, thanks. LOL your cow cracks me up, I remember some of the friendly ones when I lived on the fish farm. It was also a 600 547 acre cattle ranch, babies sold for meat after growing one year. The lowing is real, the mom cows cry and cry for a couple of weeks when their toddlers are taken to the auction house, then they forget. I have seen a bull take out a hundred yards of heavy duty barbed wire fence in the blink of an eye, to get to a cow. Poor things.

Our pig used to graze way up on the hill with the cattle, you'd see this short red dot up there keeping company with them. He would come when we called, and then the silly cows would follow. Oops. Funny when you can't get to work on time through the cows. Before cell phones, oh forget it. Nothing happened before cell phones and the Internet, that must have been a dream. Biggrin

Edited: the acreage and added drone footage because it is public land now. woot You can almost see the little cabin I lived in @ 2 minutes, just up from the fresh water pond on the left, going along the dirt road at the end of Estero Lane. Keep going and there are cows on top of the ridge at 3 minutes. I think I can even see where the old mort pit was. Don't ask.
---
As Hurricane Harvey hits Gulf Coast, Central Valley must prepare for the coming storm

The Central Valley Flood Protection Board plan said Californians must spend as much as $21 billion during the next three decades to prepare for floods in the Central Valley. Statewide, the number exceeds $50 billion.

Huh! There are 100 shiny new billionaires in California, how 'bout them chipping in half? Hahaha!

Happy Thursday
good luck

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@eyo to stop eating meat.

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studentofearth's picture

@pro left
the decision to keep the livestock would be simpler.

At the moment it seems right to continue a small reproductive herd with selective culling. That stage of human development between hunter gatherer and crop farmer. Several stages before urban dweller with no hands on interaction with food production.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

thanatokephaloides's picture

@eyo

I have seen a bull take out a hundred yards of heavy duty barbed wire fence in the blink of an eye, to get to a cow. Poor things.

[video:https://youtu.be/RBwi6SjYBac]

Wink

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

studentofearth's picture

@eyo
a bovine is unstoppable. I do my best to keep them ignorant of their strength.

The girl in the picture is now 12 and has not had a calf for 2 years. She babysits the calves and is the first one to come to the night corral for hay when called.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

mhagle's picture

@eyo

Wow . . . that's where you grew up? Beautiful.

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

dervish's picture

A US light colonel was relieved of command of a secret drone base in Tunisia last year over allegations of sexual improprieties, among other things.

Colonel sacked

This sort of thing always leaves me wondering if there isn't more to the story, and how can US commanders be so stupid as to fall into crap like this? Anybody over O3 has a target on their back regarding foreign intelligence... not saying that that was the case here, but Paquette would have been a ripe target, if he wasn't already.

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"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."

studentofearth's picture

@dervish
Remember the strong push back for any changes in the reporting of sexual abuse (men & women) via any channel other than the existing chain of command. I think too many people were feeling as if past actions could effect themselves or those they care about. Changes in enforcement are more likely to happen if there is a cut off date for actions that area prosecutable.

I changed the order of the text and my bolds.
Judge did avoided a conviction of a high ranking officer of sexual abuse. Nothing special here.

Ruling in the case on Friday, the military judge Colonel Mark Milam found Paquette guilty of negligence, but cleared him of charges involving alcohol consumption and abusive sexual contact.

He used information obtained from his leadership position to interact with (persuade) an 18 yo.

... Witnesses described Paquette as a personable commander who made it point of getting to know all his airmen. His leadership style backfired when his relationship with an 18-year-old female Security Forces airman went from mentoring to a close friendship and sexual attraction, according to testimony.

The described leadership style.

“It starts out with a mentorship but it goes way, way, way over the line after that,” Major Rachel Lyons, senior trial counsel for the Air Force, said in court, according to the Stars and Stripes. “After that, he uses personal knowledge of her family to get closer to her … and to try to take the relationship to the next level.”

The sexual abuse charge was from his own written words.

During an investigation by the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (OSI), the letters were discovered and led to the charge of abusive sexual conduct.

It did not take him long to create the situation after taking over command as if this was a pattern of behavior, not a one time situation. His past commanders may have tolerated similar behavior in the past.

Paquette was relieved of his command on August 2, 2016, three months after taking charge of the squadron.

If my recollection is correct, Navy has had more public sexual scandals and Air Force has kept theirs out of public view.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

enhydra lutris's picture

and process and we here are already knee deep in great quantities of work (chores, errands, and all that good stuff.) I hope to get a break to deal with said info shortly. I am very interested in seeing if the water harvester has dabbled with forcing localized condensation and, if so, how.

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

studentofearth's picture

@lotlizard @enhydra lutris
more time than normal for research and thinking.

Some of the rock placement could encourage condensation. It simply phrased differently.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

enhydra lutris's picture

@studentofearth
good ideas, but didn't go near the subject I was thinking of. Basically, on some days it gets below dewpoint and one gets dew. On other days it gets close enough that a few specific objects and/or surfaces will drop low enough to generate precipitation on themselves, even though there is none anywhere else nearby. (Sometimes, for example, a projecting metal object will condense water out of the air and generate drips, while all around is dry.)

People have experimented for ages with techniques to try to enhance this effect, "air wells" as it were. Some I have seen are like rock domes above rock lined pits. My idea involved using steel plates which would be kicked down in temperature by a peltier junction somewhere during the pre-dawn times and which would be mounted above catch-basins of some sort.

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

thanatokephaloides's picture

@studentofearth

..... to include lots of Cannabis when replanting the burn scars!

It holds soil well, and if when the sites burn again, the smoke we breathe might do us some good along with the harm! Wink

Smoke has been keeping me inside more time than normal for research and thinking.

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

studentofearth's picture

@thanatokephaloides
Could use your plan in the western part of the state. Might drift.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

mhagle's picture

Good morning! Once again, thanks for the links to great information and other advice. I have some funky little spiders eating pepper plants in my greenhouse. Don't know if they are the same as your spider mites, but we have praying mantis hanging out around here. Never thought about catching them. The greenhouse is a 5 year experiment that at this time, I am unsure of it's true value. The only things that are really successful are plants that survive the summer (130+ degrees) and then can produce through the fall and winter. Peppers and Malabar spinach survive. Peppers are really happier outside though. I have done tomatoes in the greenhouse, but you only get a few before it gets too hot for them.

A report on new experiments.

  1. The maggot farm is a success. It is a 5 gallon bucket with holes drilled in the bottom and lower sides. You put food scraps and other nasty stuff in it. The flies lay their eggs in it. The maggots fall out the bottom. The chickens eat the maggots. I have not actually witnessed a maggot falling out, but have confirmed that there are maggots in the bucket and the chickens hang out around the bottom of the bucket. One chicken is able to fly up and get in the bucket. Doesn't feed the flock, but a good supplement? When you watch YouTube videos about this, some folks put road kill in their buckets. That was too creepy for me.
  2. Grow shelves. Hopefully a success and I have answered previous failures. So far so good. Currently, nearly all of my seeds have come up and they do not look spindly. I bought a seed starting mixture rather than making my own. There is a metal grate at the bottom of each pan for drainage. And I am going to fertilize the small plants with some Miracle Grow. Ultimately I want to make my own starter soil and fertilizer, but just have to get something going on to gain some traction.
  3. Fodder. Failure. I followed Starry Hilder's video instructions. Very little sprouting. A couple little skinny green guys. I am pretty sure the biggest mistake is that I used oats from the feed store rather than oats from a seed store. These oats are probably hybrid GMOs that will never sprout. Plus, Starry said cool weather is better. I had the buckets in my living room, much to the chagrin of my teenagers ("you are always doing this stinky stuff mom!"). I'll try it again in a couple of months in a shed.

I'd like to comment again on "Lessons of the Loess Plateau" that eyo originally posted. That video is still haunting me. IMO Big Ag is unwittingly desertifying our country. We will ultimately need to turn to these lessons of the Loess Plateau to bring the land back to health.

Hey eyo . . . when I was a kid on the dairy farm, every morning and evening we would stand in the barn door and call the cows. "Come Boss!!!" (in solfege "so mi") They would form an orderly line and walk from the field to the barn. Your cows thought you were calling them, rather than the pig?

Lastly, another link from the randtntx comment in the same vein . . . http://www.motherearthnews.com/Homesteading-and-Livestock/victory-garden... . . . Back to the victory garden mentality that we so desperately need!

Cheers! Smile

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

studentofearth's picture

@mhagle
Experiment with the same techniques as the outdoor micro-climate. It is for my zone 7-9 to winter over certain herbs plants. Started using it last year to grow zone 4-5 greens in the winter. Use ventilation and curtains in the summer to prevent over heating. In the winter it is heated to keep above 40 degrees minimum.

1. Maggot Farm. Decomposition of road kill is too variable. A harmful fungus or bacteria may be present before the maggots are introduced.

2. Grow shelves. So far I have not needed shelves. The direct sun is not to hot for the seedling to start indoors or outdoors. Major local problem outside is slow germination due to cold soils and low night temperatures. Fortunately when necessary the sunroom has enough light for starting plants in the early spring and fall.

3. Fodder. The livestock fodder systems I have reviewed use primarily barley or wheat. The oats at my feed store are all rolled. Interestingly the local grocery store now has wheat and barley grass in the produce department for sale. In the 80's grew I lawn grass for my indoor cat (seeds were not pre-treated with pesticides). Let the outside pots grow weeds and set one occasionally in with the chickens for graze.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

mhagle's picture

@studentofearth

I had a nice one in my Chicago suburb home almost 30 years ago. A wonderful feature of homes in northern climates.

Thanks for bringing up the dangers of road kill in "maggot farms." I forgot to mention the reports I read about disease in the decomposing animal that can even kill your chickens. I wasn't so sure about even trying it until a comment said, "hey . . . we're vegan and we get it to work."

OK . . . so wheat, barley for fodder . . . and I was wondering about wild bird seed mix. And what another great idea to just let weeds grow in a bucket! The chickens would love that too.

Thanks!

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

studentofearth's picture

@mhagle
for germination. Try the mixture, decide which plants worked best and then purchase only most cost effective seed.
This fodder system site has information on nutrition composition of the different grain and legume grasses at the 3 to 6 inch stage of growth. Will need to look at the nutritional pdf for each forage, no summary page.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

mhagle's picture

@studentofearth

Thanks! Very encouraging.

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

riverlover's picture

by multiple septic tanks, 1000s of gallons. I just wanted to do it in garbage cans. But no livestock here.

My TBI surprises me
every day with a new disability. It's all disconcerting to me. Grammarly caught multiple spellos in the previous sentence. I am trying hard to not feel sorry for myself.

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Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.

studentofearth's picture

@riverlover
sadness is not inappropriate. It is hard having to evaluate if one can continue to live the lifestyle they are accustomed or have to make adjustments.

Sorry to send you to dailykos but I don't have time to bring this diary I wrote for Kosabiity over to the site today and the comments are as instructive as the diary. I hope it helps.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

riverlover's picture

@studentofearth If tired I go to bed. No matter the time. Sleep must be good. Now I must search for escaped dog.

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Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.

http://www.pressdemocrat.com/news/7367566-181/wildfire-threatens-burning-man-entrance

RENO, Nev. — The Nevada entry way to Burning Man has been closed due to a wildfire that is roaring through the area.

Officials say the fire was 0 percent contained as of Wednesday night and had burned about 47 square miles (122 square kilometers) of land.

Officials say the Burning Man gathering is a major safety concern, as there is potential for the fire to progress toward the event.
...
The fire started on Tuesday northwest of Pyramid Lake in the mountains west of the highway.

pyramidlake.jpg
Pyramid Lake 1941
---
It's been hot here, getting hotter. Fri, Sat, Sun:

Cloverdale...........109, 109, 105

North Bay braces for prolonged, ‘oppressive’ heat wave, increased fire danger

Say goodbye to August, this is the photo on my Accordian Crone calendar this month. Welcome (to Hell City Limits, Exit 666)
augustgoodbye.jpg
September is an outhouse? oh noes.

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The dude is a sick racist. If any American deserves to be lionized it's Harriet Tubman. What a shriveling little coward Trump is compared to Harriet Tubman.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IA0tDu-6v5A]

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Beware the bullshit factories.

studentofearth's picture

@Timmethy2.0
She truly is an American hero. Trump is unable to effect foreign wars, but can continue to score points for domestic strife.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.