The Old Folks Home

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I don't understand why the windmill was taken away? What did I miss?...
His neighbor didn't like to look at it on his way to his house. It was out in the middle of the woods. He suggested that his neighbor look to the left as he drove by. They still removed it though.

I know people who make homemade septic tanks and field lines...a shovel, 55 gallon drums, a cutting torch, pvc pipes, rocks, and sand.
Are you talking about my dad again?

The old homestead, about a mile from where I live now, had an outhouse, a bathtub in the unheated summer kitchen and water came from the hand dug well. When MSD laid sewers in the 1960s in our part of the county, my uncle was too tight to pay the connection fee (something like $500) and they passed him by. When my mom died in 1976, my dad decided he would sell his house and move back in with his brother on the farm. He couldn't get used to the idea of using the outhouse or bathing in the summer kitchen, He also didn't think he or his brother would live long enough to benefit from the $10,000 it would now take to tie into the sewer. So he, in stealth mode, built one exactly as you described.

No, I am talking about very strict population growth restrictions in the US. In other words, the wide scale adoption of anti-natalist policies and drastic restrictions on immigration. Immigrants have historically, and continue today, to have a significantly higher birth rate than native born in the US.
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I'm with you that overpopulation is a problem but immigrants having a significantly higher birth rate is no longer true.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the US birth rate has been plunging. Immigrant women are mostly responsible for that plunge.
For all women of childbearing age in this country, the birth rate overall has declined 7% since 2007. Immigrants contributed to most of the decline since the birth rate to foreign born women declined 13% in that time.
Both foreign born and U.S. born Hispanic women had a bigger decline in birth rate than any other group. More so than white, black or Asian households.
You might also be interested to find that among women from Mexico, from where the largest number of U.S. immigrants come, the birth rate fell by 23%. That's the immigrant group with the largest decline in birth rate. The birth rate for US born women only dropped 4% in the same period.

Just saying.

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Back in 2006 when we were looking for a bigger house, we were shown a house on some nice property but it had a lagoon. ChickenCanoe, you know what that is right?
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I remember another kind of lagoon in Missouri. Anyone remember the big dioxin stories here in Missouri? There were 29 superfund sites here because of dioxin contamination. The entire town of Times Beach was evacuated and all the soil incinerated. It took 25 years to clean up. It was a big mystery for a while how such a high concentration appeared all over town. There was also a boarding stable and riding arena that was condemned.
It resulted from meeting of two less than reputable firms. Russell Bliss had a waste oil company and people would hire him to spray oil to settle dust. He really didn't care what was in the oil.
NEPACCO, a Verona, Missouri company, made a product called Hexachlorophene and another called Agent Orange. We all know what Agent Orange was used for. Hexachlorophene was an ingredient in talcum powder and other products for its antibacterial and fungicide properties. Several babies died in France when some baby powder accidentally contained 6% Hexachlorophene. It was then removed from the market and along with the end of the Vietnam War, the company went belly up.
They asked around to other chemical companies if they knew anyone that would remove toxic waste, no questions asked. They all came up with the same name.
Russell Bliss was hired to empty the lagoon, the contents of which contained dioxin levels 2000 times higher than Agent Orange. He would mix the dioxin with waste oil and spray it at stables and on roads. Some of the oil sprayed in Times Beach was transformer oil which contains dangerous levels of PCBs.
After he sprayed a stable and riding arena, 62 horses died. One of the stable hands said he watched a swarm of gnats fly into the riding arena and as the swarm entered the building they immediately fell to the ground dead. The owner lost her business and suspected Bliss. She started following his trucks around and her detective work was responsible for making the connection. The truck drivers even joked, "there she is again, wearing a wig and driving a different car." She once followed them when they took a load and dumped it right into the Mississippi river.
He was never convicted for the Dioxin but did do a year in jail for tax fraud.

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You can save the seeds and just pay the owner of the patent the patent fee.
The farmer that has a whole field of GMO plants that he claims is from cross pollination would have better odds of winning the lotto then having a whole field of GMO. But the real give away is when the farmer uses Roundup to control the weeds, and plants his crop with the spacing called for with GMO plants. That is a farmer that is defrauding the patent owner.
Who wants to pay a patent fee for saving seed to plant the next year? 53% of the world's commercial seed market is controlled by just three firms – Monsanto, DuPont and Syngenta.
Monsanto Canada Inc. v. Schmeiser [2004] 1 S.C.R. 902, 2004 SCC 34 is a leading Supreme Court of Canada case on patent rights for biotechnology,

Monsanto had brought numerous lawsuits against farmers and found some 142 patent infringement suits against 410 farmers and 56 small businesses in more than 27 states. In total the firm has won more than $23m from its targets.

In one case, a 75-year-old farmer bought soybeans from a grain elevator near his farm in Indiana and used them to plant a late-season second crop. He then used some of the resulting seeds to replant such crops in subsequent years. Because he bought them from a third party which put no restrictions on their use, Bowman has argued he is legally able to plant and replant them and that Monsanto's patent on the seeds' genes does not apply.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/polit...29f05a-717c-11e2-ac36-3d8d9dcaa2e2_story.html
The Supreme Court case.
http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/11-796_c07d.pdf
Monsanto won.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/20...Court-Sides-With-Monsanto-In-Seed-Patent-Case

So much for seed saving if you're downwind of anyone growing a patented crop that you may also grow.
Traditional/heirloom seed found with GM components.
http://gefreebc.wordpress.com/2010/02/21/traditional-seed-supply-found-to-have-gm-dna/


History tells us that the earth has cooled and warmed but even if part of it is because of us humans raping this land then we need to take responsibility.

The initiatives have given us better fuel efficiency in combuste engines, planes and even light bulbs.

I am all for using renewable resources and those that are not renewable at a more efficient rate.

At the height of high tide at Christmas the water laps my fence. There is just a three inch grade to the bottom of my steps 100 ft inland.
Can you say, Kiribati?
Or the Maldives for that matter.
Many of the Bahamas are barely out of the water.

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You forgot the list of those who think humans do contribute to global warming.
Which is the overwhelming majority of climate scientists.

It does remind me of tobacco research in the 1960s
It defies logic that filling your lungs with smoke several times a day isn't a bad thing.

Some of you need to take a trip to the third world and see what poor code enforcement and zoning can do to a city
Scary stuff. Even in a relatively advanced society like Costa Rica, taking a shower is a death wish. They don't have water heaters but have an electrical gadget on the shower head that heats with water flow. They work similar to an instant on hot water system but with major flaws. Somewhere I have a picture of one of those gadgets at a hotel with the bare wires hanging out the side powered by an extension cord. One of the biologists at our parrot breeding facility was a very tall Kiwi. He got shocked almost every time he took a shower unless he stooped the whole time.
I borrowed some power tools and extension cords from a contractor friend there for a project. I had to repair all the wiring before I felt safe to use them. When I returned them I told him I removed the dangerous boxes and replaced them with what would meet code in the U.S.. He just shrugged. I guess because he hadn't been electrocuted yet.

I worked as a programmer in high technology. Even in that supposedly knowledgeable contingent we had some incredibly dangerous things done with electricity.
Probably depends on the company. Most bigger companies have strict programs for safety.

Nope not Rachel Maddow
http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/...florida-court-challengesoffthegridliving.html
http://www.nbc-2.com/story/24790572/cape-woman-living-of-the-grid-challenged-by-city
And other news sources like " off the grid news", and "American freedom fighter"
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I like AlJazeera. I wish my cable company carried it. I try to get most of my TV news from BBC.

As I said, I missed all the lead up chatter. That's why I asked what the sources were.

As it has become clearer - and correct me if I am wrong - the sensationalism was that there were people fined, arrested or forced to abandon an ill planned project in self subsistence because they failed to meet the laws of the land.

If that's the case, they deserve what they got. Being ignorant or defiant is not an excuse.

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Sensationalism sells.
Rush makes pretty good money.
Good news doesn't make headlines.

Whoops that's what I get for trying to do it from memory. I should know better after my chemotherapy stirred my head with a stick. It was Hearst not Morgan that clear cut the Baha. And it has been over twenty years and pre-chemotherapy since I read up on it. So I apologize for a late night blurt that really didn't contribute anything but confusion.
It was still a good point in spite of fuzzy details. It's the 'who's ox is being gored' syndrome, or who can benefit financially from policy change. It's an old story and no improvement in sight with money in politics.

Funny stuff? You want funny stuff? Have I got a blog for you! Insert Evil Laugh
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How much time do you have? First though- it is written for dog people. But there are many similarities between the poultry world and the dog world. Next- yes there is some foul language.

This one is marginally related to poultry. http://thedogsnobs.com/2013/05/21/the-vegetarian-raw-feeder-conundrum/

Even less related but it goes with the first one even though written at different times.
http://thedogsnobs.com/2014/09/23/dont-feed-your-dog-a-vegetarian-diet-you-****-hippie/
I loved the part about bagging organ meats keeping Jehovah's witnesses at bay.

Don't they fall off that skinny ramp?
Mine seem to fight to see who gets in first. It's about 4 xs the size of yours.
They always figure it out.

I like the doors that overlap the walls at the edges of the openings. It makes them more predator proof.

How about lets just drop that subject and move along. If anyone has a problem with another persons opinion pm them. Leave us out of it please.
I admit I'm opinionated and get soapboxy at times. But does it seem like some people come to pick a fight?

I actually do have a problem, and I would like some suggestions on ways to solve it. I have moles tunneling under my coop. I don't know what they are finding there, but they are undermining the dirt floor and making it difficult to clean and causing my carefully leveled dirt floor to have pits. My coop is covered, has a dirt floor, and I clean it by raking and shoveling what is picked up (no litter as they only stay in there at night and free range all day.) I assume the moles are finding something - worms, grubs, etc. - to eat, but why are there more of those things under the coop than in the grassy or wooded areas just a few feet away? Last year, I added salt to the soil in an effort to break the reproductive cycle of the cecal worm. I then realized that I would be unable to compost the droppings and opted not to do that again. I added a layer of fresh sand in the coop and leveled it again. Then, the mole issue. It is so bad that when walking in the coop, sometimes my foot will sink into the floor to a depth of about four inches! This was a hard packed floor just last year. I don't want to poison them. Any experience or thoughts would be appreciated.
Moles tunnels can be quite deep so I don't think a physical barrier will help.
They're there for food but also because it may be easier digging too.
My best suggestion is Mole-Go, It's 100% castor oil so shouldn't be a problem for chickens or compost.
http://www.fertilome.com/product.aspx?pid=15e48180-5aaa-4865-bb23-f73ce9ba7f6a






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Good terror speech by Obama at the UN this morning.
 
The hubris is getting a little deep, n'est-ce pas?

Much more of this and the Block button will be enacted, which would be a shame because civilized discourse is a basic element of learning and sharing.
The button works like a champ.

You have to kill them.

They are building homes. There will be multiple openings. What we did growing up was to find one tunnel, stick a hose down it and then shoot them with a 12 guage when the came out one of the other holes.

another option is to use a mole poison if they still make them.
For killing them, the best technique that works for me is to go out in the evening and stomp down all the tunnels. Then at dawn, stand out there with a cup of coffee and a pitchfork. As the moles raise the tunnels again you can either stab straight down or use a shovel and scoop them out and smash them.

Does Gopher Gas work on moles? That was always such fun to deploy. Kind of like playing GI Joe as you crawl up to the hole with your little stick of lethal gas... Plus you got to see which holes were connected by escaping vapors.
I've used it for moles and it seemed to work somewhat.

I have a Jack Russell terrier who fancies herself a Rat Hunter. She can be set on the mole hills and will dig craters, but she rarely catches any.

She loves to catch them, though, literally. When she does manage to catch one, she "fleas" it.
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You know what I mean? She gently nibbles it's fur with just her front teeth. She's such a Diva (no offense Nancy.) Maybe if I run them out with a hose like Ron suggested, she will gather them up for me and I can drop them in a bucket or something.

Sorry, Ron, I think the shotgun is overkill....
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Moles are faster than you think.

Wisher: u can buy mole killers at ace hardware. They are spikey things that are placed on the tunnel. When a mole uses the tunnel the spring loaded spikes go POW and kill the mole quickly. They work really well.
I talked to Holpers (a pest removal company) at a garden show once and asked what they use. They told me they use those. I said, "I have one and it hasn't worked" They said, "Oh you can't use one, you have to use at least 10."
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That's pricey, especially if they don't work.

Peep: ur coop is looking nice. I bet the poop would wash right off of that vinyl
I replaced my floor covering in one coop with a thin sheet of HDPE. You can plastic weld it. I covered the nests with it too.




This was the original waterproof cover but it wasn't tough.


And the chickens' scratching destroyed it.



Before the change


After cleaning and installing the plastic.


Eventually, I'll be covering all the coop floors and nest boxes with it. It's really easy to clean.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/High-Densit...830?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item20d6d194de

It comes in other colors.
http://stores.ebay.com/Online-Metal...105129012&_sid=20606632&_trksid=p4634.c0.m322
 
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Hennible I did love that cartoon. My son used to watch that show. Need more please, take back topics I can understand, or recipes , or funny stuff

Here here!!! I don't know if I mentioned it but my order of Silvery Grey Dorking eggs were cancelled due to a limb falling on the run. No damage but scared the girls so bad everybody immediately went into a molt. I get a refund.
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Bama, thanks. It will be interesting to see how it fares through winter. I think I'm going to go pick up some corrugated plastic in the weekend and cover the run. It won't be pretty, but I need to keep the snow out somehow.
 

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