At Home In The Woods

[Obed]

Sawdust or fine chips and compost is just the ticket in the bottom of hole dug to plant blueberries!

I would love to have some blueberries. We had a blueberry bush at our last house along with a pear tree. Pears mixed with blueberries make for an awesome cobbler. My mouth is watering just thinking about it.

Obed

 

[Obed]

Do We Need Our Air Conditioner?
With a high temperature forecasted to be a record 94F, today will be a good test as to how often we will need to turn on the AC in our house. So far, with high outside temps reaching the low 90s, we have not needed the AC. The warmest it has gotten inside our house has been 74F and that's without using AC.

Yesterday we didn't use the AC but this evening we finally turned it on. We're having record heat in the mid-90s for this time of year. It got to 78F inside the house so we turned on the AC this evening.

 

[Obed]

Mice
Mice found their way into our house via two holes we had drilled through the wall to run future Cat 5 and electric to the back porch. I hate mice. They pulled some insulation away from the wall and made a mess. I needed to fill in the holes until I'm ready to use them so I cut a couple sticks, whittled them to size and tapped them into the holes.

I remembered a mouse trap I saw on YouTube and decided to make one. So this evening I built one similar to this one shown on Youtube.

I am going to try my mouse trap without water in the bucket it to see if I can catch the mice alive. The drowning part seems a bit cruel so I'll try to catch them alive first. If I need to drown them, I will put water in the bucket but I'll try a more humane method first.

 

[eepete]

What's that line from the cartoon, "I hates them meeces to pieces"?

I didn't seal the end of the conduit that brought power in from my generator. One day in the basement I smelled "that smell". The picture is what I found. I had to take the switch apart and clean it all. I replaced the fuses in case they got anything in them. What a mess... I still have to take the transfer switch apart, it has one area that got peed on. I ordered the conductive grease for that, so that should happen soon. I'll also check and grease the moving part of the disconnect switch.

Also had a mouse nibble on the seal of a garage door, and so I bent up and glued in some aluminum flashing at the bottom. If that didn't work, I'd bolt the metal to the plastic seal with some small #4 screws.

Part of moving into a new house is letting the mice show you the areas you forgot to seal up all the way...

Pete

 

[CurlyDave]

I don't know for sure, but a mouse might be able to jump out of that bucket if it is dry.

I do know that a rat could jump out...

 

[tommu56]

I don't know for sure, but a mouse might be able to jump out of that bucket if it is dry.

I do know that a rat could jump out...

I set the same trap at my cabin an if its is dry = nothing caught 3" water last weekend had 4-5 in there but it still stunk.

Does any one have any ideas how to prevent the stench ????

tom

 

[Coyote machine]

I don't know for sure, but a mouse might be able to jump out of that bucket if it is dry.

I do know that a rat* could jump out...

Speaking from personal experience, eh?

 

[PAGUY]

I set the same trap at my cabin an if its is dry = nothing caught 3" water last weekend had 4-5 in there but it still stunk.

Does any one have any ideas how to prevent the stench ????

tom

How about a little dishwashing liquid in the water?

 

[CurlyDave]

Speaking from personal experience, eh?

Too old to jump that high any more -- but I used to be able to.

* * * * * * * *

About 1/2" to 1" of oil on top of the water would probably seal in the odor beneath it. Try the least expensive vegetable oil you can find. Has to be a thick enough layer to keep the "victims" from floating to the top. The oil is less dense than water, so they won't float as well in the oil. The trap would work with only oil in it, but it would have to be deep enough to drown the mice.

 

[MoKelly]

Too old to jump that high any more -- but I used to be able to.

Reminds me of the Toby Keith song ... "I ain't as good as I once was, but I am as good once, as I ever was."

MoKelly

 

[BoFuller]

A year ago we tried to get people to look at our logs and nobody was interested. We couldn't give them away. The logs are mostly white and red oak with some maple and poplar. The logs are 20' long with the median diameter = 18".

We havent built a fire since the fireplace guy left. Outside temps are in the low to mid 90s.

Covering the roots of the tree with dirt will kill the tree.

Obed

Boy I'd love to have those logs dumped off at my place. :thumbsup:

 

[Obed]

Boy I'd love to have those logs dumped off at my place. :thumbsup:

Bo,
That's the problem. Years ago my dad told me that once when his garden was producing more than we needed, he offered several of our neighbors free vegetables if they would just come and pick them. He got no takers. However, they all were willing to accept free vegetables that we picked and delivered to them.
Obed

 

[weldingisfun]

Bo,
That's the problem. Years ago my dad told me that once when his garden was producing more than we needed, he offered several of our neighbors free vegetables if they would just come and pick them. He got no takers. However, they all were willing to accept free vegetables that we picked and delivered to them.
Obed

:thumbsup: Got to agree with that. :laughing:

 

[srossman]

Bo,
That's the problem. Years ago my dad told me that once when his garden was producing more than we needed, he offered several of our neighbors free vegetables if they would just come and pick them. He got no takers. However, they all were willing to accept free vegetables that we picked and delivered to them.
Obed

You could always place an add on craigs list for free firewood. Just state you cut and haul.

 

[Obed]

Friday and Saturday after work I installed a drain line for the basement. The grading contractor dug the trench with his excavator. The first step was to put to piping pieces together to make sure I had the right connectors to make all the angles. I got to use my saw-zaw to cut the pipes. The saw-zaw is a toy I was able to talk my wife into letting me buy while we were building the house. It's much easier cutting the PVC pipes with the saw-zaw than with the hacksaw the way I used to do it.

Like normal I had extra rocks. I dumped the rocks near the culvert where I will use them as rip rap after our grading job is finished. I had to backfill much of the trench by hand to keep the rocks away from the pipe. As such, backfilling the trench took a lot longer than I expected. There was a pile of dirt below the end of the pipe at the outlet end. I couldn't get to that pile of dirt with my tractor because of the steepness. So I spent about 45 minutes throwing dirt with my hand shovel up the hill into the trench.

I stubbed out the end of the pipe at the wall of the house. The pipe does not connect to anything yet. I plan to hook the pipe to our slop sink in the basement. I will need to drill a hole through the brick above grade to run the pipe through the wall higher than the height of our basement concrete slab. If I had it to do over, I would have put a French drain at the outlet end of the pipe to keep the water from running directly onto the ground. That would be a little more environmentally friendly. However, I didn't think about it until someone I talked to on Sunday mentioned using a French drain.

 

[dstig1]

If you have a 10 or 12" chop saw, put a cheap steel blade on it (moderately fine tooth is better). Far better cuts on PVC. Clean and square, and all you need to clean up is the fuzz left by the saw cut.

 

[Tororider]

If you have a 10 or 12" chop saw, put a cheap steel blade on it (moderately fine tooth is better). Far better cuts on PVC. Clean and square, and all you need to clean up is the fuzz left by the saw cut.

And that comes off really easy with a three sided file. Just run it around the inside once and outside once and you are clean and good to go. I was thinking the chop saw would be easier too, but agree a sawzall is better than a hand held hacksaw.

 

[BoFuller]

Bo,
That's the problem. Years ago my dad told me that once when his garden was producing more than we needed, he offered several of our neighbors free vegetables if they would just come and pick them. He got no takers. However, they all were willing to accept free vegetables that we picked and delivered to them.
Obed

Well if it was within 100 miles I'd come and get them, but since it is probably over 1500 miles it's obviously not cost effective.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

If you have a 10 or 12" chop saw, put a cheap steel blade on it (moderately fine tooth is better). Far better cuts on PVC. Clean and square, and all you need to clean up is the fuzz left by the saw cut.

I use regular wood blade on my compound miter saw to cut pvc, makes nice clean cuts.

 

[CurlyDave]

I use regular wood blade on my compound miter saw to cut pvc, makes nice clean cuts.

Total agreement. I cut all plastic pipe on a 10" or 12" miter saw. Beautiful cuts. Then I de-burr the inside of the cut with one of the special de-burr tools that looks like a swiveling knife, and sand the outside with ~ 120 grit sandpaper.