Branch Fell on My Loader

[shooterdon]

About what I paid for my Diesel standby 20 years ago....

I looked at a diesel and decided I could buy a lot of propane for the difference in cost; and with propane there are no fuel issues.

If I used a lot of diesel fuel, having 300 gallons on site would not be as problematic. But I am a hobby tractor user and only go through about 75-100 gallons a year. Added another 500 gal propane tank that costs $55/year to rent and is tied to my other tank; so I have 500-800 gal on hand at all times. I never let the tanks drop under 50%. The generator uses about 1.5 gal/hr. At current cost of $1.79/ga for propane it costs $2.70/hr to run. Diesel is more efficient, but it costs twice as much per gal so it about a wash wrt running costs.

I had planned to cycle the generator to save on propane but have never done it. I think the longest run in the last four years has been 12 hours or so. Not worth the hassle to save $35. If we were going to be down for more than two days, I would run it 6 hours a day; comes to under $20/day. 500 gallons would last almost 2 months.

 

[CliffordK]

None of my equipment ever sits outside, ever and looks to me like the tracks need adjusted...bad.

You cant pull out of the tree mess with that bulldozer?

I just got the CAT a couple of weeks ago, so I'm getting the manual now, and then will go through the adjustments, as well as working on the loader hydraulics. It runs well for a machine that is from the late 60's to mid 70's. It came to me without doors, and a few broken glass panes. I need to decide if I want green or yellow, then I'll get some new panes made. Probably get it running well enough for my next building project, then do some cleanup and pass it on.

Yeah, I thought it was funny. No damage to the ROPS. It should be able back out of the tree just fine, or perhaps pull the branch the rest of the way down.

 

[CliffordK]

If we were going to be down for more than two days, I would run it 6 hours a day; comes to under $20/day. 500 gallons would last almost 2 months.

The local power company has a nice map of power outages.
Estimates how many people are without power.
Unfortunately, they aren't posting an estimate when power will actually be restored.

It was about 7000 people without power. Then down to about 3,000. Then the last night of ice and it jumped up to 25,000 without power. Now back to about 3359 without power. Half or two thirds of the remaining are in my neighborhood where they've done some work, but as far as I can tell haven't restored any power. And most around me have now been without power for a week while they've worked on people who have been out of power for about 3 fewer days.

We've now hit one week without power.

Anyway, for 1 or 2 days, I can survive with just a bit of grumbling.

But, it gets more aggravating the more time it is down.

I've been using my little battery powered chainsaw, but recharging is a pain.

Not knowing when power will be back makes it hard to plan ahead. Roads are now clear which is nice. I found a combination of the brush rake and tractor bucket could clear the fir twigs and ice droppings from the driveway, and the bigger stuff goes into future firewood.

 

[4570Man]

This track is a little bit too tight. I thought it would slack after I moved it and it didn’t. I had to loosen the fitting to let some grease out. It’s supposed to drop 2” in the middle.

 

[grsthegreat]

I just got the CAT a couple of weeks ago, so I'm getting the manual now, and then will go through the adjustments, as well as working on the loader hydraulics. It runs well for a machine that is from the late 60's to mid 70's. It came to me without doors, and a few broken glass panes. I need to decide if I want green or yellow, then I'll get some new panes made. Probably get it running well enough for my next building project, then do some cleanup and pass it on.

Yeah, I thought it was funny. No damage to the ROPS. It should be able back out of the tree just fine, or perhaps pull the branch the rest of the way down.

Which cat….the dozer or the cat in the operators seat.

 

[CliffordK]

Which cat….the dozer or the cat in the operators seat.

Latte showed up on my back porch in September 2019 as a very scared little fluffball. She would "talk to me and answer me", but wouldn't let herself be seen until I offered her some milk, after which it was all over.

Her very good voice and being somewhat opinionated is the only reason that she survived.

First day venturing into the window.

 

[5030]

Contrary to popular opinion. milk is bad for cats as they are all lactose intolerant. Our cats all get non dairy creamer. It's easier on them digestive wise and it's actually no more than milk today.

We have 10 in the house and at least 10 outside and when it's cold like it is now, the outside ones come in a lot. The cats came with the marriage actually. I don't really like them, I tolerate them. Interestingly, the outside ones will go to the door when they need to go, they don't like using the littler boxes. They all have names as well and all of them will answer to their names as well. Needless to say, we don't have any rodent issues here.

 

[5030]

Between 2 dogs and the cats, Chewy and my wife are entwined. That and all of them get regular vet care as well and all the Tom's are fixed as well. Even so, we seem to collect new cats regularly. Must be a sign out by the road that I cannot see that says 'stray cats welcome'...lol

 

[5030]

Besides the fact that I don't care for any of them (they all seem to like me anyway) is, they like to leave paw prints on the hoods of my tractors in the barn and on the hood of my car as well. We have one in the house, her name is Marne and she follows me everywhere and if I take a nap in the recliner, she's on me in a minute. Does a little 'bread making' and then goes to sleep and I will say she keeps me toasty. She appeared one day on the back deck and never left and once in the house, never goes outside. She looks out through the sliding glass doors but that is it. Always uses a litter box and we never had to show her either. Been here for at least 10 years now and she looks just like the one that has adopted you. She don't like other cats either, very solitary except for me.

 

[LouNY]

I have heard that cats are lactose intolerant. I don't know about that, I do know that when I was growing up milking cows in a stanchion barn it was a job to keep cats from getting into the pails at times. Many of the cats would stand up and catch a drink of milk straight from the teat when we were preping the cows and stripping a bit out before putting the milking machine on the cow. Sometimes you'd have a half a dozen milling around and hoping for a fresh drink at the same time. Then we always put a big pan of milk out for them at the end of milking and draining the strainers. They all seemed to do just fine on raw cows milk, and sure did look forward to it. As did all are farm dogs, heck my old dog here at the house likes any leftover milk.

 

[CliffordK]

Contrary to popular opinion. milk is bad for cats as they are all lactose intolerant. Our cats all get non dairy creamer. It's easier on them digestive wise and it's actually no more than milk today.

Yeah. I was scrambling to find something for a kitten when I had no cat food.

I have given a bite of milk to feral captured kittens to make sure the bowels are active and they're using the litter. Then it is all cat food.

 

[5030]

My wife is the cat person and she told me and it just so happens that our retired Vet, I lease hay ground from him and I asked him about it and he said it was true, that most all cats are lactose intolerant. Not all, but most. Hay is the farthest thing from my mind presently. Staying warm and keeping the bird feeders full is an almost full time job presently. It's super cold here which is actually good because it kills of the over wintering pests I have to spray for in the spring so it saves me the cost of chemicals.

We don't have a lot of snow either but you do Lou, you are on the other side of the Great Lakes snow machine.

We might have 4" on the ground, nit enough to even be concerned about. What is concerning is the ice that formed prior to the snow that is coating the roadways and it's so cold here that conventional treatments don't work. Lots of people going in the ditches, including my wife, she slid off the edge of the drive with her Suburban and got stuck and I had to call the local recovery company to winch it out. Was gonna use the tractor but where she slid off, there was no way I could get near enough to her vehicle to use a snatch strap on it so I digressed and paid the local tow company a hundred bucks (from her checking account) to pull it out. Under the snow covering it was all mud.

 

[5030]

I always know when Fed-Ex delivers Chewy because our Aussie knows better than we do. He starts whining then barking and is at the door. He knows when it's 'Chewy Time'... Chewy comes to us in big boxes always, usually 4 or 5 at a crack and my wife says Chewy beats the local prices hands down and she don't have to load the stuff in her car and bring it home and unload it and put it away. We usually have the same Fed-Ex driver and he always puts the boxes on the back deck and when he's done, my wife tips him and our Aussie gets dog treat from him as well.. It's a bi weekly ritual here. Most everyone around here gets Chewy delivered, probably not as much as we do however. I should buy stock in that company, they certainly have a going business. really, the only downside is disposing on the boxes but the burn pile handles that chore quite nicely. I did inquire if they would take the boxes back if I folded them flat but the answer was no.

 

[LouNY]

My wife is the cat person and she told me and it just so happens that our retired Vet, I lease hay ground from him and I asked him about it and he said it was true, that most all cats are lactose intolerant. Not all, but most. Hay is the farthest thing from my mind presently. Staying warm and keeping the bird feeders full is an almost full time job presently. It's super cold here which is actually good because it kills of the over wintering pests I have to spray for in the spring so it saves me the cost of chemicals.

We don't have a lot of snow either but you do Lou, you are on the other side of the Great Lakes snow machine.

We might have 4" on the ground, nit enough to even be concerned about. What is concerning is the ice that formed prior to the snow that is coating the roadways and it's so cold here that conventional treatments don't work. Lots of people going in the ditches, including my wife, she slid off the edge of the drive with her Suburban and got stuck and I had to call the local recovery company to winch it out. Was gonna use the tractor but where she slid off, there was no way I could get near enough to her vehicle to use a snatch strap on it so I digressed and paid the local tow company a hundred bucks (from her checking account) to pull it out. Under the snow covering it was all mud.

I'm a long way east of the lakes almost to Vermont. We seldom get much from the lake effect storms. Our worst storms are the NoEasters that travel up the coast and reach inland quite aways. We only have about 6 inchs on the ground at the present time. We have had a few moderate storms, and lots of rain this winter. I would have used my blower for this last storm but I had so many small branches on the driveway from the last wind and rain storm that I figured she would eat a shear bolt or two. So used the blade. Cold and flurries today, single digits this morning and heading that way now 10F.
Pic as of now;

 

[5030]

We might have 4" at best. The issue is, I forgot to lift the wiper blades on the vehicles (we park them outside in front of the garage and the garage is full, has my 97 Ford pickup on one side and Amy's Kubota Sidekick on the other and 3 deep freezers up front so we cannot get them inside and we had freezing rain to start out with followed by some snow and very cold temps so they are both encased in ice under snow. Supposed to warm up here on Monday to above freezing so I'll get after both of them then. Not like either one of us has to go anywhere because we don't. Retirement is a nice thing and I'm glad we get along well as well. Have 2 welding jobs in the shop I'm fudging on as well. Not life and death and even if they were, I'd still fudge along, it's that time of the year.

 

[camshawn]

Your power company will prioritize the repairs to get the most customers “on” with the resources ( manpower) available. We see that here. An outage of a few thousands will get fixed before a few hundreds. One big storm here a few yrs ago had several single customer outages around us off for over a week while most were only off for a few hours to a few days.

 

[CliffordK]

Your power company will prioritize the repairs to get the most customers “on” with the resources ( manpower) available. We see that here. An outage of a few thousands will get fixed before a few hundreds. One big storm here a few yrs ago had several single customer outages around us off for over a week while most were only off for a few hours to a few days.

Not one or two houses.
A community of about 1000 to 2000 homes that went dark.
Several places where lines went down, but several of the outage areas listed were a couple hundred homes.
The power company didn't start working in the area until about day 4. It is now day 8. Many repairs have been made, but most of the community is still dark