Texas Spring/Summer Thread

[Bird]

Brandi, we found the perfect window cleaning pad. It comes with a pivoting head on a pole and the pad really does clean 20 windows in less than an hour with no streaking - simply an incredible product.

Clean outdoor windows in half the time - Windex

Don, I hadn't seen that product. I do the outside of our windows while my wife does the inside and we use Invisible Glass glass cleaner and blue shop towels. Walmart has the Invisible Glass in the automotive section instead of the household products section. Of course I use the same thing on the car windows, and I prefer the aerosol version.

 

[txdon]

Bird Invisible glass is excellent but time consuming. This is FAST, if one is on the hose and the other on the swivel pole - 15 sec a window. The taking off and on the screens takes longer. It has some kind of sheathing action that leaves no spots on the rinse. The pole reaches high enough, or over bushes, that you don't have to move a ladder or step stool around.

 

[Bird]

Bird Invisible glass is excellent but time consuming. This is FAST, if one is on the hose and the other on the swivel pole - 15 sec a window. The taking off and on the screens takes longer. It has some kind of sheathing action that leaves no spots on the rinse. The pole reaches high enough, or over bushes, that you don't have to move a ladder or step stool around.

I guess maybe I need to give that a try.

 

[jinman]

I just googled images of hornets and didn't see any like I described in earlier post. So, if it's the size of a small hummingbird, very loud, by itself, and usually hovering about three or four feet above the ground, then what is it?

The biggest hornets at my place are these cicada killer wasps. They are huge and buzz the ground about 2' to 4' above. They look frightening, but this story from The Atlantic tells the whole truth. They are huge fascinating animals and fun to watch when they are dragging a cicada back to their tunnels. They sure can get your attention when you are picking peas and they buzz you. They're louder than a bumble bee.

 

[jinman]

We were lucky for the next 12 minutes and got the meat cooked. Everything else from the garden. We love eating stuff from our garden. . . Ron

Are you growing your own iceberg lettuce? I've grown leaf lettuce, but never had success with iceberg.

When was the last time anyone saw a horned toad?

I saw a horned toad scamper off the gravel road about 2 weeks ago. At first I thought it was a tree lizard and then noticed it's short wide body as it headed into the grass. I'd love to see more of them. My theory is that they were wiped out by fire ants because fire ants are everywhere while insecticides and herbicides are not. On the place I grew up we had tons of horned toads while my uncle and dad used DDT around their barns and other insecticides also in the '50s and '60s. There were horned toads everywhere. Then, in the '70s thru '90s, the fire ant invasion happened and the horned toads disappeared at a time that almost no insecticides were being used on our place. The quail disappeared and the dove, kildeer, and pigeon populations also seemed to be decreased. Right now, I have several red ant beds on my place and I won't mess with them because I hope it encourages horned toads. They are something I've always loved and really hate to see them disappear.

 

[pacerron]

Are you growing your own iceberg lettuce? I've grown leaf lettuce, but never had success with iceberg.

No lettuce. The green stuff you see in the pic on the tomatoes and in a bowl is shaved cucumbers.
We call them Hungarian cucumbers since my wife's grandparents were immigrants from Hungary and her grandmother always made them that way. There are fancy Americanized recipe's for Hungarian cucumbers but these are very basic.
Just shaved cucumbers with salt on them. Let set for 20-30 minutes. Squeeze the water out and add a little mayo.
We had corn too but eat it last. She wraps it in plastic wrap and cooks in the microwave for a short time. Keeps all the flavor in.
Ron

 

[pacerron]

Speaking of basics. It is always said:, "you can hold a ton on a string if you apply it slow enough."
We went to the pond this morning with some old, used, nylon baling twine, a milk jug, and a rag with a little
copper sulfate in it. I got on the end of the dam and my wife unrolled the cord out to the opposite side. She tied the milk jug and bag on in about the middle. We raised it up and walked toward the other end. When we got to where the floating stuff was we let the bottle and rag down into the water and started dragging it toward the other end. It kept getting
harder to pull as the mat was being collected by the string. Finally had to go back and get leather gloves for both of us so the twine didn't cut our hands. When we got to the other end we came together and a massive amount of weed was collected along the string like collecting an oil spill. So back for rakes, pitchfork, and the tractor while she got in the edge and started throwing the stuff up on the bank. Then I put it in the loader by the pitchfork full.
She had her walkie-talkie in her well endowed T-shirt pocket and it skied out into the water. But we found it. Letting it dry in the sun but it probably is shot.
The loader bucket is 6 feet wide x 32" deep so quite a haul on a little piece of twine.
I have some 1/2" or bigger nylon rope around here somewhere. I think we will "belay" the ends, one to the tractor and one to the little green deere. She can drive the deere across the dam as I move slowly along the other side with the tractor.
Probably tie 2-3 milk jugs on the line to keep it slightly submerged. A few trips that way should get rid of a lot of the weed without using chemicals.:thumbsup:
Ron

 

[jinman]

A guy asked me if my hay was "certified fire ant free" I says .. What? He told me last yr he bought some hay in Louisiana and just over the line in Arkansas he got stopped and asked for his papers to verify fire ant free they made him return the hay.

So, I investigated and sure enough there are fire ant quarantined areas .. You can transport in the area but if you haul outside the area you must provide documentation of "certified fire ant free"

Ok dept of Ag inspected my hay storage set fire any traps and provided me with a stamp of my farm number to put on the paperwork "certified fire ant free"

I've heard of blister-bug free, but never fire-ant free. Blister-bugs in hay will kill animals whether alive or dead. Surely, they mean live fire ants instead of dead ones. I don't know how you'd every guarantee a few dead fire ants weren't in the hay.

 

[Bird]

I had a friend and co-worker who had a lakeshore house, pier, and boathouse. He said the weeds, reeds, etc. got pretty bad along the shoreline one year and he got an old bedspring, tied a rope to it, hauled it out a little ways in the boat, dumped it into the water, then pulled it to the shore. He said it cleaned up the vegetation very well.

 

[Lou66]

I could never pass fire ant free hay.. I doubt anyone along the gulf coast could.. unless they have some special blend of ant killer,, I know that a good fertilizer like 26-3-3 will keep them down for a while.. but next month they are back.. Lou