Good morning!!!!

[NHBX]

Another nice day for relaxing outside watching the wildlife. The mrs has the makings for blt's for supper tonight. Slowly getting caught up, you folks have been busy. Just about time for a cold beer and some music.

 

[daugen]

to you and with you NHBX
really is a beautiful day out

sister is zooming me in an hour or I'd go take a nap.

 

[rswyan]

A very pleasant 70F and cloudy @ 14:45, calling for a high of around 71F for the day, which sounds about right. Slight chance of a rain shower according to WU.

Funny thing: yesterday WU showed low chances of rain for an 8 day period. Checking WB later they were showing like a 70% chance for rain today and fairly high (50%) chances of rain for several more days.

Very slow getting rolling today.

Hopper feeder and 1 suet feeder refilled yesterday.

Also checked fluids on Kubota, topped off hydraulic fluid which was low, front axle and engine oil were good, refueled. Have put 20 hours on it since repairs, everything seems nominal.

Tilling done on south end of expanded garden area in the middle.

10 bucketloads of screened compost/manure brought down and added to the eastern edge of the expanded garden area. Got that mostly raked out by hand, hopefully is enough to run another row.

More staples put in on the eastern side of the 4' black plastic mulch between the rows of squash and pumpkins.

Swapped out tiller for box blade, started cleaning up edges of expanded garden, running reverse to push back what was thrown out by the tiller.

Also did some box blading up at the compost/wood lot to fill in ruts so there wouldn't be standing water if it rained.

Headphones ran out of juice so got those put on the charger and recharged.

Harvested summer squash last night before knocking off for the day, got better than 5 gallon bucket.

Agenda for what's left of today:

Swap out box blade for landscape rake on Kubota and run over the compost/wood lot to clean up the remaining debris.

Get rest of staples put in on the first sheet of black plastic mulch.

Get the second sheet rolled out and positioned, maybe get some more plants in the ground.

Thanks for all the condolences on the loss of our neighbor.

Hope everyone has a great Sunday ...

 

[daugen]

A very pleasant 70F and cloudy @ 14:45, calling for a high of around 71F for the day, which sounds about right. Slight chance of a rain shower according to WU.

Funny thing: yesterday WU showed low chances of rain for an 8 day period. Checking WB later they were showing like a 70% chance for rain today and fairly high (50%) chances of rain for several more days.

Very slow getting rolling today.

Hopper feeder and 1 suet feeder refilled yesterday.

Also checked fluids on Kubota, topped off hydraulic fluid which was low, front axle and engine oil were good, refueled. Have put 20 hours on it since repairs, everything seems nominal.

Tilling done on south end of expanded garden area in the middle.

10 bucketloads of screened compost/manure brought down and added to the eastern edge of the expanded garden area. Got that mostly raked out by hand, hopefully is enough to run another row.

More staples put in on the eastern side of the 4' black plastic mulch between the rows of squash and pumpkins.

Swapped out tiller for box blade, started cleaning up edges of expanded garden, running reverse to push back what was thrown out by the tiller.

Also did some box blading up at the compost/wood lot to fill in ruts so there wouldn't be standing water if it rained.

Headphones ran out of juice so got those put on the charger and recharged.

Harvested summer squash last night before knocking off for the day, got better than 5 gallon bucket.

Agenda for what's left of today:

Swap out box blade for landscape rake on Kubota and run over the compost/wood lot to clean up the remaining debris.

Get rest of staples put in on the first sheet of black plastic mulch.

Get the second sheet rolled out and positioned, maybe get some more plants in the ground.

Thanks for all the condolences on the loss of our neighbor.

Hope everyone has a great Sunday ...

only ten bucketloads of manure RS? Kinda slackin' huh?
guess you'll have to work through dinner to catch up...
down on your hands and knees with those landscaping staples, making it all look nice.
Better get your lanes straight or the inspecting dept will be out. Or the rearranging dept. One and the same.

 

[sodamo]

Looks like AirTag range is limited to 33 feet, the distance commonly associated with Bluetooth devices. But if the AirTag is within that distance of an AirTag capable Apple device, the AirTag's position will be relayed to you via the FindMy app. That's an advantage in congested areas like an airport or grocery store, but probably not so much on your farm or ranch. The article mentions other Bluetooth trackers with considerably more range, but they may or may not be Apple compatible...

Thanks Not surprised.
Got this more Sophie than me. She tends to get a bit antsy ifshe hasn’t seen them in awhile. Funny thing is they aren’t lost, ok maybe the 2 times Makani got out. Can’t tell you how many times she might be calling them and they are within sight looking at her with the expression, “I’m right here”. Sometimes it maybe they got into the bedroom suite following one of us and didn’t follow us out, meaning they are at the sliding door looking out as she is calling. The air tags could be helpful in that case.

I need to pick your brain about your water fill setup. Either email or here, your choice. I have 3k gal take at cottage that sometimes doesn’t get enough rain and need supplemental fill. Been doing via a hose, but think I should be able to run pipe and set up to fill at 500 g, turn off at 1000 gal. The existing line for hose it maybe 30 ft away, easily extended, already hard tie here at house so is pressured.

 

[txdon]

RNG - I was in Doylestown last night where that "adventure" farm is located. Never been there though.

The only "adult" things our "adventure" farm has is a wine tasting event, adult Easter egg hunt, daytime maze and night time flashlight maze, and fruit picking. Oh, and tractor trailer rides, apple cannon, and maybe pig races and campfires with s'mores and the nighttime fireworks I guess could be considered adult entertainment. The kids have a lot more things to do.

 

[LS Tractor Owner]

Good afternoon! Our internet provider was knocked off line from a power failure since last night..... finally came back up about a half hour ago.... I'm sure we won't get a credit....

The high yesterday went up to 91°, 6 degrees higher than forecasted. Today's high is 85°, taken in the shade, but feels much hotter in the sun.... A few puffy clouds, but no chances for storms.

Yesterday's trip for parts at the local Autozone was frustrating to say the least.... I looked online before going there and it showed everything needed "in stock".... only problem was nobody there could find the specific parts on their computer..... after 50 minutes.... I finally convinced them to look under different descriptors.... WA-LAA! Then it only took 3 of them another 15 minutes to find the parts on the shelf!

After leaving Autozone, picked up some local white corn from a seller along the road, (portable farm stand) in preparation for today's dinner. I was going to stop at Harbor Freight, but decided to just make another trip later in the afternoon after I calmed down. I went back to Harbor Freight a few hours later..... got the only "propane weed burner" left on the shelf. They had some of the 'freebies' this weekend..... well, by the time I went back, the ones I wanted were out of stock, all given away about an hour earlier ....oh well.

Today, I have been running the drip irrigation and we measured up for the courtyard walkway..... it changed again.... now we are going to use "no dig landscape edging" for the walkway border. Using the edging, we can make the curves / turns easily instead of being 'square' using wood border. It's also currently cheaper than the wood. Got it ordered for delivery to home sometime this week. Now that the materials are ordered, the plans shouldn't change again........ I hope!

Dinner was again exceptionally good.... I put baked potatoes and baked sweet potatoes on the grill, along with the corn. Then slapped some prime Black Angus NY strip steaks on the grill.... mmmmm, mmmm, mmmm.

Expecting the first order of Jeep parts to arrive tomorrow, the next batch on Wednesday. I'll probably start disassembling the rear axle tomorrow and get the bearings replaced. Not sure if I'll get further than that.... maybe.

We might go out in a bit and trim a couple of Russian Olive trees, depending on how fast it starts to cool off approaching sunset. The branches are so overloaded with the 'berries' (olives), they are dragging on the ground. Not the best time for tree trimming, but these trees are tough. You can cut them down to ground level and they'll grow back. A couple of the longer branches are now hanging/ obstructing part of the driveway.

BEF and RS, sorry to hear about the passing of your friends / neighbors passing.

Hope PJ and TopPop are doing ok.....

Everyone have a peaceful evening!

 

[RedNeckGeek]

I need to pick your brain about your water fill setup. Either email or here, your choice. I have 3k gal take at cottage that sometimes doesn’t get enough rain and need supplemental fill. Been doing via a hose, but think I should be able to run pipe and set up to fill at 500 g, turn off at 1000 gal. The existing line for hose it maybe 30 ft away, easily extended, already hard tie here at house so is pressured.

The new setup is pretty simple. There's an electrical float switch in the hill top 10K gallon tank that turns the deep well pump on when the water level falls. There's a drain line low on that tank that runs to the inlet at the top of the 2.5K tank down hill near the house. That line gravity feeds through a mechanical float switch at the inlet to the 2.5K tank to keep it full.

You could use the mechanical float switch to control inlet water from the hose bib to the 3K tank. That way the 3K tank would always be full, but the hose would also always be pressurized. You can control the level at which the float switch opens by how far from the top of the tank it is mounted. That could be handy in case you don't want to use hose water to fill the tank all the way up.

I've also been experimenting with a HomeKit compatible leak detector. The idea is to repurpose it to log when the deep well pump comes on and goes off, which will tell me that the top tank is being kept full by the deep well pump. Here's what I've figured out so far:

Found the Aqara Water Leak Sensor and Hub E1 to interface to HomeKit The water level sensor triggers an alarm message in HomeKit when the two socket head cap screws on the bottom are shorted together. This will be connected in parallel with the float relay leads from the top tank so that an alarm is triggered every time the water level in the top tank drops to where the float relay closes and the deep well pump is turned on.

The Aqara hub is powered by a POE Texas GAF-USB, a PoE to USB converter. This allows the Aqara hub to be powered off an Ethernet port that can provide PoE. So the hub will be plugged into the USB port on he GAF-USB, which will then be connected via a short Ethernet cable to a powered port on the Unifi network switch in the pump house.

In the Home app, a Automation was created so that every time the water level sensor is triggered, the Automation is run. The Automation is configured to execute a shell script running on ControlTrigger MacBook Pro. The shell script sends an email message every time the deep well pump is turned on. By looking at the time stamps of those emails, I should see regular water flow into the top tank. HomeKit isn't sophisticated enough to trigger an error if too much time elapses between tank fills, but I have other home automation software that is if I decide to go that way.

Sending an email using AppleScript and Apple Mail:

tell application "Mail"
set my_message to make new outgoing message
set subject of my_message to "I restarted."
set content of my_message to "Not sure why it happened..."
set sender of my_message to "macman@christianboyce.com"
--
tell my_message
make new to recipient at end of to recipients with properties {name:"macman@christianboyce.com"}
end tell
--
send my_message
end tell

Clear as mud?

 

[LS Tractor Owner]

Forgot to mention about an odd thing that happened this morning.....
I went out to open the greenhouse, and noticed a baby mouse laying on the walkway a couple feet away from deck stairs..... picked it up and tossed it over under the back trees.

Then, when I was walking up to the deck, spotted another one, and a third, and a fourth, and a fifth..... looked everywhere on the deck and the patio furniture for a nest.... couldn't find one.
AH HA! .... the outdoor faucet box.... yep! There was a nice nest made in the insulation. No sign of the momma. Still haven't figured how the babies got dispersed on the deck....

Just one of those strange happenings out in the mountains.

 

[daugen]

paying all that money for a fuel oil pre-buy may or may not be a good gamble this year, but
what I realized most is I needed to run the oil burner less, if possible.
I've always done a consistent job of opening thermal curtains during winter to allow the sun's warmth in and I run a fan on low in the sunniest room into the other
increasingly colder rooms. So I bought several types of door edge insulation and two different makes of oil filled electric radiator heaters. One for my office and one for the kitchen.
Already have one for bedroom. With just me living here, might as well only heat where I am. I always shut everything off before I leave the house though. This way the oil filled ones keep some
heat for awhile. Plus I don't like most fan noises and they are quiet.

dryer died on me after finishing its load. I had just a few work towels to dry and darned if zero action from start button. Rather tired old Hotpoint electric drier.
Pulled the plug, put it back in, tried all wash settings, flipped the breakers, zip, dead as could be. Will call repair guys tomorrow, hopefully they will total it and replace it. It has dents and rust, has been rode hard and put away wet by tenants for a long time. Probably just a switch. door safety switch? I'll try that tomorrow morning before I call it in.

 

[Buppies]

One quarter inch of rain so far more to come very easy rain good to soak in. Got items needed for the week rain started before we got home. Been raining since 3:00 PM

 

[Popgadget]

Anyone know what to call this or where to get them? I can’t for the life of me remember where I got them, and I would like to get some more.
I spent too much time searching online, looked at TSC and Rural King with no luck. I like them for securing gates.

 

[B7510HSD]

Anyone know what to call this or where to get them? I can’t for the life of me remember where I got them, and I would like to get some more.
I spent too much time searching online, looked at TSC and Rural King with no luck. I like them for securing gates.

View attachment 758327

Here ya go!!
https://www.amazon.com/SCENIC-ROAD-...ocphy=9029529&hvtargid=pla-312053737356&psc=1

 

[buckeyefarmer]

68°F and .01 inches rain.

Happy Sunday.

The boys AirTag collars a bit disappointing. Lose track of them before the even get to the fence. Those happy with them must have city dogs and live in apartments. At least the collars look good.

Should get the interior mowing finished today with the scag. The pool area, around the bananas, up to the cottage. Basically all areas where the BX 60in deck is just too big.

I’ll give the BX an extra good cleaning, blow out all the clippings in those hard to get to areas in prep for servicing tomorrow. While tempted to just do myself, I opted for dealer to perform this initial/50 hr maintenance. Much more expensive that’s for sure. Need to seriously consider getting the right trailer.

Prayers for all
Be safe
Have a great day

I have apple airtags in a few things. It will show the location of the phone that reports it when it reports it. Sometimes it shows my vehicles at the neighbors house.

 

[Popgadget]

Here ya go!!
Amazon.com: SCENIC ROAD Bucket Hook/Gate Latch : Tools & Home Improvement

Thanks. After seeing this I see that TSC has them in stock for half of Amazon’s price. But I never thought to look for a bucket hanger until you pointed it out to me. They were in the store the whole time I was looking for them, just not with gate hardware!

https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/tough-1-bucket-hanger

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Right now my Subaru is in the garage, the Honda, truck and keys are in my family room and

the tractor and ranger are in my drive instead of in my barn.
But it’s close, which is what they are meant for.

 

[Popgadget]

Had to look up "adventure" farms, Don. Turns out there's one in Bucks County. Isn't that your neck of the woods Drew, Ken & Paul?

It’s like 5 minutes from me, on the way to Drew’s. He is about 15 or 20 minutes from me, Ken is probably another 10 or 15.

 

[Wagtail]

Good (Monday) morning from a very sodden NE Tassie... and it's still raining. The overnight Low was only 11C and there was 28.5mm in the gauge @ 0900. The wind has abated and it's currently 12C.

I convinced 'Agist' Woman to put a round out yesterday arvo, so, as I said, I threw my Driza-bone & Akubra on and had some tractor fun during a mild period of the rain/wind.

I've got the wood in & drying for today/tonight. Not much else I can do for the day, which is great, being retired and all.

Take care all.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Worship went ok, couldn’t stream songs for some reason.
Ate at the diner on the mountain. They have a good turkey dinner, they roast the turkeys there.
Mowed around house when I got home, calling for rain tonight and tomorrow.
Filled 2 more trash bags of shed junk , and 1 of basement junk and out with regular trash pickup. A little at a time.
Talked to neighbor some. He recently went to Vegas for a pool tournament. They didn’t do well there. He has his own plumbing company and they have been best neighbors you could get.
Mixed and sprayed almost 2 gallons of roundup.
Sprayed wasp nests in shed.
Need to remote into church to try to troubleshoot the streaming problem. I did do a windows update on that computer tonight. Hoping a reboot will straighten it out.

Neighbors old 3 legged cat that lives here hadn’t been seen in days. Didn’t see it in barn. It sometimes goes in there when I’m out mowing.

 

[mostly_gas]

Good evening all. 71ºFfor the start, mostly clear sky, light breeze. light wind day, partly cloudy sky and high temp was 98ºF, HI 101ºF. Chapel to start day,made pancakes for breakfast, and puttered some with washing dishes and set Volagi as riding bike. Watched some baseball with wife, and did sneak nap in. Ten day forecast showing possible rain Start next Sunday
Randy(wag) good to hear not huge amount of rain yet. Hope stint as Parade Commander goes well.
NHBX hope you conserved a lot of energy.
Drew sorry painting turned into bigger job. Hope you can get area primed tomorrow.
Dennis glad you are getting such nice weather, hope worship went well. Interesting though on PJ
Drew .95 g very impressive.
Paul nice video capture. Lot of my jobs go like that. take fixing 2 or 3 thing before you can start the intended project. Hope your gate upgrade went smoothly.
Dennis good to hear network off moberly and on Starlink. Good luck crossing "t"s and doting "i"s.
Kyle I never did anything with TopnewsTalk for same reason did not do much in politics thread, to much name calling and little actual discussion. Chicken spaghetti and tool house cookies sounds delicious. I remember Missouri spring fed creeks would be about 60F near the larger springs. Hope you get better CNC machine
Don sorry you are so short this summer, we got 3 inch on June 3 then close to your totals.
Buppies glad not trouble with bear, hope Walmart trip was successful.
Roy hope you were able to conserve energy and help wife get around. Hope her ankle doing better.
RNG sorry you are heating up more. Sorry about issues with converting generator to propane, good work on ear buds
Ken nice morning temp. Glad you got wood split and game cam working.Hope son does well at Hard Rock Cafe
David I always like for professional to look at car, truck for fist service since new
NHBX sounds like nice day, nice dinner, and nice music.
Drew I do so much better after nap
RS you know the saying don't like the weather wait 5 minutes. good to WU keeps up with the changes. Good to hear tractor doing well after repairs, hope you can finish floorboards soon. Nice to hear yesterday went so well, hope today as well.
David got a good chuckle at the boy's reaction to Sophie's calling them good luck with cottage water supply.
Ted sorry about the AutoZone issues, glad internet is back up. Sorry about the slim pickens at HF. Hope plans don't change for walkway. Good luck with rear axle work, GM used crush sleeve on some rear axles , and was touchy about getting pinion to rear gear engagement correct. Sorry about Russian Olive branches sagging.
Ted interesting about the baby mice strewn about. wonder if something got the mama?
Drew good luck with getting dryer going again.
Randy(wag) hope you enjoyed you seat time.
Dennis glad worship ok except for streaming, good to hear shes junk and base junk leaving in trash. Good luck with streaming issue. Sorry about missing cat.
prayer for all, especially Jay/Peg, Kyle's daughter/friend PT from Covid,/mom's breathing, /learning new job, Bird/aging issues/, Don /mom's pipeline process, /fire nearby, Randy/FIL living alone adjustments /MIL Covid /son's heart issues, /pneumonia and not posting, Roy /palpitations, /angina /wife ankle, Billy /wife back & hip, David(moss) /remodel, /divorce, Buppies /3 new skin cancer spots and treatment, /wife knee healing, /getting dehydrated and cramping, Thomas /gout, Phil /reflux, /wife's eyes, Steppenwolfe/son-auto immune disorder, Grev/wife's eye, Ted /knee recovery/retirement, /family issues, /wife feeling bad, Doug and wife/health issues, /nerve and pain, / wife back in hospital, Ken /kids shot tragedy, David(sadamo)/Sophie's new eye surgery recovery, /cataract surgery, /Sophie's hand infection, Chris/neighbor's granddaughter and Covid issues, Scaredy/shoulder dislocation, /wife not feeling well, /marriage, / friend stop drinking, Paul/ wife's disc issues, Gale and KY/ tornado victims, Mike /5 year plan, Dennis /retirement plans / brother "alligallyitus" and improving, Drew /foot heel issues, /friend cancer diagnosis and recovery, Helogabals /second opinion, /wife's friend situation, Ukraine war, and Country.