Texas Spring/Summer Thread

[Bird]

Jim, I never heard of asparagus roll ups before, but that recipe does sound good. And I was surprised to last 4 hours working outside today. I hate live oak trees, at least if they're near the house with rain gutters. I was up and the down the ladder cleaning out rain gutters. I have a tool that lets me blow out the gutters without getting on the ladder, but I had to take 3 downspouts loose to clean out the catkins and leaves, then put the downspouts back. And I mowed, edged, and trimmed our yard and the one next door. It was the first time in a long time that I ran the Stihl string trimmer long enough to run out of gas when I started with a full tank and wasn't quite through when I ran out and had to refill it. I used the bagger on our yard, but didn't on the neighbor's.

 

[jinman]

I bought a Toro battery powered string trimmer last year. It has a 24 volt/4 Ah lithium-ion battery. If it is charged, we can easily do our whole yard, trimming around about 25 trees and the house and other places. It is lightweight and my wife and grandson don't have to mess with fuel or the pull starter. It feeds line an adjustable amount each time you release and pull the trigger. Releasing the trigger so it stops while walking from spot-to-spot seems to increase battery life. It was expensive ($150), but I think it's worth what I paid.

 

[Bird]

It was expensive ($150), but I think it's worth what I paid.

I gave $259.19, including tax, for my Stihl 8 years ago. It's given me no trouble, but I don't know what I've spent on gas, oil, & Stabil, so an electric one might not be bad.

 

[Western]

Bird, why dot you put gutter screens on and save yourself allot of work?

 

[Bird]

I've certainly considered it, Dennis, but the only time I've seen gutter screens used they didn't work worth a hoot; in fact were more trouble than what I now have.

 

[txdon]

Bird, my gutter screens work perfect, but then I don't have limbs overhanging the house.

 

[Bird]

Don, I do have some limbs out over the house. I did have a lot of it cut back a couple of years ago, but of course this past year, we had a bumper crop of little acorns, live oaks stay green all year, but also shed leaves all year and of course this time of year, we also have the catkins. So the wind, especially from the north, puts a lot of that stuff in the rain gutter. I usually don't have a major problem except about 30' of gutter and 2 downspouts on the north side. And if I try to blow the debris out of the gutter when there's still a north breeze, it blows back up on the roof and will eventually be right back down in the gutter, so I try to do that job anytime I have a south breeze.

 

[jinman]

I pulled 8 onions from my garden yesterday. They were about as big as my thumbs and just right to use as green onions in salads or chop up into a bowl of beans. So to see which would be best, I had both salad and beans for dinner last night. They were yummy. Now, I have to get out to my garden and cover tomatoes and other tender plants. If my blackeyed peas get frozen, so be it. They look so sad that I've been thinking of replanting anyhow. My beans seem to be holding their own. If things go as normal, we'll have freezing up until the end of April and then May will be full of 100 degree days and I'll be watering my yard and draggin' hoses. At least maybe by then it will be warm enough to get my okra to germinate. Rant over. . . did I mention how good my onions were?

 

[econometrics]

Jinman, is it supposed to freeze on yall tonight? I don't think it's going to get that bad out here in ETX. Hope it doesn't on you guys.

I put in another hog trap this morning and baited it all up.

Back in March I put up a nice, big corral trap to try to catch a whole sounder that was runnin' around on my land for a couple days. As soon as I got that trap up, I never saw a hog on my cameras again.

Then on Sunday, we were out picking up some large limbs that I didn't get to chip, and saw some nosing around in the pasture. GRRR. So I re-baited the corral trap, but it looks like they didn't want to make it all 100 yards over from the fresh rootings to the trap.

So I moved in a smaller trap close to where they've been rooting this morning. We'll see what happens. I need to stock the freezer back up with sausage!

 

[jinman]

Jinman, is it supposed to freeze on yall tonight? I don't think it's going to get that bad out here in ETX. Hope it doesn't on you guys.

This morning the weather forecast called for 32 F tonight with a 20% chance of rain. Between you and me, I think they don't know what to forecast. The last time I checked, 32 F with precip is called "snow" and not rain. If we get snow, I'll really wig out. :laughing: