What do you folks think about this coming Winter?

[coobie]

bring it on..

 

[MikeR 2018]

My forecast is that December, January and February will be considerably cooler than June, July and August with a far greater chance of frost, ice and snow. There will be the periodic warming spells and some chance of Thunderstorms in some areas, but not all. (SoCal and regions of the desert southwest excluded).

And forecast for tonight - Dark. Gradually clearing by morning.

 

[sixdogs]

When I lived in very rural New England years ago, technology wasn't what it is today and the weather map was just drawn on an erase type board. Weather forecasting included lots of lore and guesses and very often the old weather guy would just erase part of the board and evolve his forecast for the next day during the forecast. There was no official weather forecast, just what the weather guy thought it should be. We didn't know any different back then but pretty funny looking back.

 

[boomer1025]

The Old Farmer's Almanac Predicts Mild Winter Weather (Video) | The Old Farmer's Almanac
2018–2019 Winter Weather Forecast From The Old Farmer's Almanac

 

[Einthewoods]

Potato racks:

(And I can steal ideas with the best of them.....but this is one of my few originals....ahahhaaaa)

These are some 2x lumber (2x6 ripped in half) x 3 lumber with a 1/4" slot dado'ed about an 1 1/2" deep in the inside for the hardware cloth to go in to....then ran some 1" staples in the face to prevent the screen from coming out or sagging too much with weight. Overall outside dimensions are about

Frames were assembled with glue and pocket jig screws (you can see the angled holes from the jig)
Short pc of 2x4 glued/screwed to the frame for a leg. That seems to be plenty of room for even the biggest sweet potato (also use them for that) to sit on the screen and not bump the


As you can see, they stack nice....you can get a WHOLE lot of potatoes in a small foot print. Air circulation is good, if you do have a potato rot, it doesn't usually affect the ones around it if you just keep a small space between spuds. We put the 'bakers' and 'peelers' on the racks.....then about late January, we'll go thru them and rub off the sprouts so they keep well into late spring. The small potatoes from our harvest go in the bags for next year's

Well TnAndy, I stole your shelf design. And proved if you can over build something, I'll do it. :laughing:

This shows one of the shelves half slid out.

Now all I have to do is build more shelves.

 

[goeduck]

Our short term forecasts are fairly accurate, but a week out and beyond, not so much.

 

[TractorGuy]

In the words of the hippy dippy weather man I predict this winter will be COLD. Continuing mostly cold, followed by lightly scattered warmth in the spring.

 

[TnAndy]

Well TnAndy, I stole your shelf design. And proved if you can over build something, I'll do it. :laughing:

This shows one of the shelves half slid out.

Now all I have to do is build more shelves.
View attachment 570308

Yeah, I thought about that route.....but my design allows for as little as one in a stack, or as many as I can reach/stack in height. Plus we use them in the root cellar, sometimes in the basement, and sometimes in the greenhouse for drying seed heads we're saving.....so mobility is an important factor to us.

But yours will certainly work !

One thing yours will allow is covering the outside with hardware cloth and making a door with the same.....sometimes we have a chipmunk or mouse get in the seed we're drying (say like corn seed) to save, and chow down.

 

[Garandman]

All the snow belters are grinning over being hurricane free zones.

But si pulled the boat this weekend, just in case.

 

[Einthewoods]

Yeah, I thought about that route.....but my design allows for as little as one in a stack, or as many as I can reach/stack in height. Plus we use them in the root cellar, sometimes in the basement, and sometimes in the greenhouse for drying seed heads we're saving.....so mobility is an important factor to us.

But yours will certainly work !

One thing yours will allow is covering the outside with hardware cloth and making a door with the same.....sometimes we have a chipmunk or mouse get in the seed we're drying (say like corn seed) to save, and chow down.

My,biggest concern and the reason for building it the way I did was I just know that I was going to get asked 5 times a month this winter to get to a shelf at the bottom. :laughing:

We grow 3 types of potatoes, so this way my wonderful wife can just yank out whatever shelf she wants to get to whatever potato she is after.

I also thought this would make it easier to check for spoilage through the time.

For the apples we pick, I think I will use more what you had. Certainly a better use of space.

Thanks again for the shelf idea!