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1. I have been looking to see if you can dehydrate blackberries, but nothing seems solid. Can you dehydrate blackberries? Thank you in advance for the assistance.

   1. Hi Dan, you can dehydrate blackberries. But you wind up with blackberry flavored seeds. The juicy part is very reduced, but the seeds stay the same. So it isn’t so great, but better than letting them go to waste. You could juice them to get out the seeds and then use the seedless mass in fruit leather. If you combine them with apples, apples will give them the needed body to set up as fruit leather

2. I had an interesting day yesterday. I’ve had the issue with getting the five foot mower blades off. The top nut is 1 5/8 and I have the big sockets to fit this. The bottom is just rounded and flat, The nut is loose enough that everything spins so I need to hold the underside. I dropped the harrow off the tractor, attached the boom poll and lifted the mower up on its side. Because I have the common leak down issue with the three point hitch I had to leave the tractor running. This isn’t good because the exhaust comes out the back of the tractor rather than up top. While wedging the breaker bar and socket into place I tried turning the bottom side with a 14 inch pipe wrench. This thing is so tight I ended up breaking the pipe wrench. I figured that if I could not loosen it then it was not coming off while mowing either so I just broke out the angle grinder and sharpened the blades as best I could. I’m open to any ideas on how to get this nut and bolt broken. I’ve used the blaster stuff on it already with no luck. It is not rusted, just firmly in place with a lock washer. I’ve thought about taking a chisel and wedging it between the nut head and the pan it is attached to in order to keep it from spinning. I’ve also considered using a propane torch on it to heat it to see it is will loosen. Any ideas are welcome.

   After that around 10:00 last night I heard my dog raising heck about something. Not the aggressive bark of an intruder, but certainly something was bothering him. He’s a 70 pound German Short Hair and has a tendency to be strong willed. I went to check on him and he had a Copperhead pinned up. When I walked out it had struck at my dog, it struck at me and I’m trying my best to pull the dog away to get him out of harm’s way. Then his collar comes off he he’s back at the snake. After the snake strikes at him he snatches it up and does the very aggressive head shake ripping about ¼ of the tail off. He stayed focused on the tail and did not realize the rest of the snake was several feet away. That gave me time to retrieve a 22 mag revolver loaded with rat shot. I finished off the snake, got the dog put up and disposed of everything else. That’s two vipers in two weeks less than twenty feet from the back door. I guess something has been killing off the non-poisonous snakes leaving a void for it to be filled by the pit vipers. But then again, August has always been the month for snakes in this area.

   1. Any chance this is a left hand thread nut? You can check your manual or documentation or check with the manufacturer.

      1. I don’t recall it being as such. I put these blades on a few years ago, but I can go by TSC, where I bought the bolts and nuts for it to see if they are reverse threads. Thanks.

         1. DANGER! Never trust hydraulics,they can and will fail without warning! Easy way to check is threads are opposite of rotation of blade(otherwise would spin off),that much pressure may have ovaled nut on bolt get new nut and use nut breaker to remove ,heat may change temper of bolt and cause failure at worst time

3. Weeds weeds and more weeds. What is the answer we try not to use any chemicals and the weeds out do us. The weeds are Bermuda grass from our yard and it gets in even the elevated boxes. We pull it and it comes back thicker, any suggestions. ..

   1. Mulch 3″-4″ will keep 99% of weeds down and keeps moisture in between watering

4. Hi Dan,

   One can dehydrate almost everything, but whether or not you like the end product will be the question. Dehydrated Blackberries will be little seed packed purple balls, not too appetizing to me. Instead, to preserve blackberries, one method I would suggest, is making them into fruit leathers. Here is a recipe to get an idea from: http://paleogrubs.com/blackberry-fruit-roll-up-recipe
   Other methods of preserving blackberries is making them into jams and freezing them. Maybe, our readers would like to chime in on their methods or recipes concerning preserving blackberries.

   Blessings to you,

   Lily

   1. I freeze them, make seedless jam by using my food mill and then I make preserves. Preserves leaves the fruit whole in a honey like syrup – so very good.

5. About this drowning tragedy.

   I was reading about this tragedy of two children drowning. I feel for these people who suffer this ordeal. I understand the magnitude of this situation. I extend all my sympathy to this grieving family in morning. May they be comforted in their sorrow. As for God, he mourns with them.

6. Was down for a couple of days with a 24-hour stomach virus so didn’t get everything done I wanted to. While struggling the virus I spent some time on family history. Still searching to find parents of an ancestor born about 1730.

   New hatchlings are doing well; some are buff orphingtons, a couple are white silkies and the rest are barn yard mix.

   Did two loads of FD meats. Made tomato sauce and pickled jalapeno peppers. Made more hot sauce and then dehydrated remaining hot cayenne and habanero peppers and sweet green peppers. Made cowboy quiche for my elderly neighbors, another for a friend who had surgery, and of course one for family.

   Started making emergency candles using paraffin and thrift store candles. Melted things down, made wicks from a string mop and poured into different size cans for molding.

   The pears are almost ready for harvesting, the young peach trees have about a dozen fruits on each tree, this is the first year the apple trees have produced any fruit so they sparse. The 3 year old grape plants produced enough fruit to make two gallons of juice and small amount of jelly.

   May your families be blessed.

7. I really enjoy reading the Editors Preps for the week segment. Thanks for taking the time to keep it up.

   It seems the weather conditions for the Rawles Ranch are almost identical to mine in this part of western Oregon. I am not sure how that works out, but they are very close.

   A lot of the tasks you are undertaking are the same as what I am doing, but mine are on a smaller scale. But, still, hearing the insight from JWR, Avalanche Lily, and HJL I find helpful.

8. Lent pressure canner to neighbor and got back canned peaches(easiest canning ever),helped other neighbor set up security cameras. Vehicle maintenence on going.

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