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9 Comments

  1. A few weeks ago, I saw this article,
    “The Resilient Gardener – Grow Potatoes, Corn, Beans, Squash, and Eggs”,
    November 2, 2017,
    by Laurie Neverman
    https://commonsensehome.com/the-resilient-gardener/

    The setting for the book is the NW & it has been mentioned in the SurvivalBlog in the past, but certain concepts work as well in the SE.

    So, I order the book, https://www.amazon.com/Resilient-Gardener-Production-Self-Reliance-Uncertain/dp/160358031X, and have been reading it this week.

    Although I have been doing a few things right, there is room for improvement next year.
    I’ve never considered ducks as a protein source and I can do a few thing different with corn.

    A few recent articles in the SurvivalBlog relating to Potatoes and Seminole Squash/Pumpkins have helped as well.

    Have the Editors ever tried raising ducks?

  2. I’m obviously not the Editor, but I do raise both ducks and geese. If you are only looking for meat yield, then I highly recommend geese over ducks. Geese can be brought to weight on grass alone. They are less prone to predator losses. And they yield far more meat per carcass.

  3. Working this week on a small fuel storage shed. Added another ton of coal into the coal shed. Collecting rock to level the area in front of the coal shed with the addition of fill dirt in order to make it easier to unload the coal from the truck. Working on chimney pipes for basement coal stove. Christmas shopping as well. Looking forward to a blessed season.

  4. Calipers.
    In 1973, I went to work in a machine shop at age 22. I bought a dial caliper made by Helios. It cost me nearly four days pay. Today, at age 62, I still have this marvelous instrument, which has served me faithfully for 40 years.
    I also have two digital calipers, which require batteries. More often than not, when I pick up the digitals, their battery is dead. I can’t use them until I locate another source of odd batteries for them. The dial caliper works, rain or shine, battery or no battery. I’ll never buy another digital caliper.

    P

    1. @Paul,
      I would have to agree with you. 30 years ago, I bought a Starett dial caliper. I’ve owned several digital ones since then and they always die. The starett is still my go-to caliper.

      1. I have a Starett digital caliper that I’ve been using for over 20 years. The battery lasts for years, I’ve only changed it twice in all that time. That said, a quality dial caliper would serve better in the long term when replacement batteries are no longer available.

        To that point, has anyone seen a quality charger for button batteries? I’ve been looking and just have not found one.

  5. Next question: since we don’t want to use insecticides that are poisonous to animals or humans, what would be a good one to use to defend against termites?

    1. @Charles
      Regarding termites: Ants are your best friend.
      I used to indiscriminately kill ants because they bothered me and I didn’t like it when they stung or pinched me as I worked around the property. It didn’t happen all that often, but I considered them the “enemy” and when they popped up, I killed them. At the same time, every piece of wood left outdoors was eaten alive by termites. On one particular occasion, I was cleaning the yard and found a weed next to a harvester ant bed. When I grabbed the weed, I noticed that it had dirt attached to the branches. When I moved it, the dirt crumbled and it turned out to be termite tunnels. The termites and ants proceeded to go to war and in short order, the ants wiped the termites out.
      The lightbulb went on in my head at that point 🙂
      Now, we keep the ant population down, but allow a significant number of mounds to exist. The only areas that have termite issues are those areas where I have been forced to eradicate the ants (like the sand pit for the grandkids to play in.)

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