I bought a cheap, cheap chainsaw mill online, just haven't had a chance to use it yet. I almost don't want to because of the huge kerf, but my policy on tools has always been "buy cheap and use it til it breaks or is so slow that it makes sense to upgrade." This fall/winter I may start tinkering with it anyway.
Black walnut trees in an air prune bed.
I gathered the nuts locally last fall and threw them into a poultry brooder I made that didn't work well. I used foam board to insulate it for the birds and the birds tried eating it.
1/2"x1" cage wire bottom, 2"x4" ripped in half for the frame, aluminum flashing for the outside, 1" pink foam for the inside.
The south side had much, much higher germination rates, likely due to sun exposure/heat. This is the first May in 20 years of Kansas living that it hasn't at least in the high 80s. Night Temps mostly in the 50s, also oddly low. Curious to see if I get full germination once we heat up. https://image.nostr.build/3427d2af56054a04152c5d0cc8e4013d2c9300acb423e8f9f55e38ded29e6dd8.jpg
Air prune bed filler is (roughly):
-bottom wire
-~1/2" of wheat straw
- couple inches of aged chicken bedding
-inch or two cow manure mixed with dirt
-6" of potting soil
-2 layers of walnuts
-~2" of potting soil
-layer of straw.
Thought process behind that layout was that I want to reuse this bed for a long time with minimal work. The manure will break down and feed the seedlings over time, insulation will help keep everything cool in our brutal summers and keep soil life alive.
As I pull and sell seedlings, planting new ones is as easy as raking the bed level with my hands, adding new nuts, cover with soil, cover with straw. By the time I retire it, if ever, I'll have enough time and money (Lord willing and the aquifer don't dry) to have built 10x the production space.
My plan is to post daily updates, but I work full time, online school full time, lawn care part time, have two kids and a wife, plus the nursery lol, so we'll see how that goes!
I appreciate the zap offer! I haven't messed with bitcoin since 2016 so I'm way behind now. I'll figure it out eventually. Do you have any tips or helpful videos?
Thank you for the tips!! It is spur and tip bearing.
When I put in my permanent trellis, I'm going to make it 6 feet tall instead of 3 feet like this one. I planted the trees last year and the trellis building project got away from me. My plan is to weld chain links at 1 foot spacing onto a 10 foot piece of steel pipe and cement it 4 feet into the ground. I'll use aluminum "9 wire" or something similar with a ratcheting fence tensioner on each height. I may make the spacing 18" or 2 feet if research dictates that to be more effective.
Long story short, I didn't prune the leader because this is a temporary trellis.
I've got 2 kids. 1 month old and 18 month old. Wife and I didn't get the coof vax, started eating mostly locally raised meats and eggs off our land a year ago. Meat from a family that grows their own grain, hay, and alfalfa, then converts it to beef and pork. Our chickens that are ranged a time or two a week, and eat mostly scraps, sunflower seeds, and milo. There's a BSL box in their run that free feeds into a kiddie pool so they can't escape, and the chooks can eat them when they want. I have 200 siberian pea shrubs to supplement the chicken feed, but they aren't producing yet.
The developmental differences between our kids and kids of friends who eat grocery store food is noticeable. My kids are towards the top of their ages for weight, but not fatter than standard baby fat. My youngest just turned a month old and can already hold her head up for 10-15 seconds. She actively tracks with her eyes and her head. My oldest actually listens, and throws diapers and other trash away for us of his own accord, and helps me pull weeds in the strawberry patch and more. Again, this is a 1 month old and an 18 month old. Our friends with kids the same age are all at least a month behind developmentally.
Idk if I just hit the genetic jackpot with my wife, somehow we managed to be really good parents (I have no idea what I'm doing), or diet and sun exposure really help that much, but that's my anecdote for the night.
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