Category: garden

A quick update

Hello everyone. Its been a while, but things have been busy. I have two new project cars, the shop is under way, more work on the garden on the property, and other bits of news.

Im not sure which topic to start with so I think I will go with “Happy New Years”. Yes, in Feburary. I honestly dont know how January slipped by so quick. Time seems to be speeding up, or I am slowing down, either way I blink and another month is gone.

In other news, there is finally progress on the shop. The pieces for it have been up on the property for a few months, but I couldn’t get the tractor guy to show up. So for New Years I decided to go with someone else. The new tractor guy was there in a couple days of me accepting the contract and had the pad done in two days! Here are some pics of it.

Thats moving the big darn rock in the middle of where my shop goes.

And thats where the shop is going.

Thats all I,have time for now. Im thinking about doing some vids from the property showing the different projects: garden, shop, rusty engines and antique restoration. If you think this is something you would be interested in seeing, leave a comment to let me know.

By popular demand…

Actually, not so popular but someone asked…. so……

As most of you who know me should know, I’m kind of a bit of a prepper. What am preparing for you ask? I am preparing for retirement and I’m stocking my pantry and tool shed deep so I won’t be bored or hungry later in life. I don’t expect social security to be all that, so best I have all the toilet paper I could possibly use stocked before I have to choose between eating cat food or squeezing some Charmin. But thats not what this post is about. This post is about the spices I am stocking away so I can flavor my Friskies when the day comes.

I purchase my spices in bulk and repackage in smaller containers for my own ease of use. It also makes it easier to hand them out to people who might be caught short on something you have stocked or share the awesomeness of really good spices. I tend to share the spices amongst family and friends while putting the majority into my stockpile. I buy my spices from some odd vendors, but thankfully the majority of them can be easily found on Amazon. I’m not going to use the fancy little affiliate links that kick me back 1/1000 of a cent on every dollar you might purchase through the links because I personally detest people offering up advice for the benefit of others while still making a cut on the info.

The bottles I use to package are the clear plastic type with shaker or spoon/shaker tops. They also come with the little styro freshness seal that goes on top for long term storage. The ones I use regularly are:

16 Spice jars 6oz –

12 Spice jars 3oz –

The spices that follow are all ones I have personally tried, and many I have given bottles to friends to try, and these are the best of the ones I have tried.

Dried Basil leaves

Oregano – great citrus note when you smell this Oregano

Cayenne Pepper powder – careful with this one, used usual amount in my last ribs and people said it was noticeably hotter/spicier.

Whole Cloves

Pumpkin Spice mix – hands down the crowd favorite. This mix is amazing, the only spice mix I find I literally kept sticking my finger in to taste… along with everyone else I let sample it. My friend Dr.M may need help to break the addiction to this stuff.

Granulated Onion – awesome sweet onion flavor. Be aware that if you repackage you may be tasting onion for a day or so. Not that I’m complaining…..

Turkish Bay leaves – so fresh you can smell them when you open the package. The local grocer has bottles -> 3 whole leaves for $8, and not EVEN close the the aromatic and flavors of these bulk pack.

Ground Sage

Diced Dehydrated red and green bell pepper

Cinnamon – I used to buy William Sonoma cinnamon for the flavor when it came to cooking, this is every bit it’s equivalent. Rich in cinnamon oil.

Well, there is a good start. I will do another post with some more spices and another way to stock up some essentials that I enjoy. I will try to remember to do some Augason farms reviews too. If you don’t know Augason farms for storable food you are missing out. More to come.

Random stuff…

I have a little bit of time so I thought I would post some random things.

First off, most of you know that I have been growing my coffee plants for around 5 years. I have only had blossoms on them twice and earlier this year was the one of them. I was really happy to see blossoms, since its a good indicator that I’ve finally gotten close to making them happy. I was watering them a couple days ago and almost didn’t notice these…

Those are coffee beans! The very first time in years of growing I have had coffee beans! They are hard to notice because they really blend in with plant. As proof, see how many beans you can count in the next photo..

Hint: there are 5 beans in that photo, but I bet you counted 3. I’ll post more pics if they get to the ripe phase and turn red. Overall, I’m just happy to see any beans, ripe or not.

Switching gears…… Some of you know I enjoy making small engines and I have met many wonderful people going to miniature engine meets and forums. One of the great men I got to meet was Bruce Satra. He revived a model engine from the 1940’s called the Morton M5. The Morton model engine is actually based on the LeBlond engines in the previous post. Here is a pic of the Morton Bruce built in the ’80’s.

I started a Satra M5 from castings that Bruce sold several years back, but I didn’t buy a complete kit, just a few to get me started. When I ran into a couple machining questions I emailed Bruce and he was always super helpful. Unfortunately Bruce passed away several years ago and many of us were left without parts. A friend of Bruce, whom I will not name but is an easy Goggle search to find, was supposed to keep the Satra Morton M5 going in memory of Bruce. Alas, he has completely dropped the ball, even going so far as not keeping VernalEngineering.com (Bruce’s M5 webpage) running. Here is a pic of the fantastic castings Bruce used to sell…

So, left without a source of parts after several attempts over several years to contact Mike (oops, wasn’t going to name drop) I am left with my usual answer. I will make my own castings based on Bruce’s notes and conversations we had. (As if some of you out there couldn’t guess I was going to say that)

I’ve started the process and here is a little info on progress. I started by modeling the parts in CAD software and then printing out the parts to verify dimensional accuracy…

Those quick and rough prints checked out, so now I am making my wax molds. I’m a couple revisions in on the rod and piston molds, and have found a wax suitable to injecting into the small lines and cavities. Now I am just refining the molds to help with the last small imperfections in the wax parts. I’ll post more pics and info when I have some final wax parts before attempting the first metal castings.

New things happening this month….

Well, the heat is finally here and I haven’t been spending too much time up on the property. Mostly I go up in the morning and take care of the things I need to do like watering the plants and checking on stuff. I purchased two new raised beds made from corrugated Gavalume, with some kind of paint on them to help with corrosion. I plan on putting one together this weekend and getting some pictures of it. I probably won’t install them this weekend since I want to level a spot and put some gravel under them. I also plan on trying Youtuber ‘Self Sufficient Me” way of doing Hugelkulture planting. It’s interesting and sounds like something that may work. He lives in Australia and has a pretty nice set up in an arid hot land.

I also worked out a deal with a gentleman in Massachusetts for some antique engines. Yes, I know…. how many antique engines does one person need? I already have a turn of the century Half-a-Horse, 5 Model A engines, a ’20s Fairbank Morse Z 3hp, and others. And yes, they all need a little bit more attention than I have been giving them. But how could I not rescue what looks to be four 1930’s LeBlond 5 cylinder radials? After all, not only are they fairly rare antique engines, but they are also radial airplane engines! The only downside is that they are in pieces… and in Massachusetts.

This is one of several pictures full of parts for the engines. The gentleman I am purchasing them from didn’t want to ship, but after talking over things came to an agreement that he will ship some parts to me now and then bring the rest out to Cali later this year. He has been packing things this week and plans on shipping them next week. It’s a good thing I am building a shop.

Or am I……..

*Sigh* So, I have no pics of shop construction yet because the person who has the bulldozer to start cutting the pad broke his hand. He seems to be healing up fine from what I am told, but no date yet when I can expect some dirt to be moved. In the mean time, I do have the permit for the shop and the metal parts are in production. I should have a truck of parts heading my way in about a months time and hopefully some dirt moved by then.

That’s the update for now. I will post more when there is anything interesting to see.

A quick update…

I haven’t had much time to post the last couple of weeks. My shop is a ‘go’. Submitted the paperwork for the permit last Friday and am waiting to hear back. For all those that that have dared the maze that is my garage workshop, I will soon have a 40’x50′ workshop if all goes to plans.

The plants seem to be happy still. I had to move the Tayberries out of the greenhouse. They were taking over, tangled in each other and the other plants. I moved them out to the deck for now, but plan on trellising them when I figure out where I want them permanently.

I spent my first night up there in the shed on Saturday of Memorial weekend. I was pretty excited about it until I realized around 11pm I had left the only way to fill my air matress back in town. The sleep was a little rough, but breakfast made up for it. I made ham, eggs, and coffee with a couple cherry turnovers.

I enjoyed my breakfast as I listened to the rain hitting the metal roof.

Last bit is an update on the Medlar, still has fruit and is going strong.

That’s it for now. Maybe more after this weekend.

Spring Storms….

The first week of May brought a storm through the area. It’s kinda rare to have a thunderstorm in the central valley but we received a good one complete with plenty of thunder, lightning, and wind. It is beginning to become apparent that if there is a stiff breeze on the valley floor then it’s going to be gale force up in our hills. If you think I’m exaggerating, remember this pic from a couple weeks ago showing the new screens for the greenhouse roof?

Well, this what I found two days after the storm came through…

Um…. yeah…. did a bomb go off nearby? Seriously. It blew bunch of fairly heavy (appx 5lbs or more) stuff all over the place. I found some of the panels that are missing in the second picture over 200 feet away. The greenhouse put up a fight before it blew apart, it bent a 1/4″ x 3/4″ brace and a corner bracket before it went.

The bracket in the second picture is showing the entire roof moved over about half an inch. I found all the panels, straightened the structure, reinforced some areas, and then put it all back together. On the bright side, all the plants survived just fine and look even healthier than the last post. we are supposed to have another set of storms roll through this Thursday (5/16) and Saturday (5/18), so we will see if it holds together.

Oh, check out what it did to the solar panel mount. Lol.

I laugh because the expensive mount literally blew apart, but my cheap temporary rigged mount below it did better with the storm.

I also did some more work on the raised bed planter. I continued the work by putting down a thick layer of weed block….

Then I put down two layers of fine aluminum screen mesh to see if it will keep out gophers, cause there are a TON of gophers…

No, the dirt didn’t get darker, the light being reflected caused my phone to filter it. As you can see I used the next layer of blocks to hold the weed barrier and screen in place. I also figured it wouldn’t leave gaps for anything to get though. Next came the final layer of blocks….

I was going to use PVC pipe in the cinder block holes to interlock the blocks and layers together, but PVC pipe has gone up in price. Would have cost me over $40 to cut 28 pieces of 2″ pipe at 24″ long. Instead I went with….

2×3’s. Yup, 2×3 wood instead of PVC cost me $17. I’m cheap and this is a proof of concept trial, so wood works. Since the blocks overlap I figure locking them together will give them a little resilience in case the pigs investigate it….

Next is to build the wood portion on top of the block base that will have the screening to keep out the bugs. I will tap all the 2×3’s down to level before I cap the blocks with the wood structure.

Finally for this post, I’m trying something I have never grown before but have always been interested in. I’m trying to grow some tobacco from seeds. I started the seeds in a seed tray on the 26th of last month and here is a pic of the fresh little sprouts….

I started them in potting soil put in paper ketchup cups. The seeds are super tiny and I didn’t realize I got so many in some of the cups. Lol. When they get about 2″ tall I’m going to try and separate them out into individual plants. There are 5 different variety and 4 have sprouted. From left to right (in vertical rows) are Yellow twist, Virginia Gold, Standard Burley, Tennessee Red Leaf, and Orinoco. I’m hoping Orinoco is just a late sprouter.

Things are growing….

And not just my beltline. 😉

It doesnt seem like its been a month since my last post, but the date in the header doesnt lie. The medlar tree has flowered. They are good size blooms, around an inch across. Since I put this tree in the ground in Feb it has taken to the spot and out performed all expectations. Here is what the flowers look like…..

Neat flowers and they were at the end of every branch.

I couldnt sense any fragrance or smell from them, nothing at all. I was sad when they started to wither after barely a week, but then I noticed that they didnt go completely away….

All of them shed their petals and pulled back to this. Some were more closed then others and as the week passed they all closed up tight. This week I netted the tree and noticed that it was getting bigger…

Im now fairly sure that this tree is setting fruit. The pic was taken today, the day this is posted.

Speaking of netting trees, my trees are starting to all look like ghosts for Halloween…

I noticed a few full grown crickets around and want to make sure my trees have a fighting chance this year. The grasshoppers/crickets/locust killed about half of my trees and all but one blueberry last year. I also made screens for the greenhouse so its enclosed but can still circulate plenty of air…..

There is a mix of solar shade screen and plain bug netting screen. Im trying the sun screen to see if I can mitigate some of the direct summer sun here in the central valley. As far as the plants are concerned, they seem to be loving the greenhouse….

Those are all the same plants seen in the previous post. All of them have grown a bit and look healthy. I even found some blueberries on one of the bushes that are starting…..

Since the greenhouse is doing well I am going to give a try with a raised bed idea I have. I found a good location for a test bed and asked dad to bring in the tractor to scrape away the tall grass. Here is the spot…..

And here is what it looked like after Dad brought the tractor in…

I got the first row of blocks done and need to bring more up. Im going to use the blocks for the raised bed portion to see if I can keep the wild pigs from destroying it…..

When I go up next weekend with more supplies I will adust and level the base layer a bit more, I ran out of time on this trip.

Spring is starting 2…..

After years of trying various lighting and humidity profiles to grow my coffee plants, I think I may have got close to the right conditions. I know this because not only are they growing well, but they have flowers..

They seem to be happy, and they are pretty little flowers…

I spent last Saturday moving the greenhouse from my backyard up to the property on the hill by the shed (due to the asshole behind me planting a bunch of trees to block my sun for growing things) . The greenhouse was in shade almost all day long and was useless where it was, so best to put it somewhere it can be useful.

I put it in the middle of all that tall grass, the thought being that there must be plenty of light to grow things there. 😉

I’ve already put my Tayberries in there. Herd to believe these were just bare sticks from Trees of Antiquity just a month or so ago. They love the light and already have buds for flowers…

I put my blueberry plants on the other side of the greenhouse, they have a ton of flowers on them and I’m hoping I will get to enjoy the berries this year instead of feeding the grasshoppers like last year.

Speaking of things that are budding and flowering, the Medlar tree has more buds on it and they are getting closer to flowering. Last week they were closed tight at the top, this week they are larger and just starting to unfurl the outer leaves/petals.

Last but not least, this Saturday I made a stand for the new oven. It was WAY too tall sitting on the table I made. I couldn’t get my coffee maker on the top and there is no way I’m going to put up with that. I wanted the top down low enough that I could use a pan on it comfortably like I would at my regular cook top. This is what I came up with.

Much more usable now. I just need to run it a few more times to double check the heat levels on the things around it. Every weekend I’m up there things get a little more refined for ease of use, and every weekend I’m up there it gets harder to come back to town.

Spring is starting…

Just a quick post. I planted this years batch of trees in the ground, and blueberries/tayberries in pots the second weekend in Feburary. We have had more rain this year than usual and the springs are running still at the end of March. The first tree to wake up was a Medlar from Trees of Antiquity. It was a stick when we put dirt around it and now a few weeks later its leafed.In fact, I think it already has flower buds on it….I haven’t grown one of these trees before, so I am surprised a bit by how vigorous it is. The peaches, apricots, plums, and cherries are just showing signs of leaves. The apples are just now getting fuzzy tips.More posts and pictures coming after this weekend.

Hi everyone……

Work has been keeping me busy, so I haven’t even thought of posting. Now that I have a new position in the company and am no longer head of the Maintenance department and the sole Parts person I can post occasionally again. Yay!

Lately I’ve been keeping my eye out for a grain mill, one of those things that takes wheat and turns it into flour and things like that. I had been holding out for the Cadillac of grain mills, a Diamant D525. Turns out I really don’t like the thought of spending around $1000 on a mill, go figure.  So, my next pick was a Quaker City F4, with a retail of around $250 for the base raw cast iron model,  or a little more for the fancy TIN coated one that makes clean up easier. I just happened to be looking on E-bey for some blacksmithing stuff and saw a QC F4 for sale, $75 as is missing parts. The kicker was, it was the TIN coated fancy one. The ‘Buy It Now’ button was firmly smacked and it was in my mailbox a few days later.

 

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It is in great shape except the missing clamp to hold it down and a few bolts and wingnuts. I contacted Quaker City about replacement parts, clamp $75 and bolts a few bucks apiece. Nope, not going to pay that price. I have a machine shop in the garage for goodness sake, no way I’m paying $75 for a damn C-clamp with a hole in it. Off I went to OSH and picked up a 4″ C-clamp, some STAINLESS bolts and wingnuts, and a can of semi-gloss black spray paint. Total cost, $12 freaking dollars.

Score.

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Take a look, there is almost no wear on the grinding plates. And… they are metal plates. None of the stone ground, wear your teeth out eating fine rock crap for me. The light surface rust will go away with the first milling, I’ll run a small bit of wheat through it and toss the results from the first rough grind.

Ok, time to modify the C-Clamp. A little work with the hack saw, drill press, and belt sander was all it took. About 20 minutes total while listening to Pandora and this is the result.

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Fits like a glove and holds the mill tight and true. Spray Bomb love made it look good.

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Put it all together after a thorough bath in suds, bleach, and hot water and ended up with this beauty for under $90 and a little attention.

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And for those of you who know me, no, I didn’t wait more than 10 minutes to see how well it worked. I’m really happy with it. The grinding plates are like brand new and haven’t even worn in the spacing bosses yet, so I expected some course flour. Turns out even with the ‘virgin’ plates it turned out really nice wheat flour that made some really good bread. A little more than 3 cups of flour took about 15 minutes since I was playing with the settings. Figure I could do it under 10 minutes once I get a feel for the mill.

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Sorry, no pics of the bread. It and a can of Red Feather butter disappeared before I even thought about taking pics.    😉