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- dominiquer60Moderator
Yes that is a good one, seen it a few times now, also a pair pulling a tour bus out of a bad spot. I only wish it was that easy on Carl and his team Sunday night.
Erikadominiquer60ModeratorI have no place chairing finance committee also, I volunteered for membership because I may have an inkling of skills for such and it was an empty committee. I don’t want to get into the “Not It” game, but I also don’t want to get way over my head. We will have to decide at another time.
Erika
dominiquer60ModeratorI suppose it depends on what you want to do and what is available to you. Where I live there are plenty of western belly backer type and D ring harnesses, both types work well for most situations, but they have their strengths and weaknesses. What kind of harness is available in your area?
Erika
dominiquer60Moderator“I actually am even more bummed now…. man it would have come out really slick I bet.”
Tim and Carl,
Though it would be really awesome to try again and set up the pulley, I am afraid that the disc harrow has been unloaded and to do it without would just not be an accurate reenactment of the situation. Also I am not sure that I could get up the hill without the disc on board. I do agree that it could have potentially come out rather well that way. I guess it is food for thought until your driveway consumes another helpless blond and you get to try it out:)Erika
dominiquer60ModeratorJust to clarify, under the fiance committees,I think Neal and I are the membership sub committee not the communication committee.
Erikadominiquer60ModeratorJust to clarify, under the fiance committees,I think Neal and I are the membership sub committee not the communication committee.
Erikadominiquer60ModeratorGeoff,
The potluck was a driving factor for sure, and man was it totally worth it. I also had my “friend” Bazel as a co=pilot, he told me all the tricks on the way up. A minor factor may have been the brand new rear snows, 2 tractor weights and the disc that I had just picked up from Ben (that sweet little one that Carl posted for him). Carl’s driveway was actually less of a challenge to get up than Ben’s, yet Ben’s was less of a challenge to descend, it had a couple inches of fresh white on it, Carl’s was rather well packed.Dale did a little body work today and the T100 is ready to take on the town again. No harm done to the truck, I hope the same can be said for those horses.
Erika
dominiquer60ModeratorThere was consensus.
It seemed that the big concern for us was loosing the sense of community that is the largest thing that draws us together everyyear. But we hated to loose such an opportunity to have NOFA do a lot of leg work, pay bills, pay one of us to coordinate the event and the exposure of our organization to so many more people than we normally attract.
To address this we decided that we have to have another “in the field” event that is more of a social techincal draft dork gathering. Jay Bailey is completely willing to hold this event at his farm. It will be more of a “Howevale” (this was the farm that we were supposed to work on Friday when it rained) time with community meals made right there with home grown food. We can have our annual meeting then and it will be in September if I recall correctly.
Also David had the sense that in 2012 and hopefully for many years, the NOFA gathering will again all be on the campus with the farm, so things will be less spread out and more cozy after this year.
We didn’t want to give up this opportunity or our sense of community so hopefully with these two events we can do both and redistribute the work load so that Carl and Lisa can enjoy the actual events for once:)
Erika
dominiquer60ModeratorI should have said something, I was wondering about a pulley, I even looked to see if there was an good tree to hitch it on, but I really don’t know much about these things so I just kept my mouth shut:(
It was a lot on the horses and I don’t know how we would have done it with out them. The tow strap certainly helped, and once Carl was at an angle that I could see him, I was able to better my timing when I let my foot off the brake. Once we got a good rhythm going we got it out of there inch by inch.
Tim sadly I don’t usually park there, after 5 winters in Florida and generally avoiding such narrow steep drives with a 2WD, I had forgotten how to use my E brake. It worked amazingly well once Carl reminded me I could use it for more than just parking:) Perhaps I will stick to visiting Central VT in fair weather.
Again Carl I can not thank you enough, sorry to put the horses through that, and the shoe, and fresh cut. Folks like you have plenty to do without fools like me adding to it. Just let me know what I can do to return the favor someday.
Carl for your curiosity, I looked it up, the GVW for my truck is 3, 320 pounds, add me, the dog, 200# of tractor weights, a disc and all the junk under and behind my seat and I am sure that we were at least 4300 pounds. Those are some good horses, yes sir.
Erika
dominiquer60ModeratorSeed orders and trying to keep up with the youngsters training, hopefully I will help Dale saw up enough siding to enclosed our sugar shack this week. Last week was the first time I got to see the old Ireland mill go to work, it is a dandy.
Erika
dominiquer60ModeratorSickle Hock,
Our farm, back in the day (1940), bought a brand new horse drawn John Deere grain drill. The unused tounge, yoke and eveners is still up in the rafters. Every year we carefully take it out to seed down our oats that we need for feed, at the same time we also seed down clover, brome and timothy for the next hay rotation. It does a good job. Once oats are done it carefully gets cleaned and oiled and put away for the year.
We do several other cover crops for the vegetable ground and our winter rye crop for seed and straw. We could take the old John Deere out, but we are perfectly happy to use a handheld or tractor broadcast spinner and a harrow or disc for these crops (winter and annual rye, clover, oats and peas, etc). It seems like once our season gets going there is no time for cleaning and caring for the old John Deere like we should, so we do things the quicker way. Or perhaps not quicker when I use my cattle to harrow the crop in, but they work handy in odd shaped or small plots, and I enjoy working them and look for any reason to do so. The only disadvantage I see is that we put down twice the seeding rate with this method, especially for cover crops when we want a really thick stand for biomass.
Erika
dominiquer60ModeratorDavid,
I sent a letter to over 40 people that started with the paragraph below. My apologies if you did not get it. Thank you Geoff for sending a reminder, it is nice to have someone else reminding folks, shows that there is some real interest from our side.
ErikaDecember 29th, 2010
Dear Supporting and Founding Members,
The DAPNet transition team would like to invite you to a potluck debriefing of the 2010 NEAPFD at Earthwise Farm and Forest, Bethel, Vt on January 16th, potluck at 1pm followed by the meeting from 2-4pm. This invitation is being extended to DAPNet founding members, NEAPFD helpers, individuals that want to join a committee and everyone that joined the first conference call on 11/8/10. In addition to NEAPFD we will also try to come to some consensus on how to start to organize the structure of DAPNet so it can better serve our goals. Also a DAPNet newsletter is in the works to be released in Jan/Feb, we need your contributions and help finding advertisers. It sounds like a lot, but many hands make light work, and we will be sharing good food with some great company.
dominiquer60ModeratorJohn,
“I suppose the Amish communities could be termed as some of the islands of humanity that Carl mentions”
Just to shed a little light on the Amish, not all Amish communities/families are equal. Some spray crops with horses, use GMO’s, buy lots of foreign goods at Walmart and hire a neighbor with a vehicle to drive them everywhere (only using the horse for church). There are so many variations in the Amish community. You have David Klein who is an organic grass based dairyman and then you have some of my friends Amish neighbors that will buy in and sell anything as “Amish” for a buck. As with any group of people there are good and bad.
I would wager that even with their autos, Carl and his family have quite a few of today’s Amish beat as far as energy conservation and self sufficiency. Just remember that it takes all types, and even the Amish have their bad apples when it comes to making it in the future.
Erika
dominiquer60ModeratorErik and Carl, I agree with you both.
dominiquer60ModeratorSounds like a great time for all, wish I could make it. We are working on the calender function on the DAPNet site. It should be working soon and would be another good place to post your event.
Have a great time,
Erika - AuthorPosts