[goodcompanion]

@Countymouse 21235 wrote:

Perhaps there is a practical reason that so many oxen people start with calves?

Very good question, I’ve wondered this myself. Any takers?

[goodcompanion]

@OldKat 21229 wrote:

Wow, I had no idea rice would grow that far north. I suspect that you only will get one cutting rather than a first mid-summer and a bonus cut in the fall? Right? Be ready for geese to invade your fallow rice field if you are on a flyway. We use to have as many as 20,000 to 30,000 feeding on the fields behind our house. I miss those days.

The area where I grew up use to be a major rice producing area, and has been lost to suburban sprawl in the past 20 to 30 years. But I heard that the oldtimers used herds of cattle that they would drive back and forth in flooded fields to “puddle” the ground. I think this was in preparation of seeding, but I don’t know for sure.

Are you actually growing your rice in flooded fields or are you growing it dry land?

In this climate the rice is started in a greenhouse in April, transplanted into standing water in the paddy in mid-May, and harvested in September. This is pretty much the same schedule as is used in northern Japan. This type of rice can’t be grown dryland to good effect.

I actually visited a bunch of rice farms in northern Japan when I lived there 10 years ago but I wasn’t paying that much attention. Never occurred to me that I’d develop an interest in growing such crops.

The cultivars I am using are cool-temperature-tolerant short grain brown sticky rice. We grew 23 lbs this year. Next year going for 500! We made a little huller out of a corona crank mill and it worked okay. We had a little with dinner and it was fine.

I would bet that the feet of the ox alone would provide pretty good puddling action.

[goodcompanion]

@bivol 21231 wrote:

also, there was a method, i think, called rice-duck-fish. it’s an integrated system where ducklings and small fish are introduced in paddies once the rice stalks are at a certain age.
if the ducks grow up along rice, they won’t try to eat it (at least from what i red). instead they concentrate on slugs, snails, and other vermin. they fertilize the field, and are ready for slaughter at the time the fields are dried.
fish (talpia i think) are also released in the field and eat agae and stuff, grow up till the fields are drained.
this system was used in china and japan.

heads up anyway…

Ah, well, that’s exactly what I’m going to try and do here. Maybe minus the fish, we’ll see. Takuro Furano, the author of the main English book in that integrated system, also uses grown ducks to agitate the soil for the “puddling” step in place of tractors or draft animals. That has potential too!

[goodcompanion]

I had turkeys in my barley this year. Damage to my livelihood was light, but it was still irritating to see them parked there gnawing on the crop. I called the fish and game wardens and they gave me free rein to shoot a few. Easiest way to make the rest go away, they said.

I don’t know about them eating your sprouts, now. I just know I’d rather eat them than watch them eat the least valuable of my stuff. I wouldn’t be able to sit tight and watch them eating broadcast seed off the surface.

But back to my barley story for a second–the turkeys must have known my bloodthirsty frame of mind somehow and made themselves scarce before I could outfit myself with the right firearm. So, maybe if you just think really hard about killing turkeys that will be enough to give them a bad vibe.

[goodcompanion]

Supposedly Robert Burns was driving a plow with a coulter (when he rendered the “wee sleekit tim’rous beastie” (featured in “To a mouse”) homeless. I guess it could have been either oxen or horses pulling the “murd’rous pattle.” In my mind’s eye it was always horses.

Ayrshire is fine arable country, and with the Scots penchant for engineering, was probably among the first areas in the world to benefit from agricultural innovations.

[goodcompanion]

@jac 21102 wrote:

. but then a lot of folks think Mel Gibsons version of events are true:rolleyes:..
John

I guess a bit of misinformation is the price of freedom. Or perhaps the price of…

FREEEEEEEDOMMM!

Anyway, I remember reading that Rabbie Burns wasna sae mich o’ a farmer. That it was more his brother Gilbert who took care of the farm while Robert ran around Ayrshire precipitating crises with various women. But steady-state farmers are boring, who wants to read about them?

[goodcompanion]

I got my cultimulcher from Shipshe Farm supply, saw it demonstrated last year at NEAPFD. It does have those rollers with the spirally-attached steel rods. I got the 5 foot wide model which pulls with 2-3 horses for around $1600.

I could add that the cultimulcher has been a great training tool for a horse I am breaking of running with equipment. You can apply or remove load by raising or lowering the sweep tines. Can’t run too far with those sweeps engaged!

[goodcompanion]

I remember a situation like what you’re describing. Lots of harrowing will eventually solve it, once the cover crop breaks down enough. It cost me a few weeks as I remember. Very frustrating.

Now I use a cultimulcher with the rollers fore and aft, danish sweep tines in the middle. It is the end-all of cover crop termination and general purpose harrowing tools.

[goodcompanion]

Right on! I like those shafts!

[goodcompanion]

A treadmill-v belt-mill arrangement would probably be one that would work well in such a place. Depending on how many tons needed to be ground/juiced, of course, the treadmill and other machinery need to be sized appropriately. Plus the treadmill could run a pump or a generator if appropriate, when not milling grain juicing cane.

The pieces are going to be pretty heavy and expensive to ship. For a gristmill arrangement (again, I don’t know about juicers) probably you could get it there and set up for $10k or so.

[goodcompanion]

You could just buy a horse treadmill, for which there is a dedicated thread elsewhere on this site, and link it to a meadows mill or similar with a v-belt or chain. This would be easy to do with new-manufactured components. I don’t know about cane juicers but I would bet that could be powered with your treadmill too.

I haven’t heard or seen a horse-powered gristmill outside of a pre-civil war museum setting. I imagine the dressing of the custom stone alone would probably run you double the cost of the treadmill and the new meadows mill both together.

What exactly are you trying to accomplish, and what are your requirements, and why do you have them?

[goodcompanion]

It’s not my horse I’m worried about. It’s being hit by a car, or inadvertently causing a car-car collision. My horse has behaved quite well throughout, but we have nevertheless had near misses due to the behavior of motorists.

[goodcompanion]

I will add that I’m happy to be the one supplying the “kitchen.” It’s my bakery’s stove that gets uprooted to cook up a storm. It is capable of broiling, cooking, baking, and griddling most anything you might imagine and will be available for general use for the whole event. It has six burners, 24″x24″ griddle, broiler, and two ovens. Any thoughts germane to the camp kitchen setup and what I might outfit it with to be most useful, you can let Jen know, or me directly.

Also, if anyone with a good towing vehicle going from the Champlain valley to the event and back could give my kitchen trailer a lift there and back, that would be very much appreciated and worthy of recognition and/or compensation.

[goodcompanion]

The bakery wagon is used about every other week to attend Vergennes market. It is a big eye-catcher when present. It leads to some good conversations and maybe a few extra sales. My horse also has learned to be very attentive, mindful, and sensible on the roads, and does the job barefoot with no problem.Also very fun to drive, when no cars are present.

But there’s the rub. As every ardent bicyclist knows, cars rule the roads. I worry not about some unpredictable thing the horse might do so much as the what the motorists might do. People do weird and erratic things confronted with a horse or any other non-standard thing in the road. For instance, person one comes up behind you and tails very slowly and cautiously. Second car comes up behind and does the same thing, following the first car. Pretty soon you have a train of eight cautious cars. Then the ninth car comes along, says, hell with this, and tears past the line and swerves in front of you just in time to miss oncoming traffic. Then the rest of the train, now out of patience and having seen that car #9 got past without causing a wreck, then follows suit, in no particular order, and with varying degrees of caution.

In the relatively few trips I’ve taken, I’ve seen more near-misses than I would like to. Don’t care to be the recipient or the indirect cause of any accident. Also because of the risk factor, using the wagon is something I can’t delegate. When I’m pressed for time I often just don’t use it and we attend market in the conventional way (which I can delegate).

Thanks for asking. I guess I can say I’ve learned a little about the possibilities of this idea, and a lot about the limitations.

[goodcompanion]

Any number of ways to approach this problem limited only by your imagination and maybe a few pesky zoning ordinances.

If you file for a building permit for your “real” house that allows you two years to occupy, maybe with possible extensions for extra years, many townships are pretty lenient on sub-standard residency while a building permit is valid. So this can allow you a fair while of living in imaginative housing while you plan and build properly.

People overwinter in yurts in climates colder than new york state. They are small and easy to heat. A double layer of canvas holds in more heat than you’d think.

I have also seen hi-end mobile houses. There are some youtube videos of these things around too. Just build a real well-built house with real insulated wood walls and a gable roof with a sleeping loft on a 16′ x 8′ utility trailer frame. Then when you build your real house you can sell it, rent it out, move your grandma into it, whatever. I was on the cusp of building one for interns and figured it would run about $3000 in materials. Two people could probably stand to live in one without killing each other if they got along real well going into the experience.

And second above comments about smaller bedrooms and houses in general in the not-too-recent past. I once lived in a house of 600 ft2, 20 x 30, two small bedrooms, little bath, small but functional kitchen and living room. Not too terrible to build such a thing and add onto it later, though multiple foundation excavations and pours are a pain and involve some wasted money and effort.

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