Today I acquired...........

Seadog · Mar 21, 2022

Happy birthday Tom :thumbup:

Nick DV · Mar 21, 2022

Happy Birthday Tom, have a great day :drunk:

Mick Annick · Mar 21, 2022

Rannsachair said:
57 today, a few gifts from my Amazon wish list influenced by this forum: Bosch knife, knipex snips.... My son is building me a control panel with invertor for the new mill.
View attachment 338511

Happy Birthday Tom, dunno what use that hammer is though to an metal botherer…

Rannsachair · Mar 21, 2022

Mick Annick said:
Happy Birthday Tom, dunno what use that hammer is though to an metal botherer…

I am rubbish at woodwork, though been doing a lot around the house recently so thought a quality hammer would be a nice to have, half the rubber grip has come off my old one. Should probably of asked on here what to buy, Estwig reviews were pretty good.

RichardM · Mar 21, 2022

@Rannsachair Happy Birthday - but the important question is "when is the mill arriving?"

Migmac · Mar 21, 2022

Happy birthday Tom

Onoff · Mar 21, 2022

DAPPH said:
Run your bean & pea trenches north to south like grape vines & potatoes etc. if you can so the plants get sunshine on both sides of the plants for a better harvest .

Line the bottom of the bean trench in six inches of sopping wet newspaper , cover that with six inches of horse muck to make the hot bed and top it over with six inches of fairly fine sieved soil so once the roots reach the nice moist bed the beans will have a consistent level of moisture to draw upon . If you don't have enough bean sticks use two 8 foot tall upright posts set true & stabilized with adjusting < guy ropes at each end use 18 inch long stakes and a cross bar then bring off the bar to make a tall tent shape .

Use as many 6 mm guy ropes as needed to be pegged out a foot or so from the centre line . Plant the seedlings or sow seeds an inch or so to one side of these stakes two or three plants /seed per string . Use slug pellets regularly to protect emerging new bean shoots as slugs & snails just love them or better still if you have th money use a nematode slug & snail killer as they don't harm birds , pets & hedgehogs .
It's also a good idea to plant /sow in pots an extra half dozen beans in case you need urgent replacements ,.they can always be composted if they are not needed by the time the plants are 18 inches tall.

You can do the same for your peas too as they are stronger than the traditional willow wand or bamboo wigwam growing frames) Once you start to get flowers on th plants help set the flowers in the cooler late afternoon with a fine spray headed hose so insects are more attracted to the flowers by scent and the chance of a gentle drink . The spraying also helps agitate the flowers to put pollen in the air for self fertilization as well.

When Munchkin was 8 ( 12 years ago ) I set up an automatic time clocked micro misting watering system , we grew loads 42 inch long runner beans on our bean bed made up as above . Not one of them was woody /scaly or otherwise in edible . Consistent access to the best nutrient rich moisture laden growth medium is the key here .

Over the years moving the deep bean & pea beds over the blue clay garden a few feet each year we've managed to deep dig and fertilize much of the back garden .
I also fed the bean & pea beds with a gallon of tomatorite type liquid feed down old sink waste pipes directly into the top of the newspaper base once the flowers had got going and kept doing it till the frosts killed the plants . Picking regularly we'd more than enough legumes for three families as well as the three of us . I still dry , freeze , pickle or pressure canned the surpluses . These days now there is only two of us I've changed things a bit so there is less heavy work & not so much veg .

Takling to my wife yesterday if Putin carries on being a nutter past the end of the month that may well change as I'll be growing and storing a much as I can .

Cheers. I'll sit down and take that all in a bit later. Very roughly below, the red lines show the plot front and side boundaries. The yellow line the approx bean trench which will run north east to south west. North to south would offend my sense of symmetry!

Saying that the feng shui may be better...

25.4_mechanic · Mar 21, 2022

Onoff said:
North to south would offend my sense of symmetry!

It'll be totally fine the way you planed it NE to SW - provided the pic is northed-in. :clapping:

No long shadows from the southern sun, a bit in the evening from the big tree near the house wouldn't hurt - maybe you can even water earlier in the day this way and it dried up a bit before the slugs come out at night.

btw: We don't use chemicals against slugs,

1) because: no poison, no artificial fertiliser, no F1 hybrids, no terminator seeds, no patented seeds;

2) it would also kill the snail with the nice name Tigerschnegel here, Limax maximus (tiger angel or tiger snail perhaps?)

which feeds from the eggs and offspring of all the other slugs .... and they are hungry :thumbup:

3) in a year with not enough tiger snails or just too many slugs we use beer-traps, the cheapest sort will do.

Good success!

Carsten

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slim_boy_fat · Mar 21, 2022

25.4_mechanic said:
we use beer-traps

At least they then die 'happy' :laughing:

Onoff · Mar 21, 2022

Won't be using slug bait. Too few hedgehogs as it is. Nematodes maybe?

Plus we have the giant, edible Roman snail that migrated from nearby Lullingstone.

JMS1972 · Mar 21, 2022

DennisCA said:
Acquired a hex nut ER-32 collet holder a while ago, last night I used it for the first time, turns out it's not very concentric, I was wondering why my part was turning out so weird.... Cheap chinese crap...

I've got one like that :doh:

keep meaning to correct it on the mill at some point.

Onoff · Mar 21, 2022

Sorry mods, just realised it's getting a bit gardeny here!

Arc Tourist · Mar 21, 2022

Rannsachair said:
57 today, a few gifts from my Amazon wish list influenced by this forum: Bosch knife, knipex snips.... My son is building me a control panel with invertor for the new mill.
View attachment 338511

Happy Birthday young man. :thumbup:

Some nice pressies you have there.

Rannsachair · Mar 21, 2022

Arc Tourist said:
Happy Birthday young man. Some nice pressies you have there.

Also in my other post, I have had a delivery

Arc Tourist · Mar 21, 2022

Today while dropping off some bags of rubbish at the recycling centre, I spent £2 at the recycling "shed" as they call it. Got a cheap ( unused ) plastic
welding shield, a couple of very small stainless steel bowls, and a cool cup which appeared new its ratty cardboard box.