Episode-1501- Listener Calls for 1-16-15
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Today on The Survival Podcast I take your calls to 866-65-THINK
Today on The Survival Podcast I take your calls on chickens, bees, dehydration, plant propagation, permaculture, communications, technology, business, the prepper marketplace and more.
Remember to be on a show like this one just pick up your phone and call 866-65-THINK. The best way to improve your chances of being on the air is ask your question or make your point up front, then provide details.
Also please do your best to call from a quiet area with a good connection and speak up so you can be well heard.
While I can’t put all calls on the air but I do my best to get as many of them on as I can.
Join Me Today As I Respond to Your Calls and Discuss…
- Last day for GenForward, we are so close!
- What is up with chickens eating dog poop
- Getting into bees and feral vs. purchased bees
- Thoughts on dehydrators and dehydration for food storage
- Propagation of elders, bilberry an goji from seed
- Thought on observation before permaculture design and the “1-year rule”
- Dealing with remotely owned land that you want to retire to some day
- Thoughts on suburban backyard ducks
- What percentage of Americans live a preparedness lifestyle
- Using wild grapes as grafting stock for other cultivars
- Steven Harris on “Software Defined Radio” (SDRs)
- What a real time traffic app based on social media can teach us about anarchism
- Can you use russian olive for a “root stock” well yea but not for much
- Can you raise Muscovy ducks in a semi wild manner, yep, but
Resources for today’s show…
- Join the Members Brigade
- The Year 1501
- Join Our Forum
- Walking To Freedom
- GenForward.com
- TSP Gear
- PermaEthos.com
- AgriTrue.com
- Sawtooth Tactical – (sponsor of the day)
- Bulk Ammo – (sponsor of the day)
- Radios1234.com
- Steven1234.com
- Waze.com – Social Media Style GPS Traffic App
Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon. Also please enter our listener appreciation contest and help spread the word about our show. Also remember you can call in your questions and comments to 866-65-THINK (866-658-4465) and you might hear yourself on the air.
Also remember we have an expert council you can address your calls to. If you do this you should email me right after your call at jack at thesurvivalpodcast.com with expert council call in the subject line. In the body of your email tell me that you just called in a question for the council and what number you called in from. I will then give the call priority when I screen calls.
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GenForward just crossed $20,200+. Almost there folks! It’s a great idea Jack, I can’t wait to get started on it.
The Geoff Lawton video was the apple/avocado orchard one. It was towards the end of the video. If I remember it rightly it was his son in law or something like that who researched it online and made it.
I wanted to respond to the gentleman who asked about ducks on his 20 acre location with the large pond. No worries man. I grew up in a similar location and we raised Muscovey ducks and a few other varieties. They are tuff self reliant ducks and the reproduction is great. We did have predators, mink, weasel, racoons etc. We did lose an occassional duck, but it never seemend to make much of a dent in the population. Also, we did not feed our ducks except in winter we would toss some crack corn to them and maybe some bread. The idea of a deer feeder is great. Also once we “homed” the first birds it was never needed again. The mother ducks would teach the new fledglings the ropes and away they would go. They would nest in close to the house often in a corner behind shrubs. You might need to help them with nesting habitat if you have lots of predator issues. They were good at letting us handle them, mainly i think because i would pick them up all the time and when mothers were nesting I would lift them up checking for the babies to hatch. Once the babies hatched I would pick them up and play with them (ok yes a kid does this kind of stuff). I think you will be amazed at how easy this is for you. Have fun…they are really great ducks. A floating refuge in the pond is a very good idea too. They should use it and you will probably find wild ducks are starting to show up on your place too. Cheers!
On SDR, here’s how to do it for $40:
http://spectrum.ieee.org/geek-life/hands-on/a-40-softwaredefined-radio
Ok. I know ducks. Unfortunately, they’ve had to be confined. I now own an 18.5 acre homestead: 7.5 acres hardwood, 3.1 acres pine that needs pulped, & around 8 acres overgrown fields & homestead built in 1977 with tobacco barn built in 1945, home w/complete basement including usda licensed commercial kitchen, shed, chicken coop, (all needs fenced) in East Tennessee …
This round I’ve raised from ducklings 12 cayugas, 2 duclaire, 2 Peking & one brown swede. Six total are drakes. A friend wants 4 drakes for their freezer.
I currently maintain an L-shaped chain link run made up of 6’x10′ panels in a 30’x20′ configuration. There are 2 35 mil garage floor mats 14×7′ each overlapping 8″. The run is on a slope. The other 3′ walkway I’ve lined with 3×4′ anti-fatigue stall mats over rounded river rock or pond pebbles. Also in the run are 2 large plastic doghouses lined with hay.
The run is currently tarped. However, plans include PVC roofing from Craigslist which works great as predator protection and directing rain away. I can hose poop off the entire run, refill water bowls and kiddie pools in 20-40 minutes depending on how long I can dedicate to the daily “hose bath!!” Lol! I wish I could post some pics! There are hundreds in my phone library! :o)
Also in the run is a portable “chicken barn” from my old place with a predator proof mini run a few feet tall. The side where winds blow is tarped on the chainlink. I love my ducks!!
Jack,
could you do a show on how we can harvest a profitable crop from a permaculture food forest / silvo pasture system?
I’m looking at a few properties from 13 to 70+ acres and have plans to convert these currently standard AG (corn/soy) into self sufficient permaculture properties of awesomeness. I’ve watched a bunch of Geoff Lawton’s stuff, am taking the PermaEthos PDC, watched Permaculture Orchard and Restoration Agriculture. I understand how to build it and run animals through it, just not harvesting efficiently and marketing.
Perhaps you could make it two shows. One on harvesting a medium size to larger permaculture plot, the other on marketing (though you have covered businesses before…)
Thanks!!!
Follow up, I should note, I have been gardening since I started listening (about 2008/2009), but small scale, a few beds, a few fruit trees and bushes.
I come from an engineering background (computer security), so no farming experience really, just big ambitions.
Jack, your view on Sharia/Judaic/Christian laws. Exactly! There is not and never has been ‘religious’ violence, there is only political violence Really enjoy the daily podcast, particularly the ‘This Year’ segment.
(Just heard the part about frost)
Here I am 7 am on a saturday (went to bed late, doesn’t matter 7am is the wakeup call). Just fed the animals and made my rounds. Wrote down the temperature in my farm journal of 33 degrees and noticed the frost across everything.
I have definitely confirmed (as you might imagine) planting frost sensitive trees up against the south side of a forest (so the trees get southernly light right now) particularly when that forest is evergreen, does leaps and bounds about protection tress from frost. I have 3 avocados under there and no frost to be found.
When you answered the question about dehydrators, you said you would post a link to the Geoff Lawton video that featured a solar dehydrator – if you had time. I don’t see the link in your show notes. It was “From Monoculture to Permature” at 5:15 into the video. http://www.geofflawton.com/fe/76230-from-monoculture-to-permaculture.
A question about elderberries. Are there any varieties that are not edible? I work for a landscape contractor, so I can get some 15 gallon Sambuca for really cheap from one of my nurseries. They are Sambuca Mexicana, which from what I have read is a variant of the Sambuca Nigra. I’ve read the barries from the Mexicana are eatable, and are not. Does anyone know for sure?
I can’t say for sure on the Mexica, but the Reds (Racemosa) are a lot of work to make edible.
Quick note on waze. I love and use this app, but on Android specifically, if you use bluetooth audio it can cause problems. It misbehaves (bug or intentional, I’m not sure), and to hijacks the ‘audio focus’, so if you are using the Android TSP app (or any other audio app) and you lose the ability to control the audio via bluetooth, it’s probably because of waze. Amazon MP3 is another app that does this as well.
I’d like to second the waze app. I’ve been using this app for about a year. When someone ahead of you sees that there’s a wreck ahead, something in the road, vehicle on the side of the road, inclement weather, road work and yes police shooting radar they add it to the app and the app will alert you. If you see something you can add it also. It’s a great community of folks heading down the road.
I had been using this app up until about a year ago, however using it for directions it sent me to the wrong location twice for job site meetings. It was way off, like 10 miles. Not sure if the built-in navigation has gotten better, but because I couldn’t rely on accurate directions I stopped using it. Your mileage may vary, as I often travel to some pretty off the beaten path locations (though the apple map app seems to do fine).
As far as using it for traffic hazards and a heads up on cops, it was pretty good. Obviously works better on more highly traveled roads and around population centers, but a cool example of the power of community sourced information.
Without confining ducks at night, how do you protect them from night time predators like racoons?
First and foremost I’d not take that apprach but the most logical approach is
1. Livestock Guardian Dogs
2. Islands on a Pond
3. Muscovies and let them roost in trees, wrap said trees in sheet metal to thwart climbing racoons.
You mentioned you have a duck house/shed/building, do you close the door at night and let them out in the morning to protect them?
They are fenced but not closed in the house, one door stays open. They have two geese that live with them that provide attention. On the rare occasion that something upsets them they geese go NUTS. You hear them even if you are asleep. If that happens Charlie and Max are put out, anything out there at that point meaning harm to the birds has a real big problem, well two of them.
For FAST growing and cheap protective hedgerow I would probably go for Gleditschia triacanthos (I think that’s the thorny as hell variety of honey locust).
On that note locust would do well period. Few hundred black locust seedlings 18 inches apart grown as a hedge, 2 years later equals, nope not gonna cross it.
Not another Steve Harris question, when will the transcriptions end!!!
On a serious note, I get the logic on a laptop using more power. But always looking to consolidate my gear. More gear = $$$ and space.
Thanks for the question about grafting on to wild grapes. We’ve got those things everywhere down in SWFL, and I’d been letting some grow along my fence and gate with the plan of grafting some productive muscadines on to them. I was planning on giving it a shot anyhow, but it’s awesome to know it has a good chance of working.
Also, Waze rocks.
Hey Jack and fellow TSP listeners,
Thanks so much for all the great info. Just wanted to mention that we have raised Muscovies ( 20-35 at a time) for several years and wanted to mention that yes, a muscovy will lay her eggs in an elevated nest, as ours have lain in the chicken nests often, that are 2-3 ft. above ground, if that makes any difference to your muscovy raising operation. In other words, a muscovy (like any self sustaining/adaptable critter) will nest in any place that seems safe to them.
I’ve been thinking about “stocking” my large pond with muscovy ducks as well. My main concern is the winter…I’m in NH. When the pond freezes over, their food and protection source is gone and they’ll become fully dependent. Wracking my brain for ideas on working around this. Sounds like they could probably roost in trees, but food and water will be 100% on me for 3-4 months. Am I right?
Steve was talking about the power usage for using a SDR through your computer. A much better approach would be to use a Android app. All android phones use USB so you can easily connect the SRD to your phone or tablet.
WAZE! this is probably the best app i’ve ever used. Waze is great for looking ahead and avoiding hours of waiting in traffic. I was using it on the road trip to the PE fall festival and I saw traffic starting to backup in front of us, it immediately directed me to the next exit a mile ahead and it took us on a service road that ran directly among the backed up interstate for 7 miles. It took us to the first exit that was clear of the jam and we the open interstate to ourselves. It was so funny watching all the cars just sitting there for so many miles. I always scroll ahead on my maps to see where traffic is backed up and you can gauge where the speed traps are. But, beware that waze will go wacky on you and send you off to nowhere land on rare occasions. I always verify routes with google maps navigation to avoid it and typically run both apps at the same time, google maps for primary navigation and waze to check for shorter routes or travel issues ahead. 2 is 1 and being prepared right?! I’m using android so not sure how you ipeoples are going to like it. I know that iphones don’t know how to navigate anyway so you’re probably better off with waze then the native i-nav app. You can make travel groups of waze users and use it to track family or your travel party ect.
Cheers, Joe
oh and can’t wait for the plant course!
anyone that wants rugosa seeds reply to this comment. I picked a quart bag of dried hips this winter when visiting up north.