peds

Heras makes a fine run, and is sought after. Bury flat the thickest mesh you can afford around the entire outer perimeter, or just lay on the ground and let the grass grow through it. This deters burrowing predators. Use the same mesh across in strips for the roof, and ideally cover at least ½, ideally all of it, with a decent tarp or better. They prefer a dry run. Ensure sufficient ventilation if using the plastic of an IBC, they sweat something rotten. Cut a strip out and reseal with mesh,or keep holes small enough to prevent access for mink etc. Completely removable bottom is necessary for ease of cleaning. Bark-on-stick perches, replaceable from the forest floor when needed, are preferred for grip.

I might try other glues in the future, but I really can't complain about the clear Tec7. Adds a good waterproof layer on the outside of the seam, too. I tend to always have an open and in-date tube these days, otherwise I think it'd be a pricey enough fix. I'd agree with that, a stitch in time definitely saves nine in this case.

Djaknow how you can get chainsaw chaps to put over regular trousers... ...and you can wear gaiters on your lower legs and boot tops to keep rain, mud, grit, and everything out... Wait, wait, just hear me out here... ...could you wear kevlar gaiters, maybe jonky home-made ones from an old pair of chaps, I don't know... to give a little bit of protection over your nice comfortable climbing crocs, or whatever you choose to wear? It'd work, right? Or, yeah, just try really hard not to tickle your toes with your nose.

Now, I've tec7'd the soles on a few pairs of trainers before... it's actually an upgrade... would you do it on chainsaw boots?

My opinion is worthless, I still climb in my ancient Treehogs which are just fine for me, and I really don't climb enough to make it worth upgrading at the moment. To be honest, if I'm doing a big apple tree with a silky, I'm doing it in my trainers. I have taken on board recommendations for the Scafell Lite though... but I've not even bothered to check where the closest place to me is to try them on. Maybe some better climbers will be along shortly to share more extensive wisdom and experience than I have 😉

You should never buy any footwear that costs well into triple figures without trying them on first, unless you already have intimate knowledge of brand sizing and shape. Recommendations are grand, but they don't mean a thing unless you can try them on.

Doesn't help when idiots scatter it all over their driveways to kill moss, either.

Would you like to borrow my reading glasses? It's clearly a dehydrated eucalyptus.

This one is nice, and only 76 quid!

What if you cut it into shorter lengths to fit it in a smaller parcel then stuck in back together upon arrival?

Yeah, 2h45m drive from our base in Sligo so an early enough start, and we had to stop briefly to herd some escaped cattle on the road. That's life in rural Ireland, I suppose.

Man, I wish you'd have told me this at 6am today, I'd have tried to make a bit more time to chat with the vendors there. Douglas forest and garden was there, Petzl, someone else, and my friend and colleague Mark at Safety Strand. But we just didn't have time to mingle with anyone, unfortunately. I've bought a couple of things online from him. Sounds like a great exercise yer man Greg Marah organised, and it's exactly the kind of thing people need to spend more, more, more time doing. We used one wheel of his van as an anchor for one half of our twin twin haul system. Don't think we left much of a dent.

A bit of fun for my crowd today at the 2nd annual Rope Rescue Interoperability Workshop in Dublin. As a mountain rescue team we are more used to dealing with rocks, cliffs, trees, and the natural world, but it's most interesting to be dropped into a more industrial setting to see if our systems and procedures will work on girders, gantries, sewers, that sort of thing. Not many good pictures, but we were short handed and pretty busy! Dublin Fire Brigade training centre Haul a search dog and handler up into this abandoned building, locate the casualty (broken tib and fib), package them, lower them back down. (Sadly, no photos of us hauling this search dog and handler up to where they needed to be, but isn't he a handsome chap all the same.) Underground rave in this mock-up sewer system, suspected overdose. Wrestle the stretcher through the pipes, grab the casualty, haul her aloft again. Ah no, some bellend has dropped a big chunk of iron on this poor sod. Best lift it off and try to get his heart started again. Tricky enough with not many hands available, two twin rope haul systems either side of the weight to lift, then carefully pay out on one to walk it a safe distance away from the casualty. Top craic, we were here last year for the first version, and were thrilled to be invited back for round 2. Already looking forward to next year.

Sounds interesting, I'll stick that on at some point when I need to fill the air with sound. Not now, early night. Somewhat related to prescribing nature; I've always been amused by the concept of horticultural therapy (which does of course work wonders for all sorts of people, for all sorts of problems, with a lot of data to back it up), and I've often wondered where you would find the upper boundary of a therapeutic amount of hands-in-compost time, and how it compares to the average workload of your average horticulturalist. Because potting on primroses and violas doesn't feel very therapeutic after the first few thousand. 20240913_165501.mp4

It isn't wasteful. It is the creation of biochar and wood ash, both useful soil amendments. Right, that's it. I'm out.

Hm. Woodchip is a soil amendment, as is biochar, as is - when used correctly - wood ash. A substance that is a combination of any of the above, in whatever proportions, is also a soil amendment. I think we are somehow straying from the point here. Not sure there ever was one, to be honest.

I see. But if you are using woodchip as a soil amendment anyway, those trace elements will be going into the ground all the same. It's definitely not something I'd be losing any sleep over, unless the organic material to char came from around somewhere suspect. But then I wouldn't be using that as either char or chip... I know some people like to biochar pallet wood as a way of getting rid of it... but who knows where those pallets have been before? I'd not be growing my lettuces in it!

What nasty stuff? It's woodchip...

Useful stuff all right, especially for abused soil, but it's not the magical cure-all that a lot of people tout it to be, and if you've already got decent soil then you don't really need it. But it is lovely stuff. A lot of faffy procedures around to produce it too... I just make a good fire in an old metal bin incinerator and burn it to embers, dump a load of woodchip on it, let it burn for a bit then hose it down.

Burn small enough bits and then put it out before completion, and you are creating biochar. Absolutely essential in the most fashionable compost blends these days.

A logical and reasonable response.

I cannot wait to see what's going to explode tomorrow. Also... lots of legitimate targets in morgues and hospitals, but there's also a lot of reports coming in of wives and children ending up mangled. So, par for the course for this shitty war.

Forgive my ignorance here, but would there ever be a form of TPO which stipulates that the tree must be maintained in such a manner that it wouldn't get the chance to escape or become a problem or just otherwise continue to be a tree? That an apple tree, or indeed a whole orchard, could sneak through with the necessary occasional pruning, without having to apply for the work every time? Not necessarily relating to this poor apple tree, just in general. Established big hedges in historical areas, urban Street trees, that sort of thing... Edit: To the OP, knock the tree down, plant at least 3 more, slightly further away.

Well like many aquatic delicacies, the bit of a sea urchin you eat is just the eggs or milt, so if the idea of swallowing a fat cumshot is off-putting to you at all, best steer clear. More for the rest of us! Yummy yum yum. It isn't fishy at all in the sense of salmon, mackerel, the juice-at-the-bottom-of-a-tub-of-prawns, you know the sort of thing; it is (when fresh) a clean, mineral, umami-driven hit of protein, not a mouthful of brine like with an oyster (still delicious), but a rich, silky, yielding, buttery little nugget of gold. Seriously, they are proper tasty.