Spent many years trying to get planted as early as possible and getting bit in the ass many times by late frost. Except for kale and broccoli I’m only going to get one planting in anyway. Now I wait until the start of the second week in June to plant out. It helps me sleep at night instead of laying there in thermometer panic.
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If you sprinkle water on the plants before the sun comes up, they will live. Frost damage is the burning of the leaves from the sun being magnified by the ice crystals. I am sure you already knew that though. 
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It is being said that the last ship from China has departed. If so, no more of all the electronic components that keep your cars and trucks running unless someone had the foresight to load up their inventories. I highly doubt that. This will be interesting.
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Interesting it will for sure. Last ship I dont think so. What I am wondering if you guys feel something of this one man show. The average Joe has to pay… I dont want to talk politics and it is never black or white, just want to know if things are changing. Container prices dropped for sure.
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It really isn’t a one man show. The idea for balancing the trade deficit goes back to 2008. It had full bi-partisan support. We have been working on putting ourselves in a position we could do something like this for about 15 years. It has been time to build out some new manufacturing and change the sourcing at least out of China to more trade friendly countries.
We will see a hit in prices in -some- products. I don’t know how deeply it will impact our overall market. It might not effect some items, and others will see significant price increases.
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I think Dubyne has some good points, but I also think he is exaggerating the ill effects of the trade war. Yes there will be disruptions, but to say it will never go back to the smoothness of yesterday is hyperbole. There were severe disruptions during Covid, but trade recovered. China is already looking to negotiate as they have much more to lose than the US. For the Chinese Communist Party it is an existential crisis. Their hold on power is tenuous and threatened by the looming economic disaster. I think there will be some price increases and a lot of job loses, but there will be a recovery and the US will be in a better position ultimately.
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China manufactures approximately 30% of all goods globally. Include Chinese controlled plants in Asia but outside the mainland and the percentage is even higher. It is an absolute juggernaut.
It took a while to get here. It will take a while to get that lost manufacturing back. Abrupt, huge tariffs do not give time for domestic production to step in, they just cause chaos.
Instead of crazy tariffs, the US needs a national industrial policy and the patience to spend a decade or two investing in new plants and training people (or robots) to run them. That’s the only way to balance trade without stopping it all together.
Our US political cycle doesn’t support that kind of long term thinking, so I’m not going to hold my breath but fingers crossed.
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It is exactly what we did. It started in 2008, but probably the earliest/best documentation is the 2009 Recovery and Reinvestment Act which passed almost unanimously. We started attacking mainly the Energy sector since we all use it, and high oil prices gum up the economy. It has been fairly consistent, even with the ebb and flows between administrations. But also to use suppliers outside of China, that are more trade friendly.
That is why I said, we aren’t in the worst position to apply tariffs and certainly in a MUCH better position then 2008.
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You have to go back way farther than 2008. If there is one thing the globalists have an abundance of is patience. If you have a lot of time and patience of your own then you can go back to the 1870’s in America when the country was basically sold to the bankers in London. Connect the dots and you find after several aborted attempts the Federal Reserve system was finally installed. Through two engineered world wars the owners of the world banking system were able to consolidate their holdings and basically hold the mortgages of the US and all European countries. Then Japan and then Korea. After Nixon opened trade relations with China in the service of the Rockefeller’s their bag man, George HW Bush went there and established the framework for the industrialization of that nation. Not easy research, but not theory either.
A scene from a 1976 movie. Toward the end you hear the WEF propaganda long before Karl Schwab assured you that you would own nothing and be happy.
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This gentleman always fascinates me. Gives me hope for the the old days. He is 80 in the video but there are also vidros of him exerciseing at 100. Leon Štukelj, a Slovenian legend.
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i meant the recent attempt at an industrialization policy that put us in a position to change the trade around a bit.
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I came across this interesting method of making charcoal. Great if you have a bunch of used motor oil to get rid of…
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Here is something I didn’t know …this Allis Chalmers has a distributor from a Farmall H in it. I didn’t know that would work.
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Please forward to youall’s better half that they may have a wonderful Mother’s day: The world needs our mothers as they are the inspiration that drives tomorrow.
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Finally got to quit feeding the wood stove yesterday. Been doing it every day since 10-16-24. I’m very happy to get a five month reprieve now. I have been processing the waste from it. Just about done other than the last weeks worth of ash and char. I haven’t been running the gasifier to feed the generator since last fall because I normally just use it to charge batteries for the lights in the greenhouse and I didn’t do anything in there this winter. Just too much snow to fight through this year and I don’t have that much fight left in me. So anyway, from what I’ve burned this winter I have ground and recovered 200 gallons of fuel sized char, About that much Ash but most of that and 50 gallons of char went to keeping the road driveable. I got about 40 gallons of bio-char from the grinding process that I have to get charged with NPK. Was not sure a few times this winter if I was going to make it when I was daily shoveling a head high tunnel through the snow to get out to the wood pile but everything is greening up now and the birds and squirrels are outside the window chasing each other around. I’m trying to remember why. Memory is the second thing to go. Anyway it’s good to be alive.
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When you are a babe . . . it really is, day-by-day.
Matured and vibrant; it is year-by-year.
TomH. you, me and others it is now Season-by-Season.
You did make it. Good for another Season, eh.
Regards
Steve Unruh
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Up here we’ve had an unusually cold spring. Buds started to burst in a couple of less cool days a month ago, but most species have been on hold ever since. Still burning wood on and off to keep warm indoors and I’ve been using longjohns and a woollen hat most days working outdoors. Only a few light rains so far and I’ve still not mowed the lawn. Put the potatoes down a couple days ago, but the soil still lacks the heat to make things happen.
This is probably the coolest spring in dacades. I don’t recall still burning firewood in May. I usually stop during April and rely on hydro-solar until fall.
Midsummer is coming up in a few weeks and we will be on our way towards winter again. I’ve procrastinated and saved several chores for summertime. It will be a busy day.
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You are a funny guy J-O 
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The woodburner never stops overhere. Now only sanitair water. Every three days the buffer is empty. Maybe spend a few days insulating.
This round two today. Maybe tonight another one.
In a few years it will be electric during summer. Now the e-contract is bether.
Maybe time to install the new boiler. If work lets it. Mmm. Probably not then.
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Today I ran the weed wacker for an hour using E-10 treated with Ethanol Shield and a little left over Stabil. This gas was purchased and treated on October 6, and the Stihl trimmer ran on it without any problem. In case you are wondering how long you can store E-10. Not going to find out just how long it will be viable. I’ll dump it what I have stored in a vehicle and start over in the fall.
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