Ranch life

Things About Tree Care I Didn’t Know

Trees are like children; they need attention. They need to be treated with tender love and care to flourish, and especially when they are young. When you live on a ranch, you are bound to learn a thing or two about taking care of trees. I recently bought a ranch with lots of trees on it and let me just say that it has been a good learning opportunity. I also made friends with some awesome local tree service guys from Tacoma who showed me a thing or two. The following are some of the things that I didn’t know but have learned along the way;

Mulching

Mulching is beneficial to trees. Covering the soil surrounding the trees with organic or non-organic matter is essential to tree care. It not only maintains the moisture in the roots but also ensures that high temperatures in the environment do not damage the roots of the tree. One thing that you should know is that how you mulch is crucial.

Putting mulch too close to the trunk of the tree, for instance, may suffocate the tree, killing it. The material used also matters as some materials may absorb heat and stress out the tree.

Pruning

On the one hand, pruning too much may damage a tree. On the other hand, not pruning may also be bad for the trees in your ranch. You want the trees to maintain a good shape, get rid of dying branches that harbor pest infestations and make room for further growth of trees. Pruning will achieve all these. However, you may get over excited with the pruning and overdo it, leading to negative consequences.

The leaves provide shade for the tree; thus too much pruning would expose it to too much sunlight weakening it, and even killing it. Too much heat is especially bad for young and thin trees which may get their barks scalded.

Maintenance

Tree maintenance never really ends. You will need to add fertilizer and mulch, prune, water it from when it is a young plant to later stages. Watering the plant, in particular, may end when it is older, and the roots have gone deep enough to source their own water. This depends on the type of tree in question.

This introduces the other point that each tree is different and there is no one set way of maintaining every type of tree. Some may need to be watered frequently, and others can survive on less water. Getting to know what each tree type needs is in your best interests to ensure that they are healthy.

Trees are beneficial to us as humans and animals as well. They are more useful to us when they are older than younger, thus require to be taken care of especially in their first years. This is the much knowledge I have acquired along the way and I hope it benefits someone who not only lives on a ranch but anyone who has tress around their houses or on their commercial property.

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Ranch life

Living on a Ranch Isn’t Nearly as Dirty as People Make It Out to Be

I’ve lived my whole life in a rural town, except for the brief time I resided in the city to get my degree in Animal Husbandry. Now, I’m back at our ranch and running the family business. The city was fascinating and I had the time of my life during the 4 years it took to earn my degree, but the country will always be where my heart is. If anything, the experience made me love and value my roots more.

That doesn’t mean I don’t have fond and interesting memories. One thing I would never forget is how surprising city folk’s ideas of ranch life are. I don’t really blame them as the extent of their experience in ranches and farms is probably limited to what they’ve seen on television or what’s portrayed in books and movies. That said, I always try to straighten people out. I can’t really continue to let them believe that us ranchers practically roll around in mud or animal waste all day. Maybe, just half the day. Kidding!

I mean, sure, we do get intimately acquainted with all things cow—cow drool, cow feces, cow smell. And there’s the occasional wading in cold, waist-high mud to retrieve a lost calf or being covered in oil and grease while repairing a truck. But we don’t walk around, perpetually covered in dirt and manure. We also mend fences, cut and bale hay, grow feeds, and bottle-feed calves and a few abandoned kittens. There are days spent cataloging inventories, negotiating, auctioning our livestock—all the things that come with running a business.

During my university years, I would always bring a different group of friends home every summer to show them how a real-life ranch operates. I like to think that the ranch was as educational and surprising to them as the city was to me.

I’m also still friends with some of my city dwelling mates and visit them for a beer or two whenever I have business in the city. They also sometimes visit me. Most of us have children now and kids love the ranch! I appreciate how my friends take the time to acquaint their kids with ranch life too.

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Woodturning

Beginners Woodturning: Getting the Best Wood Lathe to Start With

There are many different lathes out there, and as it happens, woodworking lathes are probably the ancestors to all the other types. Wood lathes were the first ones to be developed and used. They are used for making various round and radially symmetric wooden objects, such as furniture legs, or even bowls and plates.

Modern wood lathes are fairly safe to use, without risking injury to your hands. That despite the fact that the object is rotating at a rate of 200 to over a thousand rotations per minute. Typically speeds just over a thousand RPM are preferred, but for larger objects one will need to choose a lower speed.

If you are looking to purchase a wood lathe for yourself then you might be thinking of getting one from a brick-and-mortar store near you. But lately, it has become more common to purchase even such large tools online. There are several reasons for this. First, you get a much broader choice of products to choose from. Secondly, you can read reviews of any lathe that you might be interested in. And third, prices from online shops may be significantly lower than in your nearby brick-and-mortar shop. That’s even including the shipping cost.

So, if you are planning to buy a wood lathe for your woodworking projects, whether you are an amateur woodworker, or a professional woodworking shop, it makes sense for you to look through some online sites that review woodworking tools, and specifically describe the ups and downs of each model. You can then make a well-informed choice and get the best wood lathe for your money. In almost all cases, you will also be covered by a money back guarantee in case there was something wrong with the tool that you bought.

When considering the various options for the best wood lathe, there are quite a few things to keep in mind. Remember to consider the price, which is obvious, but also things like serviceability, comma that is, how easy it will be to repair the tool if something goes wrong, and portability because you never know when you have to move the tool. There are tools out there that are suitable for beginners and there are also wood lathes that are better suited for big production workshops. So make sure you do your homework and make the best choice you can.

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Woodturning

A Beginner’s Intro to Wood Turning

What do you think of when you see a pile of woods or logs just lying around? Most people would normally assume that those woods would make great firewood, make-shift bench or even a great scratching post for cats. A wood turner on the other hand, would be swamped with creative ways and ideas of turning those normal, everyday material into great pieces of art.  Turning is probably the best way to work with woods; shaping and custom-designing them into various objects of purposes. The reason it is called wood turning is because it uses a machine tool called a lathe.

A lathe is a lot like a potter’s wheel that is used to shape wet clay. A lathe however, is more specific for use with wooden block or slab. The lathe rotates the work piece on its axis, so various operations like sanding, drilling, knurling and turning can be done with relative ease. The machine’s rotation also makes it easier for the wood turner to be precise and detailed in his work. There are two methods in turning wood; spindle turning and faceplate turning, also known as bowl. The main difference between the two lies in the orientation of the wood grain, which will be important to the axis of the lathe.

Working with wood usually entails the worker to move the tools used in shaping the piece. In wood turning it is the piece that would be moving, while the cutter and other tools remain stationary. The best way to wrap your head around the concept is to delve in and get some hands-on experience. If you can have access to the tools needed, it is time to start turning simple objects. Start with the chosen material to work on. As a large wooden block can be hard or take longer to shape, wood workers usually lob the rough edges and corners with a chainsaw before turning it. Nail a plank to the four corners of the wooden block and place and clamp the plank to the saw horses for better cutting precision.

Now remove the plank from the wooden block and get a measuring tape. Measure properly and find the center of the piece, and mark it. Place the faceplate on the center and the block can now be fixed to the lathe. It is time to do some turning. For this, you will need gouges. Depending on your preferences, there are three variations of materials for the gouges. These tools need to be sharp and their materials will determine how often they would need to be sharpened. High speed steel can maintain its sharpness longer than carbon steel, but it would not stay sharp as long as powdered metal tools would.

Before you begin turning however, note that you would be working with a big chunk of spinning wood and it can be quite dangerous if your hands are not steady enough. The wood would be turning in an anti-clockwise manner. Hold the gouge upwards, roughly at 45 degrees slant and shave off the work piece as it spins toward you. You can shape it into various objects. The tools will help you gain all kinds of shapes and details. You can add intricate designs or lines to the center of the piece. You can also add a gentle curve near the base of the piece if you wish. If you want to add details to the base of the piece, then you would need to use the tools at the side of the lathe, near the tailstock or the ram that holds the piece stable.

That covers the basic concept of turning wood to make a bowl using the faceplate method. Though it all can be quite a hassle, wood turning is a great way to give a physical form to your creative visualization, and the end-product would be more than mere satisfaction. Take your time with the work, and always stay safe.

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