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Vole & Gopher Wars

2023-08-23

If you have been following along, you know that we have been having a lot of problems with voles, and likely gophers as well. We are still uncertain about gophers, as we have seen them occasionally, but have never captured one in a trap. In any case, the underground dwelling and root eating critters have forced us to grow only in felt bags in our orchard, with almost every other plant getting destroyed. A few exceptions are the fruit trees. Most of them are mature now. We lost most of our original live tea plants that we bought and placed in the orchard. A few were dug up and moved to other locations and have, so far, mostly survived. We also have lost all but one or two of the blue and black elderberry bushes we planted in the orchard. And even the one or two that remain are stunted and haven't yet produced any berries. So I decided to try some 'gopher' bags and stainless steel mesh to protect some new transplants. As you can see in the pics below, the S.S. bags are easy to use but seem very thin. Most wildlife sites suggest a minimum mesh size of one quarter inch. These mesh bags are much larger in at least one dimension. And they seem thin enough that the critters likely can chew through the wire. But I decided to give them a try. I'll find out within a year if they are effective at all.
I also bough a roll of stainless steel mesh. The quarter inch stainless mesh is quite expensive, even compared to the half inch mesh. So I thought I would try the half inch stuff and see if it helped at all. It is, at least, a heavy gauge wire, and welded, so it is very unlikely that any of the rodents could chew through it. I'm sure some could slip through the half inch openings, but perhaps it would be difficult enough that most would not bother. Again, time will tell. The roll is two feet wide and I cut it and formed it into cylinders and then dug holes large enough to place the cylinders with a bit of the mesh above ground. I had formed a basket with a couple earlier ones by folding the bottom over. It made for a much shallower ring of mesh, but the bottom was closed. I'm hoping that the two foot depth is enough to deter the voles without needing the bottom closed. Extension sites suggest hardware cloth of 18 inches in depth would deter most voles, and 24 to 30 inch depth would deter most gophers.
The left photo below shows a ss ring hole getting soaked before planted. The bottom right shows a kiwi planted in one of the mesh bags, folded over at the top, and inserted inside of one of the ss cylinders. The mesh bags are fairly inexpensive, so I added them to most of the cylinders as well.

Vole & Gopher Wars

2023-08-23

If you have been following along, you know that we have been having a lot of problems with voles, and likely gophers as well. We are still uncertain about gophers, as we have seen them occasionally, but have never captured one in a trap. In any case, the underground dwelling and root eating critters have forced us to grow only in felt bags in our orchard, with almost every other plant getting destroyed. A few exceptions are the fruit trees. Most of them are mature now. We lost most of our original live tea plants that we bought and placed in the orchard. A few were dug up and moved to other locations and have, so far, mostly survived. We also have lost all but one or two of the blue and black elderberry bushes we planted in the orchard. And even the one or two that remain are stunted and haven't yet produced any berries. So I decided to try some 'gopher' bags and stainless steel mesh to protect some new transplants. As you can see in the pics below, the S.S. bags are easy to use but seem very thin. Most wildlife sites suggest a minimum mesh size of one quarter inch. These mesh bags are much larger in at least one dimension. And they seem thin enough that the critters likely can chew through the wire. But I decided to give them a try. I'll find out within a year if they are effective at all.











I also bough a roll of stainless steel mesh. The quarter inch stainless mesh is quite expensive, even compared to the half inch mesh. So I thought I would try the half inch stuff and see if it helped at all. It is, at least, a heavy gauge wire, and welded, so it is very unlikely that any of the rodents could chew through it. I'm sure some could slip through the half inch openings, but perhaps it would be difficult enough that most would not bother. Again, time will tell. The roll is two feet wide and I cut it and formed it into cylinders and then dug holes large enough to place the cylinders with a bit of the mesh above ground. I had formed a basket with a couple earlier ones by folding the bottom over. It made for a much shallower ring of mesh, but the bottom was closed. I'm hoping that the two foot depth is enough to deter the voles without needing the bottom closed. Extension sites suggest hardware cloth of 18 inches in depth would deter most voles, and 24 to 30 inch depth would deter most gophers.





The left photo below shows a ss ring hole getting soaked before planted. The bottom right shows a kiwi planted in one of the mesh bags, folded over at the top, and inserted inside of one of the ss cylinders. The mesh bags are fairly inexpensive, so I added them to most of the cylinders as well.







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Merchants of Poison Report final 12/05/2022

(with 579 cited references)


Find out about: America's (now the World's) Favorite Poison By Far!


“In order to save glyphosate, the Monsanto corporation has undertaken an effort to destroy the United Nations’ cancer agency by any means possible.”[10]

... " just four companies — Bayer, Corteva (formerly DowDuPont), BASF and Syngenta/ChemChina — controlled 75 percent of plant breeding research, 60 percent of the commercial seed market, and 76 percent of global agrichemical sales in 2019."[78]



Just gotta' LOVE glyphosate, right?????

Yes, the second link is old news, but not forgotten and more importantly, as the first link shows, not remedied:

Monsanto / Bayer's Roundup Triggers Over 40 Plant Diseases and Endangers Human and Animal Health. Protect yourself and those you care about!

http://www.i-sis.org.uk/argentinasRoundupHumanTragedy.php    

http://www.NaturalNews.com/031138_Monsanto_Roundup.html

[10] Foucart, S. & Horel, S. (2019, April 7). Monsanto Papers. European Press Prize. https://www.europeanpressprize.com/article/monsanto-papers/

[78] ETC Group. (2019, April 06). New report: Putting the cartel before the horse…and farm, seeds, soil, peasants. https://www.etcgroup.org/content/new-report-putting-cartel-horse%E2%80%A6and-farm-seeds-soil-peasants

Just Say No To GMO by Michael Adams - Video
https://www.naturalnews.com/NoGMO.html

Just Say No To GMO by Michael Adams - Music
https://oregonTruffleTryst.com/_MEDIA/JustSayNoToGMO-192.mp3 Song Lyrics

Song by Mike Adams, with spoken lines from Jeffrey Smith

I’m lookin at the food that’s in the grocery store
They say it’s safe, everybody eat more.
On second thought, I don’t really know if it’s made with those GMOs

So I’m lookin for the non-GMO label ‘fore I bring it home and put it on my table
I wanna know it’s verified so I don’t
Harm myself with genetically modified

Uh-Oh
They don’t want you to know
All the poison they grow
The corporate profits they show from those GMO OH

Those Frankenseeds that they sow
They’re gonna hurt us we know
It’s time we told ‘em to go, say GMO NO!

I don’t want eat poison, I don’t want gene mutations at my dinner reservations
it’s a food abomination what they doin’ to this fast food nation
They take artificial gene combinations
inject them in seed variations
so they can grow their Frankenfood imitations
while the side effects cause medical patients

Keep their profits alive while they
spraying all the food with name brand herbicides
and all the while they’re spreadin’ their lies
Monsanto (Bayer now!) destroyin’ farmers lives
and the FDA keeps it all going
saying it’s safe even though they all know it’s just
poison stealing away your life, and that’s what you eat with genetically modified.

GMO safety huh that’s a corporate myth
if you don’t believe me listen to Jeffery Smith
He’s the man with plan gonna do what he can
To help us all get those GMOs banned
But we need you to lend a hand
take a stand against this food scam
It’s a mission for the health condition worldwide
We don’t wanna live genetically modified

Don’t eat food unless you know what’s in it
Don’t believe the propaganda cuz the press will spin it
Affects everybody, we all up in it
Stand up to Monsanto (Bayer now!), tell ‘em oh no you didn’t

Reject Frankenfoods in the store
demand honest labels so we can be informed
We have a natural right to know
What we buyin’ Just say no to GMO

Before our farms start dyin’
Just say no to GMO

Those corporate crooks are lyin’
Just say no to GMO

This time we’re not complyin’
Just say no to GMO

We’re just not buyin’ it
Just say no to GMO

Song and Lyrics © 2010 by Michael Adams, All Rights Reserved

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