Yep, things are complicated.

I have managed my little orchard in completely organic ways, which takes quite a lot of effort and knowledge of insect life cycles, degree days, weather conditions, etc.

More recently I did use some pesticides, but I personally have used the same (supposedly relatively safe) chemicals used in agriculture. One problem with backyard products is they mix lots of stuff together so that a homeowner only has to spray and not think about what they are doing, but really only certain insecticides or fungicides are needed at certain times. It is better to be aware of the current situation and mix specifically what you need. This reduces the overall input into the environment. But it takes more work.

My best results were obtained with only two sprays, one just before and one after bloom, using malathion (the same insecticide used all over for mosquito spray programs) and captan (fungicide), neither of which are systemic like the neonicotinoids are (I think they are anyway). Then, I put plastic baggies over the apples, one by one! A physical barrier like that works reasonably well. It's a common method in Japan where they sell fruit for much higher prices, so they can justify the added labor for bagging individual fruit.

But even with the supposed relative safety of some of these chemicals, I don't like it. In the rest of our yard and garden, we never use any kind of sprays or lawn treatments etc. But, our neighbors do! The chemlawn truck is there frequently spraying their lawn and trees with who knows what. It drifts around, the kids run around in it, and there you go. You can't avoid it.

Hopefully understanding about bee CCD will continue to improve. When I was a kid growing up in concord grape country in western NY, the grape farmers used parathion and paraquat. I remember big clouds of the stuff encompassing the tractor, and the farmers wore full suits and respirators. They would come off completely drenched. Both of those have been banned; they were highly toxic to non-target organisms "including humans"! So I think we are much better than we were, but still the effects of extremely low levels of things on the complex web of life make one wonder.

Alas, this year I'm giving up on my home orcharding...cut down the peach and cherry trees, and going to cut down probably 8 of my 10 heirloom apples. Pear trees will stay. Back yard orcharding really requires too much effort to get something, between the massive insect and fungus pressure from neighboring woods, racoons, birds, and years like this where warm spells followed by cold snaps ruin the fruit set.

Probably you're right. I've been expecting payback, now that we're used to summer weather in March, what would be crueler than a big April snowstorm...

I'm in Michigan...don't know what's weirder, that I've been able to prepare and paint my house trim in mid March, or that I've been bitten by mosquitos already. It is certainly extraordinary.

Wow, $200 for two of them...I think you got the deal of a lifetime! On low heat setting, 1 lb/hr, it will run for almost 3 days on one hopper full. It's a pretty low heat setting; level 3 will get you a day on a hopper and pretty good heat.

Mine is s/n 3771 so yours are definitely older. Check the condition of the augers; if they are original they should need replacing by now (the center one at least), if they've been burning every year anyway.

I might be wrong here, but "Europa 75" implies an older one, like I have. They have burn programs for corn, pellets, and wheat. I think more recent stoves have burn pots specific to different fuels, so there is more to it than just pressing a button. If it is an older one, there will be three buttons on the panel, one for each fuel.

They are GREAT stoves, I have been very pleased with mine. Hopefully you can get one running well, you got a great deal anyway. I can't help much with problems, mine hasn't really had any other than a worn out auger - but it still works OK even with that.

If one is working, well, try it! Assuming you have it installed, vented and all, clean it out well. Vacuum behind the doors, the combustion fan is behind the door on the back wall on the right side. Take out the burn pot, clean out the air holes, scrape any deposits off (soaking it in warm water helps). Clean the augers like that too. You can check the fuses, on the backside of panel on the left side of the stove, or just see if it runs.

When it's back together, just fill the burn pot about 2/3 full with pellets, and prepare some starter pellets. Probably you know all these details, but anyway, I use a baby jar full of pellets with Heet gasline antifreeze (methanol), but isopropyl will work, mineral spirits, biodiesel, etc. If you use Heet, just use a tablespoon or less, and soak them only for 30 seconds.

(The stove is probably empty of pellets. There is a procedure for priming the auger, but to be honest I've never done that. It will usually start feeding in time to keep things going, but if I am starting up after having run completely out of pellets, I just open the door a few times and throw a handful of pellets in the burn pot until it starts feeding).

Throw the starter pellets in the burn pot, throw in a match (with volatile stuff like Heet, don't get your hand anywhere near the pot, it will poof), close the door, then hit the green "pellet" button on the left side of the stove, and that's it. There's a 30 minute startup cycle during which you can't do anything. After that it will be on heat level 3, with ash and combustion air set at 10. You can adjust ash and air up and down from there, depending on your fuel, draft, etc. With no center auger in mine, I tend to run ash pretty high, around 18, and air at 12-15 to minimize soot buildup on the window.

Mine's on the 4th winter now, and it was a floor model when I got it. Zero problems except for the worn out auger. They draw only around 20 watts, really low power use, and are efficient burning too. They are not as high heat output as some, and I almost never burn mine above level 3, but it's perfect for my house.

Yeah, well, in the meantime it keeps getting warmer and warmer. What a great winter! Mild, so much sun. It's going to be close, but I might make it through the year using only 2 tons of pellets, usually I use between 3-3.5 tons for a season. Amazing! My stove is off for a while most every day, it's been so nice.

I use Heet gasline antifreeze, which is almost 100% methanol, and pretty darn cheap. Works very fast and easy. I just fill a baby food jar with pellets, put in probably a teaspoon or two of heet, coat the pellets for maybe 30 seconds, dump them in the burn pot, and throw in a match. There is always a poof from the vapors, and the fire is going instantly.

I guess there is some risk. I'm always careful to not let vapors accumulate for long. But, I think, with only a teaspoon or so, in an open environment, you can't cause a big problem. I did worry, though, that if there was too much solvent, enough so it could drip down through the pellets into the burn pot, then vapors could build up in the ash drawer and cause a problem.

I used my torch for a while last year. It's not as fast as the methanol, and I found I would end up leaving the torch upstairs so I didn't have to keep running up and down to the basement. Then my kids became curious about the torch, so that had to stop.

Biodiesel works, probably like kerosene and the heavier solvents. These tend to not soak into the pellets as much, and start slower. But they do work fine.

Most important thing is to be careful regardless! I remember the thread on the old forum of a daughter that got burned pretty bad starting up one of these things. One always has to be aware of the danger.

Eh? The unemployment rate is coming down, clearly the trend is in the right direction even if the current rate is slightly higher than it was in 01/09 when the President took office.

Your figure of 300,000 people giving up last week is incorrect. It was last month, and it was 315,000. Hmmm, what about the month before? 182,000 people were so encouraged, they started looking for work again. In the whole year up to Nov 2011? All of 67,000 people became discouraged. So, some historical context can help interpret the numbers.

The only place I ever hear about Soros is from people complaining about him or Buffet running things. But other than that, evidence seems to be lacking. And there's no anarchy around here, or Sharia law, so who knows what you're seeing.

(BTW, consider there are two sides to a story. The "occupy" movements could be viewed as anarchy, or as a great thing to see in a free nation, people voicing their opinions without being massacred. I choose to view them as the latter; if you view them as anarchy, perhaps you'd feel more secure in, say, Syria )

Class warfare?

www.businessweek.com/news/2011-12-07/rai...rs-nick-hanauer.html

Ummm, absolutely!

At least his glasses have some transmissivity to them...

The local astronomy club had a moon viewing last night, geared towards kids. Took my 10 yr old daughter, it was a great night, warm too. A variety of scopes were there, up to 12". We looked at the moon, Jupiter and its moons, the ring nebula, a comet (2009 something or other) in the constellation Hercules, and some binary stars.

It was fun. Made me want to build or buy a telescope and get back to the pleasure of pondering all that is out there.

Nice work, Mary!

I was ignoring all the Katy Perry tunes my kids listen to, until I saw how freakin' HOT she is. Whoa.

I think the analogy of a household budget to the US economy is certainly not accurate, or even that useful. They are completely different things, with different rules and constraints.

That's ridiculous, we're not broke. We can borrow at practically the lowest rates ever. We're still the #1 economy in the world. Broke means you can't pay your bills. We can pay our bills. We are clearly NOT broke, by any usual definition of the word.

It seemed to me to be more of a distraction. You originally posted that countries that have spent more than 18% of GDP inevitably go broke, which I think is false, including the example of the USA (ignoring the obvious fact that all countries will eventually go broke sometime).

I see no evidence for this 18% "rule" and your questions on other topics didn't seem pertinent.

People seem to grab onto these little tidbits ("uh-oh, 18%, we're doomed") when as far as I can see they have no basis in reality.

What's with all the questions? Does it help? Should we answer each one? Did you learn to post videos from that other guy? If wikipedia can't be trusted, can youtube? Is it dinnertime?

I thought we did in the '40's.