jdmidwest

1/2 inch of ice and sleet here. Building up on trees and power lines since 3. Some power out in town. It will be slick and nasty in morning.

Nice job. The trouble with making your own poppers is the time invested. It kinda makes you sad to look at that little masterpiece stuck up in a tree limb just out of reach.

Do you have to use their screws with the pocket system or will any screw work? I was thinking about using the system to join bee boxes, but I like a good strong exterior screw for them.

I was thinking he should just check out a shocking rig, call MDC for the permit, and go over to the Gasconade. Gar get pretty sluggish in cold weather. Hard to get them any other way this time of year.

I run across this company on a beekeeping web tonight and found some interesting products. The 2 I am interested in are the circular saw jig that allows you to set it and follow a straight edge. That would elimate my rigging when I need to cut something larger than my table saw table. And the other is the box joiner system that eliminates rabbets or dado's. Anyone one here use any of their products? Do they work or is it hype? http://www.kregtool.com/prodlist.html

And I did not get my lettuce in the ground.. I walked into a Farm and Home store today and noticed seed potatoes and it hit me. I am slackin this year. I still have not pulled the mater stakes from last year. Normally on or around Valentines Day, lettuce, radishes, and other cold crops hit the dirt. But not this year, all of my areas are just like I left them last fall. I have been busy building up wooden wares for the apiary. I have 3 complete new hives built, 3 5 frame nuc boxes built, and 2 swarm traps. I spent Sat making up frames. I cut up 5 dozen top bars for the frames and ripped some lumber down for the sides and bottom bars. New cedar boards are coming next week and I can build some more hives. The apiary may get larger than I first anticipated. Instead of making honey this year, I am going to concentrate on making bees. I plan on splitting my hives and hope to have 5 or more by the end of the summer. I am also on a swarm list with the local pest control company, who knows what I will pick up there. And I made another contact this week for possibly 5 hives on another property this summer. As of now, the one hive is making it thru the winter and 2 more small hives are on order for the end of March. Foundation, feeders, and a new bee jacket is rolling in this week UPS. I may not get much fishing done this year either. I guess I will have to put my glass on my raised beds this weekend to dry them out some. I need to clean up the main garden also. Maybe spread a little lime.

Its an amazing piece of engineering, but I never took a shine to one. I know of a few that has them and like them. I tied a few on them at a fly tying get together one time and did not really care for it. I have used a Renzetti Traveller since back in the early 90's. I love the rotary feature for some flies and the ability to flip the fly over and see if I tied it the same all the way around. My latest Renzetti is the cam jaw version. It has a screw to lock the rotary down to keep it from turning if you don't need the rotary. Before that it was a Thompson A vice. I have tied on a Regal Rotary. I like the ability to mount a hook fast but I found the head gets in the way when tying.

I love the Crawfish Etoufee and Crawfish Stir Fry at Broussards in Cape Girardeau. I wish the weather was a little better, been wanting to set my traps out and catch some. The want a mint now days for crawfish meat at the store.

Must be a SW Mo thing. I have never heard of him either.

It is a lake you have to know real well to fish effectly. Since it is open, small winds kick it up pretty bad. Lots of stumps and fallen cypress, moss and other things to hang up on. But it has excellent topwater bass late in the season.

Under Feinsteins Ban, you would be. Both of you would have to go thru a background check system for a private, face to face sale.

I am sorry, but how would you like it for the government to tell you what type of fishing rod to use? Some nutball runs amoke and beats someone to death with a fishing rod, then all of the liberals that don't understand fishing rods start trying to take your rod away.

Stumpy. Was thru Friday, main pool is back up from the drought. It is a shallow lake that is used to flood the timber units of the hunting portion. This year it was too low to draw water from, so no timber hunting. Bass, crappie, bluegill are great at times. Excellent pickerel. I think a few record book fish have come from it, pickerel, gar, and grennel. In summer it is 80 percent covered with duck weed, coontail, and water lily. Average depth 5 to 8 foot. Warms up pretty good in summer, I have seen water temps in the low 90's. It is closed to fishing from Oct thru the end of middle zone duck season for ducks. Upper half is a refuge area. Stanley Creek near by on Mingo offers some good fishing too in one of the last bottomland swampy areas in SE MO.

You bring up a good point about the game cam on public property just happening to catch a mountain lion on an elk carcass. Did the person stake one to the ground or tie it to a tree for bait? Or did they just shoot it and leave it lay for the buzzards and lions? I am not too familiar to lions, do they eat carrion or fresh meat killed by their own claws.

Yes, it may be a chicken little response. But recent elections have proven that people don't always seem to elect the right people. I will not say "It can not happen". And with the new SCOTUS we have lost support their too. And the sky fell in Russia this week, so chicken little was right. Main thing that needs to be done is WRITE your representatives and let them know how you feel. Both Ruger and Smith and Wesson websites have links to your State and Federal representatives to help get our message out.

Good eating

A bill introduced into the State Legislation this week by STL area Democrats. If passed, all "assault weapons and semi auto handguns with more than 10 round capacity and feeding devices that hold more than 10 rounds" will be banned. Owners will have 90 days to dispose of them or be in violation of the law. You can ship them to other states in case you don't wish to destroy them. http://www.stltoday.com/news/state-and-regional/missouri/mo-democrats-propose-assault-weapon-ban/article_a1e7ef85-ae97-57b0-bb85-a1b2bed51f80.html This is the most extreme proposal I have seen to date. It exceeds the Federal proposal. Time to write some more letters. The best part is the one about sending the banned stuff to another state. If it is such a problem, why would you want to give it to someone else?

I just bought a little android Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 7.0 that has built in gps and wifi, no phone chip. I use Sundroid, tells you sunrise and sunset for location, draws precise location off the gps. Mapdroyd for road maps, you can cache several states on it. A digital compass app, don't remember the name. Both are free. I am looking at a couple of topo apps that are paid, same thing, you can download the maps and use them off line. I have digital topos that are in adobe pdf format on it and use the adobe app to read them, works good too. You just can't use the gps to fix your location on them like the other programs.

Looks like a little snail darter snuck in and spermed the egg on the nest. Snail darter/smallmouth hybrid.

My neighbor has been trying to hunt the squirrels out of the 10 acre patch of woods behind our property. He has killed 28 this season. I have not been able to plant sweet corn for about 5 years now. They either cut it off at the ground as it is growing or strip it just before the ears ripen. I have a big hickory at the corner of the lot next to the garden. When the leaves dropped this year, there were 7 squirrel nests in it where they were camped out this summer picking off my maters. They have gotten too smart for my traps. When I do catch one, the neighbor dogs tear up the trap trying to get into it.

It used to be like that over here too, but that has changed alot. I see alot more on creeks and streams than I used too.

I did not have the heart to tell him that.

My Mom and Dad used to ski that lake years ago when they were dating. Dam busted one time in a big flood and drained it. Upper end has silted and filled with gravel around the church camp. We used to fish below the Hwy bridge from the shut ins down a way to the upper portion of the lake but never fished the main body of water. I never really thought about smallies in the lake, but it makes since.

And a slight jab to the MDC. I run into my bee mentor yesterday, a fine old man of 89. I have learned alot from him the past few years, he is like my third Grandpa. I notice some red on his fingers that looked like blood and asked him "did you cut your self or something"? He looked down and said "Oh that, its just red paint". He proceed into story mode and explained about all of the troubles he has had with the city squirrels eating his pecans, digging up his garden, and other problems with them. He has been trapping them for years. I had seen a few of them. Some of them ended up in the stew pot, but most he relocated to the Elks Lodge about a mile away. One day after he released a trapped one, he went inside for a beer and sit down next to a retired MDC employee and struck up a conversation. The MDC guy told him he was wasting his time, the squirrel would probably be back home before he got there. So my mentor had an idea. He was going to test that theory and prove him wrong. That is where the red paint on his hand come from. "I paint the little c suckers red to see if they really return, and I have not seen any of the red ones back in my yard". That made my day. So if you are ever in my neck of the and see a red latex painted squirrel, you know where they come from. I hope that 40 years from now I am still going like him.

Changes need to be or we can just all go down the local aquairum and zoo to enjoy what once was. Seen any free roaming bison lately? Just give my neighbors a few more years and I might see one....