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INSTEAD OF SPRAYING FUNGICIDES ON APPLES, WHICH MAKES THEM UNMARKETABLE TO HEALTH CONSCIOUS, ORGANIC PEOPLE, PLEASE FORCE SUPERFICIAL, AESTHETIC FANATICAL CONSUMERS TO ACCEPT THE HARMLESS SCAB AND BUY YOUR HEALTHY, UNSPRAYED APPLES. Please educate them that the scab is harmless and the apple is perfectly fine to eat with the scab. WE don’t pick good looking fruit because its toxic from spraying!  WHO SAYS SCABBED APPLES ARE UNMARKETABLE? -THE PESTICIDE INDUSTRY?

Dave, I read your piece on skulls with more than average interest.  I wrote an article for Northern Woodlands in the summer 2006 issue titled, “Skull Session”, about this bony subject.  I used to teach a high school biology class in which preparing animal skulls was a lab activity, and the kids absolutely loved it!  Back then, we primarily used the “pick and grin then boil” technique and had great success.  I must admit, though, that most of the odoriferous boiling was done at home in my garage over a Coleman stove.

I have used dermistid beetles for shrews and small birds.  They do a very fine job but the odor is something to get used to or not.  My next colony might just have an air vent system that uses nice active dirt as the filter… Set up a little computer fan that turns on a couple of minutes an hour.

Are the apple seeds toxic for animals? I know they give dogs seizures.

Will green cut canes sprout roots?
Thanks.

My father said when he was a kid (1920s), the old-timers called Swallowtails “piss” butterflies because they were often seen puddling around urine puddles in the pastures.

Thanks Rachel.  My family referred to “blackcaps” and as I recall that was the black raspberries, not the true blackberries.  When I was a kid and after our dairy herd was sold, our “night pasture”, about 100 acres, was solid blackberries for a number of years.  One year my father (I guess needing something to do) literally filled a chest freezer with blackberries.  I can’t even guess how many pies we had that year!

I have tied a lot of different methods including the ones you mention, and by far the best I found was what I’ve heard called maceration. It involves a bucket of water with floating bits of yuck sitting under the sink for several months, so it’s not for the faint of heart.  But it works well for the smaller, more delicate skulls.  It is a middle step between manual de-fleshing and the finishing process with the hydrogen peroxide (which also works well). But soaking the skulls ensure that no animal walks off with littler bits, and that the bone doesn’t weaken (like it can with boiling and bleach). The flesh eases off the bone and is largely eaten by bacteria, even in the brain case.  And it gets very, very clean…eventually.  It takes patience and warmish water.

I bury my skulls or a year or two and that takes care of all but bones

Way back in college I earned extra credit in a wildlife course by providing skulls for the college teaching collection. Our method for cleaning was using a mixture of bleach and water and boiling for hours and hours. If memory serves it took most of weekend day to get them cleaned up. Stunk up the entire biology hall but the finished product was nice. Still have a couple that I cleaned for myself.

Dave,

It seems there is so much to say, yet I’m speechless. Fascinating!

Ed

Russell, even better if we can get people to stop planting lawns and put in meadows with nectar sources and larval food plants- then more butterflies

I found a fairly good sized nest under the hood of my propane tank with 5 blue eggs in it today.  The nest is made of straw and feathers.  Do you have any idea what it might be?

Laura, thank you very much for this comment. In response to your post, we followed up with some dragonfly/damselfly experts, and discovered that we had a detail wrong (yikes) - though it’s not quite as you describe. We’ve corrected the essay above, but here’s more detail on what typically happens: the male inserts sperm into the female, they disconnect, and then she lays the eggs. The eggs are fertilized with the stored sperm as they are laid. But fatherhood isn’t a sure thing. If a second male mates with the female before the egg laying, the sperm of the previous male is replaced.

Nice article.
Having done business, a number of years back, with D.H. Hardwick , I can personally testify to what great people they are to work with. This article does a great job of encapsulating that.

thanks for sharing!

This was very interesting. Now if we can just get people to stop spraying poisons all over there lawns, butterflies might be more plentiful.

I think I get it, but in step two you comment about keeping the same annular ring in the center of the handle….

But, you’ve split the bolt into equal halves and quarters, yes?  So either you will just have a portion of the ring in your axe head, OR you’ll split the bolt off center so that you have the whole ring….

I’m guess it’s the first guess - You want as much of a portion of the ring as you can get…..

For most of us without milling equipment, there’s a limit to how big a bolt we can use, therefore having a handle of extremely “straight” grain seems difficult.  A big tree will no doubt produce blanks of straight grain, but not the smallish ash trees on my property.

Thanks for article.  If you can offer clarification on above thanks.

TB

Are there any good home remedies (for nettle stings) to get rid of the tingly prickly feeling?

I agree with you Mike! I’m a forestry consultant in MI, where forests are still looked at in “stands.”  I’m wondering what your suggestions are to change this outlook? I mostly write management plans for folks looking for tax breaks, but all the government cost share programs require plans written for the stand level.  Thanks!