Foreverford

Hi all, can somebody please tell me if an Avo tree will succesfully grow in the Pattaya area

That's avocado I assume and yes it shall. Now do you want fruit? If so i would recommend to plant three different types. Even though the Avocado is unique in the fact that the flower is male with pollen the first day it opens and then becomes female thereafter to set fruit I have found that different varieties planted together stimulates the setting of fruit. We grafted many different varieties onto the same tree with literally no success. Probably almost 6 - 8 different ones and never got any fruit in California. then when we planted a new tree, after one year, the big monster tree of nearly 20 years started to put out a bunch of fruit.

The tree can be a bit quirky and if you plant many your odds will get much better. The tree has a fiberous root system so it doesn't need deep watering similar to a mango tree, for example, as its roots are near the surface and it needs constant and shallow watering at the drip line (where the canopy of the tree doesn't shade the ground). Good luck and enjoyable eating.

Hi all,

It appears that the more things change, the more they stay the same here in the land of smiles. For those of you that have read some of my previous posts, the pig sty is still not quite ready. The pigs are though and I have rehoused them at a relatives place some 15kms away in the interim. There are 8 gilts ready to be breed and my boar Bertie who is brother to 3 of the Duroc gilts in the total of 22 pigs. The plan is to establish a batch breeding operation of 4 groups of 4 sows so another unrelated boar will be needed.

So after explaining all of this to Chang Moo we returned to find out that all 8 had been served by my boar. So not only was the month gap between batches of four overlooked but some of them may have two heads or whatever. Amazing how the most carefully explained plans can be co-jai-ed then completely ignored.

I have four farrowing crates and now could need anyway from 0 to 8. Brilliant, will keep you informed.

PS. First back bacon produced is great, sorry should say was. More on the way if anyone is interested. PM me and I'll send you a picture to whet the appetite.

Isaanaussie

Sounds just delicious. Will cross paths with you and fruity as soon as I can and try to see if I can find you sopme crates near Prakon Chai. I'm no fool I don't want pictures that will make me have to wash my short after drooling on it. yum yum

Thanks, but I have it covered will use part of my 16 crate gestation layout if I have to. By the way, I sourced Fruity's crates as he couldn't get any in your area at a reasonable cost.

As an another aside I drive a Ford Ranger 4x4, used to be an operations manager for a first tier supplier to Ford in Oz, and are great mates with the local Ford team that was here some years ago.

By coinciidence we have a 2002 4 door Ranger like yours but I think this one was taken from someone who tried to import it from Australia illegally. It still has under 100k and is built to Aussie specs which are supposed to be the best in the world. It's a much sturdier truck than the Thai counterparts. Cheers

yeah....er... i was kidding... had enough contact with "baby mafia" in thailand that i know to keep my distance from real drug mafias in mexico etc.

is it so bad outside of the border areas though? surely tourists would stop going if that were the case?

Unfortunately it is so and really nowhere in general (and you can find the exceptions Todos Santos is much better than Pescadero just 7 kilometers away) is anywhere near as safe as it was nad theft has and is endemic on a large scale as everybody is constantly being ripped off by friends family and any one else that can get in on it. This is what political corruption breeds along with a police force that is not paid a living wage. Mexico was a truly delightful place 30 years ago and again still very nice up to 20 and 15 years ago but they obliterated the Agrica- Reforma laws sometime thereafter and allowed everybody to own and sell all the agricultural land and small farming villages that were acquired and then distributed back to the common folks during the revolution of Juarez, Zapata and Villa. That along with a bunch of other stuff that ai'm too lazy to write (the US banking policy and the foolish US land investments and the continued additcion to cocaine in the US) caused a new cycle to emerge into which the AMexico hassn't hit the bottom and the newest President has been somewhat completely unable to fight the corruption that is everywhere and turning more and more violent. The borders are definitely the worse unless you get to the big cities and Mexico city was a place to stay away from 20 years ago at that so I still think you are ill-informed if somewone telss tyou that mexico is the place you want to go to possible spend the next ten years or the rest of your life. I would say take a trip to the tip of Baja and just enjoy the scenery and check out LaPaz Todos Santos and San jose

Del Cabo. They are very close and convenient to visit with the most beautiful coast lines of anywhere on earth (bot the ocean and gulf sides) but I couldn't recommend livingf there unless you said you were forced to have to be living in Mexico

Choke Dee and a little buenos suerte tambien. Adios mi ninita

I follow the concept...

Ripper teeth hinge up harmlessly when moving forward,

dragging gently over the freshly dozed surface.

but lock against the back of the dozer blade when moving backward

A photo would clarify for all

The time honored method in Mae Sot is to bust the surface with a disk plow,

then push with the dozer blade.

While it works, it is cumbersome, and exerts unnecessary wear on the valuable plow.

Your method is a brilliant stroke of machine design.

Grandpa Henry Ford would be proud of you!

Well here goes and I'll try to make it short (no laughing now). I just had an experience that felt so good I know it is or will be illegal shortly. Has to be.

Anyway i arrived in Buri Ram a few years ago with a Ford 6610 on a truck with a 3 a 7 and a casava hiller. I took the hiller apart and took the 3 point frame to the local welder in Prakon Chai and gave him a few pages of drawing and selected a sheet of steel and a piece of two and a half meter mobar for a dozer blade and 4 days later we were painting a space ship (well at least they thought it was) Ford Tractor blue. I was a proud owner of a giant 3 point box scraper. Never got to use it much due to time of year other work, tractor lessons etc etc.

I recently found a fellow in Phetcheburi that sold equipment for Caterpillar motor graders and I bought 5 two foot long ripper teeth. Back to the farm and off with the front dozer blade and over to the welder, drawings in hand and shazam! I got a blade with 5 removeable ripper teeth that can be mounted facing backwards. some of locals said no good as they needed to be facing forward but with a space ship and these dragon teeth watch out.

we had a high spot in the new rice farm and had been flooded twice due to the enormous amount of rain this year and the klong blowing out the leveee road in a couple of places. Let's make this short, in two days me, one guy, and a couple grand of baht in diesel. I built nearly 300 meters of new road with some fills of over 3 feet with no lifts over 3-4 inches (not the Thai 2 1/2 foot lifts of dumping a truck and pushing out a bunch of dry dirt). I ripped it all out of the high spot on the farm found some good golden clay and saved that to top off the road at the end with the stickiest, all the soil had good moisture content and if not I blended the different one to make it right.

The illegal part was that I did it all in 6th gear and reverse. I'd drop the blade and rip in reverse then drop it in 6th and lower the box scraper and pick it all up and go somewhere and lay it all down nice and thin When i got enough down and compacted, I'd cut it down with a full box of dirt to compact it more. Two days of just almost thinking someone was going to come and get me and say i can't do it anymore. It was miles better than the old Gannon box scraper design where you had to use you hydraulics to lower your ripping teeth below your box scraper, then rip going foward, then put it in reverse and back it up, then hydraulicly lift the teeth, then (lots of "thens") put it in forward and scrape it all up.

I actually started to think they were going to really make this illegal when I ripped going back down into the farm and then shifted into 6th and dropped the box and while scraping it up I used the Dozer blade to cut away the edge of a spur road i had built earlier. It was mind boggling I thought this dozer blade on the front of a farm tractor was one of the goofiest things I had ever seen when I got here in Thailand but with a little bit of adaptation I have never accomplished more good work in such a short amount of time.

The box scraper cost about 17,000 baht to make (during the high steel prices days), everything included (except the hiller frame as I actually designed so it can be unbolted (I know it never will) and you can put the hiller discs back on). The ripper teeth and fabrication and welding of the mounting boxes and pins was pocket change. I can't see anyone investing a million baht on a 90 horsepower tractor and not investing this extra amount to create a monster.

The road was hard as cement and was properly crowned and properly sloped around the couple of turns so that I guarantee when it rains there will be no potholes, sinking or washboarding as every and almost all dirt roads (without a finish of rock and the use of a motor-grader) in Thailand are with their massive lifts of fill.

Maybe they'll just consider this type of modifications as hazardous materials like chiles and neem trees but for two days I was like a little kid again and really really enjoyed being on a tractor and it sure didn't feel like work.

And ya all know that god surely wouldn't have made farms and farmers if he wasn't going to make Ford Tractors ya got to luv em. ForeverFord

Thanks for the reply but this is much heavier-duty than hinged rippers. The teeth drop into a box (5)welded onto the back of the blade and lock onto a piece of metal that matches one of two notches that are cut out of the ripper tooth for height adjustment (these are Caterpillar teeth for their big motor graders). I've thought of cutting one more notch for a finer adjustment for cutting extremely tight rocky soils. Anyway you drop the teeth in and then put in a square pin in the same slot (with one side cut slightly on an angle) this falls into place and wedges against the tooth and can only get more secure as you use it more and it wedges a bit more into place. To remove just tap up on the pin (and many times you can pull it up with your hands) and it comes loose and the tooth can be removed. The other pins can be tapped out with the first pin and installation is probably less than 2 minutes and removal about a minute, very easy and very safe. This is similar to most installations of ripper teeth that I have seen for scrapers and motor graders. If you need to push piles of dirt you can do so with the teeth in place but can't doze flat on the ground cutting soil out. I would doze the sides of roads and levees with the teeth in but the blade a foot off the ground while I was going forward filling the bucket.

I shall post a few photos but it will be after the 10th or so as I don't have the ability to do so until then. If I had to buy a new tractor now I would probably be considering John Deere but in Thailand for used tractors it's Forever Fords

Summer vacation will soon be here. Plan on taking the family south to the beaches. How long does it take to drive from Hua Hin to Krabi? Any "must see" points of interest on the way?

Somewhere from sunrise to about noon depending on where you are going. I'd say the places to see are Krabi if this is your first trip. Forget about everything in between and get down so you have a good portion of the day to settle in and then enjoy some of the most beautiful ocean geography that you will ever see. Generally you will have to boat to a place to enjoy what Krabi has to offer and there are many boat taxis and charters avaioable at reasonable or fixed prices (also extremely reasonable). After you have been once then start to think about sidetrips on the way down or on the way back but I highly recommend just driving down as fast as possible and enjoying what Krabi has to offer. After doing that you can cut across just below Chumpon and go over to the Andaman Sea side and see Khao Lak and the coast on that side and also take a daytrip in Phang Gna to the mangove swamps. Enjoy

hrmmm ...that much violence eh... maybe i will have to do like nancy on 'weeds' and look for the mafia kingpin to hook up with and get me some protection. (idealistic much, girlx?)

Yeah right have you ever seen what happens to some of them. I remember one that survived and she was sporting all new (poor looking) ivory in her gums as the f'er who was doing all the drugs with her got tired with her like everything else in his life that made him choose the profession that he is in and just up and kicked all her teeth in for sport and then told her she wasn't pretty enough for him to protect anymore. Fine woman at one time, nearly 6 feet tall, all of her and black as the night. "Sorry baby you don't intrigue me anymore so let's make sport of you". Heck at least it's better than a bullet in the ear and throw you off the cliff or as they have been doing in Tijuana is just cutting the heads off for artistic value and dumping them at the local elementary schools for their morning lessons. Don't make a joke of the reality that too many unfortunate folks have put themselves in or are stuck living in due to their unfortunate birth in a nation of sub-human creatures. Mexico has gotten much too too ugkly. I used to tell people that were being ruled by African despots that they were still living in a near paradise as the corruption in their country was like 1st grade grammar school compared to the stuff I've seen going on in Mexico, That was nearly 20 years ago when things were somewhat civil and normal in Mexico. Now it is a Hollywood movie and you can write any script that yu want as it has already been done and it won't surprise anyone.

Cheers for the pointer FF !! I,ve been looking into green manures and plan to use a mixture of 2 or 3 maybe more rather than a monoculture (possible candidates thua dam- cow pea/ thua daeng-rice bean/ krham pa-white hoary pea/ thua pae yi-lablab bean/ mahae- pidgeon pea/thua phra-jack bean) , this one sounds excellent for short term cover and if I mix it with a couple of other species I should be able to get ground cover for the duration of the wet season (a period for which I will be returnig to the U.k.). I will also plant plenty of sweet potato-man thet (excellent for long term ground cover as well as providing a crop). At the moment I am bringing on seedlings of NFT's such as sesbania-kae ban/leucaena-krathin as well as senna siamea-khi lek ban ( this is not a nitrogen fixer but has a high nitrogen leaf content, ideal for mulch and well suited to pollarding) . The idea being that the green manures are short to mid term plants (improving the soil and suppressing invasive weeds)while the NFT's are mid term nitrogen fixers to be coppiced/pollarded shortly after the onset of the wet season to provide mulch for the fruit tree seedlings (mango, jack-fruit, longan, lychee,guava, coconut as well as some more unusual local fruits which are planted at the same time), during the dry season the NFT's provide shade for the fruit trees. I also have seedlings of Tamarind which will be my long term nitrogen fixers and I'm also trying to locate Inga edulis-Ice cream bean tree for this same purpose. Very interested in the link posted by camille , thanks! Because we are trying to imitate a natural forest (allbeit with solely fruit trees) but speed up the natural cycle by "chopping and dropping" the NFT's, shredding will speed this process even further and fungii is essential to the ecosystem !! I think I have seen shredders on sale in Chiang rai in a variety of sizes, I know that they are used for shredding the residue of maize plants after the harvest and maybe would be suitable for our purpose ! Gradually as the fruit trees grow the NFT's are phased out/shaded out and the end result should be a closed canopy of edible forest !! Also incorporated into the system are other edible plants such as eggplants, chillies, gingers, bamboos, fruit bearing vines, pineapples, roots, edible fungii and herbs ("stacking" the plants in both space and time). Well thats the theory !! now to put it into practice !! (see a thread called forest garden for some other useful links) happy organics folks !! Jandtaa

Wow you'e truly a superstar. Great ideas and lots of time and work spendt just getting the knowledge to try and put it into place. This is the first year for the green manures here in Thailand and just planted the Paw Theung and "Sanoh African" (sesbania rostrata). The Sesbania is suposed to be etched with, I believe, Sulphuric acid, for a half hour before planting but i didn't and it took a long time to germinte but is very small,still, las week with a New year's planting. It is supposed to attain a 2 meter height.

The reason I wrote is because I truly believe that Chippers (shreders) are the key to a lot of global warming problems as everything that gets burned, if it was chipped or shredded would make it very compostable and also not a fire danger. I've used some chippers that w part of a tractor trailer rig and we put 3 foot diameter Cypress trees through it to make mulch that we used to to top dress the deep rough to occlude weeds at the Harding Golf Course in San Francisco during a re-build of the course a few years back (President's Cup will be there this summer for the World angainst the US in Ryder Cup Format). I think it is one of the most impoortant pieces of equipment any municipality can own and if you as an individual can afford to get a functioning one for yourself congradulations let us all know of your success and a lot of Choke dee to ya.

Pity the dependibility didn't spill over on to their cars.

Regards

Same story in regards to simplicity and over-built reliable design for any Ford 1965 or older (the only kind I have ever owned). They were as reliable as any ever built. '65 was probably the best year and I owned nearly a dozen and a half Falcons, wagons, coupes, four doors, pick ups, you name it, but when the brushes on the generator go out in the midle of the Baja desert asnd you roll into a fishing camp on the gulf a 100 miles from nowhere and back and just walk around the abandoned broken down mess of their back yards and see a brush with wire attached sluffed off in the dusty sand and pick it u and believe it will actually fit and jury rig the other bad one you've lost your generator light and the generator is charging again and you're on the road searching for petrol and another road to somewhere on the way to nowhere. Can't beat em, no questions no lies, just the facts. I had a 65 3/4 ton flatbed that came from the factory qwith a custom "Omaha Standard" 7 foot by 8 foot flatbed. Omaha Standard is famous for making the best flatbed trailers and truck beds in America. Mine was finger jointed 1 1/2" x 8" oak that was built into the floor of the bed, on edge, so there wasn't a bull or anything that could fatigue or destroy it. It had completely removeable fold up and down sides, all the way around that wouldn't allow even Fruity's monster Indo-Brazilian bulls to be able to get their head over the top of it. You could put it in Compound low and get out of the cab and walk for a few minutes on the backroads of the Baja to get the kinks out of your body while the truck would drive itserlf down the deep rutted roads. I've parrallel parked the succker in the middle of the biggest cities in the Californias and it would do 160KPH (90 mph) no problem rolling thru LA or San Francisco. It's still running and working in the Redwood forests of California. The transfer case on that model was built by Spicer and if you owned a Dodge Power Wagon or any Gm military or civilian model full size pick-up it had the same transfer case in them. Talk about simplicity and ability to get parts. In San Diego on a Super-Bowl Sunday I was able to by a rear shaft seal and to make it better it was designed to be set in the tail end of the transfer case but because this area of the tail end was usually worn out causing tthe leaking and also the contact point to the shaft the seal you bought woyuld seat deeper into the tail of the transfer case allowing for a new contact point further in on the rear shaft and any wear issues were resolved just because people and Ford thought to look at a problem and design a repalcement part that would allow you to still use a worn part but a completely functional one with this new rear seal. That's the way it was and is if you opwn these vehicles. the closet thing I've found here to that dependability and readily available parts is an old '69 benz sedan that I've put a newer fuel injected Thonburi thai 230 engine in it. Forever Fords

Just a little PS, but my '60 T'Bird had the original paint on it when I owned it in the late 80's into 2000's and many people would assk where I had it painted. Engine and all the interior was original and without a licensce int he USA I would drive it at 200 KPH + and really enjoy the peoples faces as I rooled on by enroute to Oregon to chase some Salmon and Steelhead and to see what Kesey or the Grateful Dead might have up their sleeve for the week. 6 inches ground clearance 390 cubic inches of Ford power and my African wife saying it was a "James Bond" car because it lookede like the Batmobile well before its time. Ford had it all in the golden years of the mid 60's and anybody that was there knows just what I mean.

Hi all,

It appears that the more things change, the more they stay the same here in the land of smiles. For those of you that have read some of my previous posts, the pig sty is still not quite ready. The pigs are though and I have rehoused them at a relatives place some 15kms away in the interim. There are 8 gilts ready to be breed and my boar Bertie who is brother to 3 of the Duroc gilts in the total of 22 pigs. The plan is to establish a batch breeding operation of 4 groups of 4 sows so another unrelated boar will be needed.

So after explaining all of this to Chang Moo we returned to find out that all 8 had been served by my boar. So not only was the month gap between batches of four overlooked but some of them may have two heads or whatever. Amazing how the most carefully explained plans can be co-jai-ed then completely ignored.

I have four farrowing crates and now could need anyway from 0 to 8. Brilliant, will keep you informed.

PS. First back bacon produced is great, sorry should say was. More on the way if anyone is interested. PM me and I'll send you a picture to whet the appetite.

Isaanaussie

Sounds just delicious. Will cross paths with you and fruity as soon as I can and try to see if I can find you sopme crates near Prakon Chai. I'm no fool I don't want pictures that will make me have to wash my short after drooling on it. yum yum

Hi there Foreverford!

Sounds like a real neat idea, using the floating greenery in the compost! Maybe some of the

other guys could take this up, cos ain't a waterway or a river anywhere near where I am. At most

there's a little creek that runs on the next piece of land, but that only gets water during the wet

season - the rest of the time it's apparently quite dry. I HAVE seen the floating stuff (on the

Chao Praya, too!) and often wondered where it originally came from. hel_l, might be a good

business opportunity for someone - making black soil out of stuff passing by on the river!

But yeah, we still go to the land almost every day for a couple of hours - gotta get that firebreak

finished, as it's getting very hot here now. The work's been going slower of late, as the ground

is very dry and very hard, so the clearing work is getting harder all the time. Still, I'm pleased

to say that we only need a few more yards and it'll be finished. Well, I hope it's finished, as

we'll have to take a walk around the perimeter to make sure the grass'n'stuff hasn't bounced

back up again in the meantime - heh heh!

As you already know, we've changed our plans once - and it looks like we'll have to change

them again, especially after seeing the mess the recent bushfires made. We reckon we'll be

better off this time around by clearing the land as quickly as possible and (unfortunately),

burning the grass'n'stuff as we go - at least as long as the weather's hot and dry. Most

likely we'll revert to our original idea if (and when) the weather changes - and there's a big

enough downpour to dampen the earth for a while. Mad as I might be - I ain't risking the land

burning up (possibly along with other people's land) just to satisfy my own ego.

We're told by the locals that March month can bring a few thundery downpours, so we're waiting

patiently for the heavens to open up, then we'll take a look at things once again.

In the meantime, we're still collecting the stones in piles to build the rings when the chance

comes. Don't want to have to hurry doing that sort of work - building with loose stones needs

a little time (and patience, I guess!).

Anyway, you keep thinking up them good ideas - I'm sure there are guys that can use some or

all the ideas available - I know I can!

Hang in there!

SB

Anyone knows you're trying your best and 99% of the people out there wouldn't be giving the effort that you are to try to do the best thing. Unfortunately we can't always do the best and have to be logical. If burning is a necessity due to the fact that it is a new operation for you, let it be. Your plan is to eliminate burning entirely when you have a complete grasp of the land and what you can accomplish and you have to be commended for all the effort and the future plans you have. If it works out try to burn during the rain and that would mean that you would be able to get a good hot fire going and add to it with other piles and not worry about flying embers. Otherwise as I'm sure your neighbors have told you burn small manageable piles, one at a time, that won't allow for any big drifting embers to fly out of you piles. Also consider bringing as much water as you can each time you scoot up to the property so you can have a bit of reserve stored up for the time you start to burn. try to empty it into a large vessel (plastic garbage can?) the days that you burn and have at least one half filled bucket nearby anytime you light off a pile of cuttings. If needed you can go back to the big vessel and dip for more water as needed. two people and two buckets is good three people and two buckets a bit better. When done put the water back into small vessels that can be sealed to avoid evaporationa and keep hauling up more (you will be a recyler with all the palstic bottles you will scroung to do this Yuk Yuk)

Always remember that no matter how good a fire break you cut that flying embers can "jump" even breaks that have been bulldozed three blades wide. Though if you have a good break the fire may be contained to your property only and your good maintenance will save your neighbors. Choke Dee and keep on Scootin'

Well here goes and I'll try to make it short (no laughing now). I just had an experience that felt so good I know it is or will be illegal shortly. Has to be... Tractors ya got to luv em.

ForeverFord

i have no idea what you are talking about, but it sounds awesome. do you have some pics to share?

I don't know how to do it on this site but I can send a few now to you and you can post them or just enjoy them feel free to PM. I'll have a bunch more in a few weeks showing the entire building of the box including golf lessons for the fellow who owns the welding shop a real first class great guy who does fantastic work in Prakon Chai. Choke Dee me

mulch great stuff !! I like to use a mixture of coconut fibre (brilliant for retaining moisture), banana plants; old leaves, chopped up trunks once they have fruited and thinned suckers (all a good source of organic pottasium), burnt rice husks and weeds (altough I burn any that are seeding). I collect all these towards the end of the rainy season and start to compost them using my homebrew BIM. Once the hot phase of composting is over (about 3 weeks) and I'm happy the materials are no longer using up nitrogen to decompose I apply it my vegetable beds to a depth of about 5 inches. This is not like well matured compost used for potting but a very coarse material which breaks down slowly over the growing season, in fact the banana leaves and coconut fibre take about 10 months to fully decompose. I top this off with another 5-10 inches of rice straw into which i make planting holes down to the level of the first layer fill them with homemade potting compost and then either direct seed our plant out plug plants. By the end of the following wet season everything has completely broken down giving maybe an extra 2 inches of topsoil and I start again. This has created raised beds on clay soil from scratch without buying in any "din dam". I started after the end of the rainy season (when the clay became workable but still had good moisture content by loosening the soil to a depth of 12 inches watering in some gypsum (an organic clay breaker) and proceeding as above 3 years ago. I now have some half decent soil !! Sure its a slow process and the area I was working on was only a kitchen garden but mulch really works!! My new project is a 2 rai site and I'm taking a different approach, It's paddy field I bought a couple of years ago and after a couple of rice harvests off it I'm turning it into my home plot. In the past 2 months I've had dug 2 fishponds the spill from which has raised the level of the plot by 50-70 cms I've just finished a post and rail perimeter fence made from eucalyptus. I'm gonna try the permaculture method using NFT's and sheetmulch to try and establish a wide range of fruit trees (a forest garden). See my earlier document link for some of the methods and the thinking behind it. I'm familiar with the mulch mats used in the U.K. and have started making my own by sandwiching corrugated cardboard with layers of old feed sacks using pva glue, hopefully the plastic feed sacks will slow down the termites but who knows. Love the idea of recycled matresses and will try and pump the mother-in-law for info as she used to make and sell them according to the wife. I know that in the U.k. the use of carpet is now frowned upon by organic growers due to the residue of cleaning chemicals in them (sometimes you just dont think of these things) !! My old man taught me the trick of reclaiming wasteground years ago when he took over a very neglected allotment plot just outside Barnsley by growing comfrey pissing all over the place, laying carpet and leaving it for an entire year. You can imagine the locals (most of whom used their plots to house their pidgeon lofts and were hard as nails coal miners) faces when this southern softie turned up and proceeded as aforementioned !!! A year later though I helped him roll up the carpet and it was pure loam not a weed in sight and more worms per square foot than I've yet to see again !! He grew some fantastic veg on that site for over 10 years !! I believe he stumbled across the method in an old book by Henry Doubleday . Other methods proscribed included reversing your car over over tough brassica stalks to crush them and speed up the composting process and collecting dogends from pub ashtrays to make a nicotine insecticide, definitely a man before his time !! happy organics folks

Have a look at the green manure posting over the last few months. Paw Tuengh is a readily available bean used in Thailand and 4 hours in warm water and you can see it ready to sprout.Get it in some wet earth and in two months you'll see it flower and chop it up and work it in or add to the compost and underground you'll have that beautiful nitrogen fixed to its roots that was once part of the air you breath. Very quick germinating and growing plant that will break down extremely easily. This is the simplest form of doing organic soil enhancement on large parcels of land and is very inexpensive and a real pleasure. Note there should be some form of composted manure in the soil to guarantee that the legume will be able to fix nitrogen. Probably had water buffalo on your 2 rai forever. Enjoy and loved the stories of you and your pop showing folks that there are a few different ways to do things. Choke Dee

For me Mexico is just too close to the USA in culture and the violence is much worse than it was only a few years ago.

hrm that doesn't sound nice at all and to be honest even though sometimes i feel like i hate thailand and want to get out of here, when it comes to actually doing it i remember how much i love it here and don't want to go! and i am not someone who usually sticks around a place for very long, thailand is the only place in the world i have spent more than one consecutive year in!!!!

BUT, if i run out of work in thailand, i have no options other than teaching english really, and i would sooner die than do that. my reason for choosing mexico as a possiblity is really it's proximity to the States so i can make a run for the border if i need work- though i read today that even crappy jobs in the US like housekeeping and waitressing are getting hundreds of applicants nowadays, and are hard to get! so who knows. maybe better to be poor and homeless here? maybe i suck it up and teach?

But now let me throw out something that will cause many people to groan---India.

as much as i wanted to like india, i really did not. i went there expecting to spend at least 3 months and made a run for nepal after 11 days. i don't think i could handle living there at all. i still would like to take another trip back and see if it rubs me the right way this time, but on my first trip there i just found it so revolting and maddening... not sure that will have changed even though i am older and wiser.

Hola

I've read all the posts briefly and they hit a bunch of points. I've been here in

Thailand for 6 years 8 years before in US (uggh) and 5 years before in Kenya and 5 years previous in Baja Mexico. First traveled the Baja 40 years ago and have owned a house and a farm for about 25 years in Pescadero about 40 miles noth of Cabo San Lucas. If you want accessibility to the US then the tip of Baja is about the easiet place to get to the US from Mexico with probaly nearly 50 flights a day possibly. Don't quote me, but there were 270 some odd flights coming into the Cabo airport daily one time a few years ago when i returned to visit.

Cabo was a small couple of hundred people fishing town when i first went now there are probably a couple of hundred thousand there at times. with this has come the problems associated with it. Unfortunately recently things have escalated quite drastically and the amount of crime, serious crime, has increased big time. I have extended Mexican families down there and know the ex-govenors and plenty of people and have 40 years of my life invested down there to tell you that what I say, it isn't just off the cuff info. My good friend that I've known for 40 years and is 45 years old has his doctorate in accounting and i chose to stay at his house in San Jose Del Cabo last year when i visited and he didn't have a lot of good news to say about conditions of the Baja, and our small farm town of Pescadero where he grew up and i have my farms is in a very bad way as the people are into the rampant use of drugs and there are many many more incidents of violent crime there in this small farming town than there ever was in the entire Baja. So the problems are not isolated to the big tourist trap areas. Just north of that seaside town is Todos Santos with a huge ex-pat artist community that is world reknowned and the town is a bit safer in the over-all picture.

Soooo if you want to live in Mexico and you want the ability to run quick to the US and you want a good blend of Mexicans and ex-pats with all the modern conveniences then I would consider thinking about La Paz on the other side of the peninsula but on the beautiful Gulf of California. But with that said be advised that it is feeling growing pains and water has been a critical issue there recently. It is probably one of the safest big cities in Mexico if there is one (I've heard guadalajara is very nice but doesn't meet your criterion of Beach). I've been through Tijuana literally at least 100 times and I wouldn't want to even fly too close over it now as it is a war zone and don't get anywhere near it. Todos Santos might work for you so there are my two coastside recommendations along with a slight recommendation for San Jose Del Cabo but too much traffic and tourist influence makes it the third place choice down there.

Obviously you will have to go down and have a look and that is part of the fun of discovering a new "home" and i doing this you can't go wrong by visiting the tip of the Baja as it is one of the most beautiful geographical settings on the ocean anywhere in the entire world. It is considered to be what they call a tropical thorn forest and it meets the ocean and the gulf in all it's magnificent glory.

Another huge thought is the fact that the economic crisis is going to hit Mexico in exponetial form as the money that built the massive resorts and vacation land of the Baja and all of Mexico in general came from residential real estate and funny bank proceedures in the Us. everyone took out second loans and bought property and built down there and there is going to be a huge vacuum because all that money has gone away and won't return, the average vacationer won't be returning as they will have no money and you will be finding a lot of desperate people in and around that country. Mexico has always somewhat revelled in it's cowboy old west lawlessness image and it isn't a myth as I have been in and out of it all my life and it isn't easy for the right person iin the wrong place. i really don't think it is anything like it used to be I'll be categoric, i know, it isn't anything like it used to be and i really don't recommend it at all to anyone unless they are an old and wisened veteran of down there. It is just too too much trouble and violence now. This isn't a rookie speaking as i do have 40 years of love, life and blood in that country and I have physically dug graves and buried a few folks down there, very very good friends included. It was a paradise at one time and it is very very difficult to meet all your criterion and feel comfortable. bangkok is a walk in the park at midnight compared to most other cities down there of 1/10th the size. If I din't own property down there i would never return. Buenos suerte con todo. If you need any more info feel free to PM me if you wish more info or have questions.

I guess the model A gave ford a good working pattern as to what was required to have repeat business. I had a ford 8n as a garden and lawn tractor, it was 25 year old when I got it and it just kept going. A neighbor or 2 farmed 160 acres with the 8n and even though slow they were planting when every one else was. You can not beat dependability.

For those that don't know, an 8N Ford tractor is a petrol powered 4 cylinder farm wheel tractor built from after WWII until the early fifties. You still see them operating all over America (that's about 60 years of being in the sun and rain almost everyday for most of them). That is the "D" in Ford "Dependable". I had one and sold it to go diesel in a Ford 5000. It was dug out of a couple meters of mud in the massive rains that California received in '80-81 and even though it was encased in mud it fired up Ford Dependable. They then used it with the loader bucket on the front to dig out all the rest of their farm equipment and other tractors (ALL THE NEW AND FANCY STUFF). It fired up on the first touch of the starter come hel_l and high water and never failed ever, though I broke it a couple of times.

I believe CMT the big maker of great implements here in Thailand has a set up where you can have both the loader and the dozer blade on the front of a 90 hp tractor. That would be something as the bucket is truly a very valuable tool to help you "walk" out of a bad situation and to lift any and all types of heavy things like steers and hogs during butchering.(I built a boom (removeable) to mount on the box scraper that stands about 4 feet above the box and the arm (3" tubular steel) extends about 5' behind the back of the box. It has another piece of tubular that just fits inside of the 3" and you can pull it out another 5 feet to extend your reach for lighter weight objects. It has a swivel mounted hook atached to the extension. With the extension out you get nearly 4.5 feet of vertical lift when you lift with the three point hitch mechanism. It is plenty srong enough to lift a 2.3 meter Howard rotovator out of the back of a truck (when not externded) and probably two of them but don't want to try).

Forever Fords - Fix Or Repair Daily (if needed) and they'll last a half century minimum. I have never seen the abuse these tractors can take until I've seen them in action here in Thailand abuse is one thing but with the complete and total neglect that they receive it geometrically increases the wear and tear on these true work horses of farming. 6th gear and reverse and foot to the floor keep the implements in the ground and watch em work. gotta love it!!

Has me a few fords and had nothin but problems.F.O.R.D,fix or repair daily,found on road dead.Hope you get the joke.

[/quote

] From the Rift Valley of Kenya to the deserts of Baja Mexico to Issan I've fixed and repaired almost daily and filled them full of fuel and used it all up too many times but never did they let me down. 8n tractors to 5000's to this 6610. Fix and maintain daily for a lifetime of good performance from a hard machine.

Well here goes and I'll try to make it short (no laughing now). I just had an experience that felt so good I know it is or will be illegal shortly. Has to be.

Anyway i arrived in Buri Ram a few years ago with a Ford 6610 on a truck with a 3 a 7 and a casava hiller. I took the hiller apart and took the 3 point frame to the local welder in Prakon Chai and gave him a few pages of drawing and selected a sheet of steel and a piece of two and a half meter mobar for a dozer blade and 4 days later we were painting a space ship (well at least they thought it was) Ford Tractor blue. I was a proud owner of a giant 3 point box scraper. Never got to use it much due to time of year other work, tractor lessons etc etc.

I recently found a fellow in Phetcheburi that sold equipment for Caterpillar motor graders and I bought 5 two foot long ripper teeth. Back to the farm and off with the front dozer blade and over to the welder, drawings in hand and shazam! I got a blade with 5 removeable ripper teeth that can be mounted facing backwards. some of locals said no good as they needed to be facing forward but with a space ship and these dragon teeth watch out.

we had a high spot in the new rice farm and had been flooded twice due to the enormous amount of rain this year and the klong blowing out the leveee road in a couple of places. Let's make this short, in two days me, one guy, and a couple grand of baht in diesel. I built nearly 300 meters of new road with some fills of over 3 feet with no lifts over 3-4 inches (not the Thai 2 1/2 foot lifts of dumping a truck and pushing out a bunch of dry dirt). I ripped it all out of the high spot on the farm found some good golden clay and saved that to top off the road at the end with the stickiest, all the soil had good moisture content and if not I blended the different one to make it right.

The illegal part was that I did it all in 6th gear and reverse. I'd drop the blade and rip in reverse then drop it in 6th and lower the box scraper and pick it all up and go somewhere and lay it all down nice and thin When i got enough down and compacted, I'd cut it down with a full box of dirt to compact it more. Two days of just almost thinking someone was going to come and get me and say i can't do it anymore. It was miles better than the old Gannon box scraper design where you had to use you hydraulics to lower your ripping teeth below your box scraper, then rip going foward, then put it in reverse and back it up, then hydraulicly lift the teeth, then (lots of "thens") put it in forward and scrape it all up.

I actually started to think they were going to really make this illegal when I ripped going back down into the farm and then shifted into 6th and dropped the box and while scraping it up I used the Dozer blade to cut away the edge of a spur road i had built earlier. It was mind boggling I thought this dozer blade on the front of a farm tractor was one of the goofiest things I had ever seen when I got here in Thailand but with a little bit of adaptation I have never accomplished more good work in such a short amount of time.

The box scraper cost about 17,000 baht to make (during the high steel prices days), everything included (except the hiller frame as I actually designed so it can be unbolted (I know it never will) and you can put the hiller discs back on). The ripper teeth and fabrication and welding of the mounting boxes and pins was pocket change. I can't see anyone investing a million baht on a 90 horsepower tractor and not investing this extra amount to create a monster.

The road was hard as cement and was properly crowned and properly sloped around the couple of turns so that I guarantee when it rains there will be no potholes, sinking or washboarding as every and almost all dirt roads (without a finish of rock and the use of a motor-grader) in Thailand are with their massive lifts of fill.

Maybe they'll just consider this type of modifications as hazardous materials like chiles and neem trees but for two days I was like a little kid again and really really enjoyed being on a tractor and it sure didn't feel like work.

And ya all know that god surely wouldn't have made farms and farmers if he wasn't going to make Ford Tractors ya got to luv em. ForeverFord

I did some searching and found that the mills in Vietnam (commercial) have a loss of about 30% with somewhat better results if moisture content is 14 to 15 %. The 50% + just does not seem to equate when the price being quoted by some of the farmers is 14 baht/kilo and I see Jasmine rice priced at 28 baht/kilo here in CM (retail). Maybe the advertisements I saw for setups are typical buyer beware. The Vietnam figures do seem a reasonable loss and they were not trying to sale a system.

Hi Slapout, Remember they do sell on or have a use for the Husk's, I've never looked into what they do with it or how much they receive, but some I believe is used as Animal feed I would love to know more on this if anyone knows.

Go to Prakon Chai in Buri Ram and go towards Surin on highway 24 about 2 or 3 kilometers. On your left you will see a 1/2 a billion baht (?) investment that has been made in a Bio-Energy plant. And you've guessed it they are poweering it on rice husks. One of my ex's fater-in-law had added it to his rather large organic truck farm which was about 2-3 feet higher than the existing groundlevel due to the enormous amount of husks he used over many years. His purple onions were the sweetest you have ever tasted his tomatoes would break the vines if not pick they were in such abundance and I could go on and on, like an over 100 pound watermelon (I've got the photos). Anywho and how it's dam_n good stuff and there is plenty of use for it if you can get your hands on it. He was in the Sacramento Valley of California a huge rice growing area. chike Dee hope this helped.

Hi Guys!

The fire break's coming along quite nicely, but as jubby writes, it ain't the most exciting work - and it takes a LONG time to get an area cleared. The g/f works upright using a Thai hoe thing - I just crouch on the ground and tear the grass and weeds out of the ground, trying to get the roots out as much as possible - with my hands (got leather gloves on, though!). Wow - our hands certainly do ache all the time!

Already collecting stones and boulders in piles to try and make (later) some high rings to dump the grass and stuff for composting. Sorry it ain't going any quicker, that's all. Generally speaking, we spend a couple of hours almost every day clearing, early morning work of course - before it gets hot.

Like Gary A, I'm a-wondering if all the grass and weeds are just going to bounce back up again as soon as the rainy season comes along - just have to wait and see, that's all. At least we've removed a ton of low bushes that put long "trailers" out on the land that trip you up all the time! Got a bushcutter (whirling blade on a long pole) that ought to take care of cutting whatever comes up again in the wet season.

Foreverford - it's good folks like yourself that come up with the ideas and suggestions that make it possible for people like us to do how we want to do!

Cheers

SB

Scooterboy my hero, how ya doin'? Here's some food for thought or food for the compost bin. I don't know if this is a good suggestion but the resources are out there, I just don't know if they are near you? All the major waterways seemed to be choked with this huge ugly hyacynth looking type of plant. Literally hundreds of rai of the stuff floats in one bunch on the Chao Praya and other big rivers. If, and a big one, your property doesn't lie in close proximity to a good clean waterway AND where you live in Chiang Mai area there is a big waterway with this invasive miserable thing. I think you could haul a little by little up as you have said you go to your parcel almost daily on your scooter and enter it into the dry materail that you are composting. It should add a considerable amoutnt of moisture into your mix and it is green matter. Again don't think of this if you are somewhere near enough to a good waterway because this is a curse to have choke up waterways. Someone might have had some experience with this stuff and can be helpful with further advice. It's sort of like lawn clippings possibly. If all you have is lawn clippings and you put it in a pile you end up with oowwee gooey oily mucky miserable stuff. but if you have a lot of dry material and you intersperse your clipping throughout and continue to blend the grass clippings with your dry matter Bingo you have worms and black beautiful soil. I think this could work the same way but of course you have to have access to the plant and the other factors I talked about. good luck and keep on scootin'!

apparently you didn't read what Sheryl wrote in the 'other' dengue thread.

Malaria kills more than Dengue ... and in Thailand car accidents kill FAR more than both combined. Please note it springs up and then virtually disappears pretty quickly (and if you check out the VAST majority of cases .. they just aren't that severe!) There just is no sense in getting paranoid and all worked up over it.

NOT TO MENTION >>>> ALL CAPS RANTS

oh my i shan't cap you again and i'll do it the thai way and wait until it is too late or not try to pre-plan something to alleviate some pain and suffering. i don't like pain and suffering so i guess it's time for me to put ballons all over my car to help the nearly half dozen idiot motorcycle drivers that have run into me in the last 5 years as they are the ones who are mostly dying in thailand. oh and by the way don't worry about global warming as more fish are killed in the sea by fisherman than global warming has caused so it's not a problem either. my isn't logical deductions an amazing thing, also please stop all women from breast feeding because 98% of all alcholics started by breast feeding first. If (oh please excuse the one cap) you need any other logical duductions and conclusions to prove your valid points hit me up again and I'll help ya out.

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, have they been convicted? I hope they are proved guilty before, being punished too badly.

I hope they become fifty guys girlfriends in the Bangkok Hilton let them burn and rot in the place. Death would be too lenient give em 50 years. Oh and I hope they aren't guilty until proven so and maybe the police can then sell those lovely small few amount to some young kids who will be so nockerd that they have unprotected sex and get aids. I feel so sorry for the Khao San Road types in this tough place where the US Dea and everybody under the sun has to get these big timers and spend a fortune so they can pull a scam get off and get some more kids some of their fine vitamins. easyiest way to prove their guilt is too see if they have a bad back then you know they are quilty from haulking around all the drugs and money. Burn baby burn

Dengue springs up all over Thailand. The higher the concentration of people and particularly people that move around, the higher the incidence.

I've had Dengue and it sucked but it was not as bad or as debilitation or long lasting as my friend's bout of malaria. (Yes Dengue CAN be bad, but mostly it's just a miserable week)

Other than staying bundled up all day every day and using scads of DEET it just isn't preventable so why stress it?

Sounds like you were lucky. I don't stress very much in my life but the death and suffering I saw in the small town that I had lived in, in Mexico was terrible. Check the new news topics on this site and get an idea of the suffering people have been through. When you get malaria and know the symptoms (also you know when you are usually going into malarial areas) you can be treated and alleviate the symptoms and repercussions not so with dengue. talk to a friend in Thailand that got it and said for over a week he couldn't have any light of any sort touch him or it would crush his body. This PAIN to the utmost. Watch out for dengue and if a simple few minutes of some facilitators time on this site gets it pinned and it saves one person from suffering with it then it is much much better a sbject for pinning than weight loss ofr some of the other non-lethal topics pinned. I'm definitely glad you responded the way you did because you didn't get a bad form of it or are extemely strong metabolicasll. No fun to see friends die with blood coming ojut of their eyes and ears as they stay deead forever usually. Also you aRE correct deet and bundling up also I stayed in my own home during the daytime hours and read a lot of books since I din't have the alternative of leaving the area if there is a bad area of some province where we know there is an extemewly high incidence of dengue going on in the previous couple of weeks due to a Pinned section then maybe you and I can choose to not go there for a while and choose to go somewhere else to get away from home in the LOS. Choke Dee me

Try this for commercial product.

however,

as pointed ot above, cost to benifit ratio would only work out in the most remote, unattended areas.

Here's someone I've found and was very professional, now I need to get my act together to get him more info as he sent much more than this but have a look. <http://www.thaisolarpump.com >

Hi fruity,

Where have you sited your frog operation, I'm presuming close by the house to keep an eye on them so they don't disappear in the night, but the little buggers must make a bit of a racket at night which can't be good for you or your neighbours....

Cheers

Teletiger, I stand corrected. Will take your word for it. Grizzley! ........Slapout, these are Bullfrogs, have some here a kilo-plus apiece.

Isee, The frogs are not noisey, seldom making any noise apart from when it rains, however, personally, I find it not an unpleasent thing. We don't have close neighbours, so no problem on that score. The frogs are kept in blue net enclosures in a pool which is only a few metres from the back of my house.

It is not wise to keep young frogs in an area away from the homestead. We sold one guy a thousand youungsters, he put them in a net enclosure in a pool in his rice field, where they were all gobbled up by the Storks in a day or two:)

Well fruity toot toot. How doody doo? Just finished a 12 day marathon on the farm (more in another post)but didn't have time to stop by. Here's the Frog Report hope it helps others. We had your frogs we bought in the three pens you saw when you came by just like yours the ones you can buy pre-made. But I told the wife the only money in farming is in real estate values and convinced her to go into the condo market and we started building condos instead. Very easy process. Went and purchased 8 200 liter blue plastic food grade barrels and got out the machete and started cutting down bamboo. Made a couple of 15 meter long runner poles and lashed four of the barrels to them and floated it in the pond. This bamboo was about 4" in diameter and every couple of meters we lashed (with about 1/4 inch nylon rope) cross members (about 8 of the same 4" size bamboo) that were about the length of the barrels to keep it all rigid and evenly spaced (sort of looking like a ladder tied to the floating barrels but with the rungs on top instead of between). We then took and made 7 outriggers ( 14 big long pieces 2" to 3" diameter lashed perpendicular to the two original main runners) that extended 3 meters outside the runners and barrels on each side. At the end of these extensions we ran 1" pieces perpendicular and lashed it all together. In each corner we lashed on another barrlel (4 more barrels) for this giant condo project. Think of a catamaran, and this created 12 large rectangular sections (we also lashed another 1" piece parrallel to the runners on the 7 outriggers about a foot from the runners to complete the rectangular square to tie on the nets. Final step to the super structure was to build a walking platform by lashing together a bunch of 1 1/2" stuff to make a 15 meter by 80cm platform and rolled it onto the top of the cross members and lashed it all together. By spacing things correctly we created about six inch square openings in each of the corners of the walking part of the structure (using the runners the outriggers and the cross members) and then placed four 4" diameter, at the bottom, and cut to a point, eucalyptus poles, about 4 meters long and pounded them into the pond vertically to allow the entire thing to rise and fall as the water doesand not float around wildly. Had the wife and her sister stich up the nets and shazam it was frog condos. Almost! I decided that they needed tops on them so I showed the girls how to make the sewwing machine fly and stiched a roll of wide blue netting to the end of each net and then left a space of about 6 inches and then stiched another net on. That created a top that covered the entire one side, 6 nets. We hand stiched with heavy cord and a BIG rice bag needle the nets to the bambboo rectangles asnd bingo bango bongo condos for the masses.

The finishing touch was to stich the tops to a couple of long 1" (lashed together to make 15 meters) bamboo where the tops (tops originally stiched in the house to the outside edge of the nets) covered the nets next to the runners so you can easily raise the tops and prop them up with a couple of short sticks. It was all tight as a drum and you know that that farm is about a couple of kilometers from the house but with the top on it there is no way any birds can get in. I also designed it so you can't get on from the ground around the pond unless you have a gangway plank to place on to the walkway (to keep out the other two footed predators that are always a problem on Thai farms (and Mexico and and and). Strategically placed barbed wire below water level will greet any other thieves that are of the more persistant variety (just like net throwers in your remote fish ponds).

Anyway anyone can do this as bambbo can be purchased for next to nothing if you don't have any growing and the nets can be purchased already made as you and the wife did originally and just build the structure to the net size. It is easy to attach with nylon cord and the rice needles and a sewing machine isn't necessary at all.

I'm sure I've confused the heck out of everyone but this does allow remote frog raising without worrying about predators and allows you to get your young into a large body of water (if you have it). It is very light weight and this allows the barrels to keep it all well above (nearly a half meter) water level. My wife smuggled out about a dozen of the "eaters" i earlier bought from you before they could be munched and lucky she did as i have had a few since. Amazingly while we were building, one of the family got a very very big wild frog of the best tasting variety in Issan so we had a "bar b que off" that night with both of them cooked together with nothing but a bit of salt. Man that wild one was sweet and juicy tasting, very very delicious but then we had a "Fruity Special" and there was no comparison as the juice almost popped out of your mouth and the meat was as tender as could be and two times more flavorable. three of us did the taste off and no question these babies are far far superior to anything they have ever tasted around here.

I have to say thank you thank you thank you again as this has really pulled the family together and given them a great project that they can persue year round. Pops is complaining (only once) asking what in the heck are we going to do with all these frogs when and if this works out. I laughed and said I hope it is a really really big problem and we would manage and told them the cost of an average size one for dinner in Paris, France. Hey that gives me an idea if you take bamboo and lash it together get some small nylon rope and hook up about a dozen or so frogs to it how long would it take to get them to haul themselves to market. Heck it would float halfway to France anyway. I get back to you something a bit more detailed and longetr than this when i get it all figure out. Give the wife a big hug from me and kiss that beautiful sow of yours on the nose for me also. peace and a lotta love me

Hey ForeverFord....Thanks for the update:) Sounds like you have built the Hilton hotel for frogs out there:) Next time you are up this way let me know & we'll drop over, be good to see you & your lovely wife again. What did you pay for the plastic drums?

My wife tells me some of your frogs developed an eye problem. Did it clear with the antibiotics?

All the very best

Barrels were 500 and 520 baht (520's were the best because they had a firm extended ridge at both ends as opposed to the others that only had it on the top and this allowed for easier tying of the rope). Only one male had an eye infection and since I wasn't around and medication was 30 kilometers away he din't get any internal or external antibiotics until I arrived and when he was pulled (they didn't isolate him) from the nets the eye looked so bad that my wife said "give him the gun" and was I glad as he made a great test subject for the great "bar-b-que cook off". I have never tasted a frog so delicious sweet and juicy and he was just an average sized one. I hope to build another Hilton Condotel in the 2nd pond just to try to create two ecosystems in case of any kind of water disease problems as I feel the more diversity in raising them the better. I will definitely be in touch the next time around but this was a whirlwind two weeks of non-stop no time to breath sunrise to sunset and i was stupid enough to not think that you could have come my way (probably that love affair I have with your sow and me wanting to see her) to check out our construction project, I think you might have been impressed. We got the barrels in Nong Rong but I'm sure you'd be going to Buri Ram for them. I'm alsdo going to check prices around Hua Hin just to compare. Wish us luck as Asean is going to be in town and they are starting to get crazy around here hopefully it will chase me back to farm and get me to rebuild the fuel injection pump that is leaking on the Ford. Boy do I have a blog about that but don't know if I have it in me to put it down today. It's a great one I think I'll label it "it's so good it has to be illegal". choke Dee me

I had dengue type 1 last august 2008. I stay for one week in the hospital in Phuket.

I was very ill. Now I'm very very very affraid to get it once again, because they said that it can be fatal.

I'm happy to read that there are people who get it twice. Was it hemorrhagic dengue?

Can anyone reassure me because I'm really panic and have serieus fear.

PIN THIS SUBJECT!!!!!!!!! Now! and everybody report every and all cases of dengue and the date and any and all info you can this is one of the diseases that can be prevented thru info by alerting folks of where and when it is hitting so they can avoid or protect themselves (long sleeve shirt massive amounts of bug spray and clening up their local enviroment. If I could say dam_n it I would and and then I'd say dam_n it Pin it!!!!!

91,000 cases of Dengue in thailand last year!!!!!!!!!!! This year they expect more!! Come on get real there is nothing nearly more miserable than contacting this and current knowledge of people who have contracted it is essential in knowing where and when to be in certain areas of Thailand. WE NEED TO HAVE A PERMANENTLY PINNED SECTION FOR THIS AS WEIGHT CONTROL AND VIAGRA IS A COMPLETE JOKE ON A HEALTH BLOG WHEN THIS IS STARING YOU STRAIGHT BETWEEN THE EYES. There is a bunch odf info on this in the current news section of Thaivisa but an ongoing section in the health section,here, is essential for everybody's well being. This is a critical issue for anyone living here and I have been constantly watching the news to see if there are any cases imagine my surprise to find out the amount of people who got it last year. I went thru this in Mexico and had friends die of it and others that were so sick that they said they will kill themselves if they ever get it again. IT IS TERRIBLE!!! I've had malaria twice and it was nothing compared to the stories nd what I have seen with this monster. PIN IT IN THIS SECTION!!!!!!!!! The sooner the better.