The Secret to White Pants and Getting Skunk out of the Dog!

 OK. Its not a secret as I am about to share an article with a recipe. Strangely enough it is close to the recipe I have for getting skunk smell off a dog, cat or human!

I didn't change the amounts from the article, but the last time I used this recipe it was for a 10 pound cat so I made about a gallon in a milk jug. The Dawn portion was about a tablespoon. Proportion to the size of the offended animal or person!

Skunk Smell Removal

• 1 five-gallon bucket or a large bowl
• About ⅓ cup of Dawn dish soap
• About a quarter of a bottle of hydrogen peroxide
• Something to scrub with (a sponge or just your hands)
• Water to rinse, and rinse and rinse!

Pour the ingredients together and mix. Gently pour or sponge over the animal/person till every bit of them are sudsy and slimy.  Let it sit as long as you can stand it and then rinse away. I had luck with one good wash.

NOTE: The green pants I wore to do this have fade patches from the recipe, so be careful what you wear. But they didn't smell!

So back to the article. Here you go for white pants for Fair showing and your basic summer attire! 

How To Get Stains Out of White Clothes

There are many different tactics to achieve a pristine pair of white pants, but some tactics work better than others

GREENWICH, N.Y. — "Keeping white clothes white can be a difficult task regardless of whether you are an adult or a child. Whether it is a pair of white jeans you are wearing in the dairy show ring or a pair you are wearing on the baseball field, they are going to inevitably get dirty. Leading us to the question, how do you get stains out of white clothes?"

See link for the recipe and more: How To Get Stains Out of White Clothes | Morning Ag Clips

Right to Repair Legislation

"Farmers just want to get their machine going again."   Rep. Brianna Titone (D)

Last month, John Deere and the American Farm Bureau Federation signed a "memorandum of understanding" the ensures farmers and ranchers the right to repair their own farm equipment. 

Why is this important or even needed? 

At this time, the software, tools and manuals for equipment is not available to the owners or repair shops, even with hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in ownership of these machines. Farmers have to wait sometimes days for an authorized technician to make the repair.

Because of the warranty on farm machinery, it has cost farmers loss of work days and loss of ideal planting and harvesting conditions.

Bills are being introduced in Colorado and ten other states that would force manufacturers to provide the tools, software, parts and manuals needed for farmers to do their own repairs.

 Manufacturers argue this will expose trade secrets and allow illegal tampering among other arguments. 

For more on this story: 11 states consider 'right to repair' for farming equipment | Morning Ag Clips

John Deere, farm group reach deal on fixing equipment | AP News

Why the High Egg Prices?

 For my own benefit, and yours, I'd like to pass on some articles here and there to keep us informed of agriculture news and facts.

I am amused when I see comments of people calculating how much money they can save by having their own hens, not realizing the cost of mature pullets ready to lay, the cost of feed and the need for a safe (from predators, weather and disease) facility to keep them.

Its almost ten years since we left On the Pond Farm. At some point 17, 18 years ago, I calculated how much feed my hens used, their egg production and how much I would need to charge for a dozen eggs to break even. Yes, I was a small scale producer with free range brown hens, so my costs would be a bit higher. The cost was about $2.00 a dozen in a day and age when people were used to going to the store for .99 cent per dozen white eggs. How egg production cost the mass producers more than a dollar less so there was any profit is a mystery to me. I always felt the real cost was absorbed by the grocery shops as a "come on". That I don't know.

Again, we have a problem that comes and goes regularly - avian influenza. The following is an informative article from Oklahoma State University Extension. 

Higher egg prices are the new normal in 2023 | Oklahoma State University (okstate.edu)