Fire...

Summer in California

Growing up in California you get used to Fires. Especially in summer and fall. In the past few years we have had several large fires within 20 miles of our home/vineyard and many small fires that the fire department put out before they got too big. 

Last Saturday I was sitting in my home office enjoying the air conditioning and I heard a loud rumble of a jet engine. I am like a little kid and when I hear a jet engine or rotor blades that are out of the normal; I usually go running out to see what it is. This time it was an MD80 firefighting plane making a low pass over our house. 

Then I noticed the billowing smoke cloud. I was not sure where it was so I climbed up the hill and found that it was on the other side of a major road so we were pretty safe. Turns out it was on a friends ranch. Fortunately they were all fine. 

 The firefighting helicopters were using the pond on the vineyard across the canyon for water so it made for a pretty exciting afternoon. 

I have to say that the firefighters are getting really good at putting out these fires. In the last few months there have been several brush fires in my area and with the help of the fixed wing aircraft and helicopters the fire department has gotten things under control very quickly. This one was contained by the next morning.

So a big thank you to all the Firefighters out there, I sleep much better knowing that you are there when we need you. 

After the Hunt

After the Hunt

When people find out that I hunt they usually want to know what I do with the animal. My response is usually "I eat it" with a confused look on my face.

People hunt for many reasons, some people are trophy hunters and like to adorn their walls with mounts. Although I do have my first deer mounted in my home office (I mounted it myself) I do not really have trophy mounts. I do have my antlers from Scotland hanging in my garage, but that is to remind me of the days in the Highlands. I don't foresee having a game room in my house it is just not my thing.  The real reason that I hunt is for the experience and the meat.

I enjoy being able to feed my family meat that I have harvested, butchered, and prepared. With prepackaged food I think that people are getting more and more detached from what they are eating. They don't understand that a life was given up to provide you with that hamburger. I have a great deal of respect for the animals that I harvest and am proud that I use them to provide food for my family.

Ok, I will get off my soap box. Some hunters take their game to a butcher to process the animal for them. I have never taken an animal to a butcher. I have always done it myself and have set up my garage to do the initial butchering.  Once broken down I do the rest in the kitchen.

 I have a winch installed in the ceiling of my garage to hoist the animals when I am doing the skinning and quartering. Originally I had just a simple hook and a block and tackle and it did the job fine. But the winch is a really cool addition.

I keep the door closed and keep it relatively cool in the garage and it works out great for the initial separating of the animal.

 I usually skin and then quarter the animal in my garage. From there I put the quarters, tenderloins, loins, ect. into a refrigerator to cool and age for about a week.

For this I have an old keg-orator that I have converted to hold meat. I reinforced the top of the keg-orator so that I can use stainless steel hooks to hang the meat. I wish I had a picture of it with meat in it but unfortunately I do not. I have a tray in the bottom to catch the drippings.

Having beer on tap in the garage was cool, but using the refrigerator to hold meat is much more productive!

 Finally the meat is frozen and used to feed my family. Here is some pulled pork that was made from the pig above.

 Some simple breakfast sausage from the same pig. It is really easy to make and my kids love it. An added benefit is that the meat is really lean compared to store bought breakfast sausage so my kids are not getting a ton of fat from it.

 Some pork loin steaks from the same pig.

My kids have been raised on wild game. Both of my children know where meat comes from and have a respect for the animals that they eat.

Gunsmith Screwdrivers

Screwdrivers

Anyone who tinkers with guns should have some Gunsmith Parallel Ground Screwdrivers. Standard hardware store screwdrivers do more damage to guns than anything else. It is really important to use parallel ground screwdrivers that fit the screw to make sure that you don't damage the heads of screws.

Nothing ruins a nice Rifle or Shotgun like buggered up screws!

I really like the Grace Screwdrivers but there are many other options. Brownell's makes a line of Magna-tip screwdriver bits. They can be inserted into a standard bit driver handle. They make hundreds of sizes and they are only a few dollars a piece. They are a really good option for someone that is just building a tool kit or for a weird size that you don't use often.

If I were to pick only one screwdriver to have it would be the Grace N3, I use it for most of the work that I do on Rifles. It is used for almost every trigger guard and bottom metal screw that I have come across. It is the most useful of all my screwdrivers.

I also have several specialty screwdrivers, there is one for the Leupold ring windage screws on Leupold scope bases and the long Phillips bit that I use for removing recoil pad screws. This is a simple bit that I bought at the hardware store. I polished the bit so that it would not mar the holes in recoil pads.

I have a set of Magna-bits that are very thin, they are made specifically for English Shotguns. I have done some work on my Holland and Holland and I wanted to make sure that I did not screw up the screws on that gun!

Anyway here is my assortment of Gunsmithing Screwdrivers. I keep them in my Gunsmithing Tool Box and they are only used for working on guns. I have a drawer in my regular Tool Box full of Craftsman Screwdrivers that are used for other household projects.

Ranger Service

Servicing the Ranger

I like to take care of my equipment. Equipment is a big investment and I am a firm believer that preventative maintenance prolongs the service life of equipment. I like to do the maintenance myself because it gives me a better understanding of the state that my equipment is in. That and let's face it I am cheap! 

I decided to do a Lube and Oil/Filter Change, Service the Front Gearbox, and the Transmission. I chose to use Polaris parts because they provide kits that have all the components and it was not really clear to me if other commercial lubricants were compatible. 

I figured that this would be a good learning experience for my Son so I asked him to help me. 

Here are all my supplies.

First order of business was to give myself a little clearance below the Ranger to work. I decided to use the redneck method of putting 2x6s under the wheels. 

 I am not sure who designed this Ranger, but you have to be quite a contortionist to be able to change the fluids. Here is a picture of me filling the front transmission.  Getting my hands and a wrench in there was quite the endeavor. 

 You would think that this is a picture of me draining the oil. But actually this is a picture of the oil draining after I filled it. I forgot to put the plug back in after I drained the oil. Remember I said that I decided to use this as a learning experience for my son. Well in this case it was learning how not to do it. 

Eventually I did put the plug back in and filled up all the fluids and the Ranger is now fully serviced and ready to be put back to work. 

Vineyard Update

Grapes

The Grapes are progressing well with lots of very large clusters appearing. If all goes well this should be a really good year and we should have a good crop. The little brown dots are what is left of the flower that blooms just before the Grape forms. They should all drop off in the next few weeks as the Grapes grow 

Here is a picture of a group of Grape clusters hanging over one of the end posts. 

New Gate

Finally Putting in a New Gate

This gate is over 30 years old and needed to be replaced over 10 years ago, It is a wooden gate that was built when the fence was built and has finally given way to the elements. Because the gate was in such bad shape I ended up not using it at all. So the first order of business was to trim the tree and remove all the brush that grew in the path.

 I recruited my daughter to help me, and within and hour we had the tree trimmed and the brush removed to reveal the true sad state of the gate. In the picture below you can see the dilapidated wood gate and the over sized metal gate that was propped up next to the gate to hold it together (redneck fix). On the right is the new 10 foot gate that I bought to replace the mess that was there.  

 Here is the new gate propped in place while I was fitting the hinges. I chose to leave the old gate in place until I got the new gate fitted because it was a very hot afternoon and I was not sure I would complete it before I got to hot and tired. 

Fortunately,  I perservered and completed the project just in time for it to start cooling off. 

The fence is built on a slope and the wooden gate was custom built for the opening. The commercial 10 foot gate that I bought is not made for a slope so I chose to mount it level. Because of that the fence post on the left appears to be higher. But the gate is in fact level.

Here is the complete gate ready for a few more years of use. I will use this entrance to the vineyard much more often now that it has a working gate. 

I still have to clean up the pieces of the old gate, but I will do that in the morning when it is cool! 

I have a bunch of these little maintenance projects that need to be done around the vineyard. They are not very exciting but they are part of working the vineyard so I will continue to document them here.