John Deck's Blog

I've been posting farming related topics over the last year in conjunction with my more nerdly posts on GIS. We now have a website for our farming venture at Deck Family Farm. Check it out if you are interested in natural meats. We are starting to take orders for direct-shipped frozen meat boxes!

Here is a photo of the fence that I wrote about last November. Most of it is done with the exception of gates. I am very pleased with the design as the fence went up pretty quick, even counting the phone and septic lines we managed to precisly locate with our auger.

In the photo is a small section of cob wall we have near our front gate. The cob is built using Oregon Cob, a new method based on a very old technique using clay, sand, and straw to build the wall. The straw acts like rebar, holding the whole mass together, while the clay holds the sand together, and the sand adds the mass. We have yet to put the outer coat on, which will be a clay-dung (yes, its dung-- we are going to use llama poop) mix and on top of that a linseed oil/ beeswax mix.

We are raising organic beef. Though we are not certified at this time, we are following the rules. One particular aspect of being organic is not using synthetic nitrogen fertilizers. This is a big deal when most livestock producers around you are using synthetic nitrogen. The benefits touted are more grass for hay and forage and the grass responding to the nitrogen will respond better than the weeds. In the words of one rancher on our decision to not use synthetic nitrogen fertilizer- "You won't get nothin' from that land without it".

After some reading its clear that there are a number of ills associated with using synthetic nitrogen, including: reliance on fossil fuels to produce it, changing soil chemistry, investing in methods requiring intervention as opposed to using time & energy in other methods that may be more productive.

A few sites detailing the ills of synthetic nitrogen:

http://hollandimac.chem.rochester.edu/n2cycle.pdf

http://www.nofa.org/tnf/nitrogen.php

http://www.farmandranchguide.com/articles/2006/05/25/bullseye/production_news/prod10.txt


Finally, i mentioned "other methods" above that could be used instead of synthetic nitrogen. This is where I want to begin to focus my attention. Some ideas are:

1) Management intensive grazing. For reading see: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0961780738/102-1149708-9712913?v=glance&n=283155

2) Overseeding legumes. Legumes fix nitrogen so used in permanent pastures can have a positive impact. Timing on this is critical.

3) Planting combinations of early & late season grasses to extend the grazing season. (I have some references on this that i'll post when i find them)

4) Fencing off creeks and providing water in the pasture. This helps keep nutrients on the pastures where they belong instead of the creeks where they cause no end of problems. We are pursuing options with WRP and CREP currently to help fence our nearly 2 miles of creek frontage.

More on this topic later!

My friend Collin Bode and I were sitting around one afternoon bouncing ideas around & through a lemonade and a beer. The big idea came up to create MapWiki. The name says it all. I realized later others have done this. (e.g. http://www.citeulike.org/user/ianturton/article/559523).

We specifically wanted something that could integrate well with natural history collections databases and also include spatial certainty, linking back to source specimen records, and a registry of organizations and names.

Anyway, a rough prototype lives at: http://mapwiki.berkeley.edu/

With the change in code in the Google Maps API v2.36, some things broke in my previous post about how to do WMS layering in V2 of Google Maps. I've posted a working sample of the WMS code for v2.36 and up here.

NOTE #1 (June 9th, 2006): I deleted the code references in the blog and instead point people to the sample link above, where a working version of the code is maintained (the key component is the file called wms236.js).

NOTE #2 (June 9th, 2006): Thanks to Guilhem Vellut for fixing up some Javascript code to make the Mercator Projection work more accurately. Now, it can be used at all zoom levels.

Attributions:
->Mike Williams http://www.econym.demon.co.uk/googlemaps2/ V2 Reference & custommap code

->Brian Flood http://www.spatialdatalogic.com/cs/blogs/brian_flood/archive/2005/07/11/39.aspx V1 WMS code

->Kyle Mulka http://blog.kylemulka.com/?p=287 V1 WMS code modifications

->http://search.cpan.org/src/RRWO/GPS-Lowrance-0.31/lib/Geo/Coordinates/MercatorMeters.pm

->Modified by Chris Holmes, TOPP to work by default with GeoServer.

->Guilhem Vellut for more accurate Javascript Mercator Fxn

// posted by John Deck @ 7:58 AM 3 comments

NOTE: I changed this posting substantially on February 1st as the previous code did not work when using GPolyline methods. This code now works with polylines.

Here is my method for creating GoogleMaps API V2 WMS Layers. In version 1, I started with code developed by Brian Flood and Kyle Mulka and ended up re-writing most of that class for V2 using code and examples from Mike Williams. The dd2Mercator conversion bits can be left off if dealing with small scale maps only.

Click here for a working example of this code. NOTE: On June 9th, i deleted the code references in this blog and instead refer people to view the source of the working example linked to above.

Since moving to our farm a little more than a year ago, we've acquired an assortment of animals: geese, chickens, dogs, goats, llamas, etc... Some of the more annoying of these animals are very good at escaping from designated pens and finding their way to our porch and pool and laying waste to vegetation, pooping on our mats, defecating in the pool. sheesh!

It became abundantly clear, at least to me, we need a fence to keep out the riff-raff from our home area. The fence needed to be aesthetic, not too tall to block our view over the top, and inexpensive. We have heard that deer do not like to jump fences they cannot see through, but we didn't want to spend the $ on a pure wood fence. Hence we decided on a wire mesh fence created with treated fir posts.

Here is the design: 5' treated fir posts (3-4" diameter) set 2' in the ground with 3/4" gravel surrounding. The gravel is 3/4" open (meaning there are no smaller pieces than 3/4"-- it does not pack as tight as a 3/4" minus but drains a bit better. We figure the top posts will help secure the fence itself so we don't have to worry too much about packing). The posts are braced on the top with another post that is notched to sit firmly on top of each post. The posts are spaced 10' apart from each other with 5" galvanized spikes holding the tops in place. We will be using a 2"x4" welded mesh wire stapled to the posts and stretched (not too tight!) and held in place with staples. The galvanized mesh is 36" high. When the fence is done, we will be planting vines, shrubs, and some small trees along the fence to create a visual barrier for animals attempting entry or perhaps jumping.

Approximate cost of fence:
100 10' 3-4" treated fir posts .... $700
9 rolls 2x4" welded wire,36" high... $385
~4 tons 3/4" Open gravel ..... $40
5" galvanized spikes .... $65
plants, etc.... $200

Many thanks to the Tilt-Reuben Family who helped us start this project a couple of weeks ago. I'll post some pictures in a few weeks when we hope to have this project completed!