little leaf
Avid Member
ohhhhhh boy- this is gonna be the biggest cage I have ever built - I am even giving myself a YEAR to do it - I know it looks like an ugly mess right now- and it is ! - I gave my husband 2 yrs to get rid of our old pool - now its mine
here are my thoughts , and any advice or suggestions would be great - or if this is a bad idea- STOP ME NOW- LOL
for this year :
remove liner- plant 2 white mulberry trees ( for free range silks , so they can just graze at will )
plant ground cover ( suggestions? ) I want to try to stay away from grass for the most part - but what else would grow, and stay short? dragging a mower in there is something I will not do - fumes and all...or my other thought was to leave the bottom of the liner to keep the grass out, and only let patches of grass grow - but then what would I put over the liner? - need your input on this
set support poles ( those will be either on the deck , or set right inside - the center will for sure be a telephone pole - we have a stack of them )
thats it for this year - I have about 1/2 of the netting for the top, but no screening yet - I feel I need to screen the top to keep in what I want in ( silks, other bugs) and out what I dont want in ( the bad silk worms we already have here- the wild birds wont even touch them -they have like "hair" ?) but I know I will need a underlying support for the screening - again, suggestions ? the screen will go under a course , strong " netting" that is really used to keep landfill from going any deeper into the ground - so I think it will hold up to a bird- lol
I will use flies for pollinating the trees -
I used to build houses, ( "punch out " was my specialty ) and I met my husband on a overhead black pipe job - cutest boss I ever had we built our log cabin together, 18 yrs of marriage later, we are still building thing together
so...any ideas, suggestions are VERY welcome-
this is just my rough draft pic- lol I am sure it will change many times - I also plan to put a "bug house" in the center to keep all the feeders - it already has power and water supply to the area - the sad thing - UGH - I live in Ohio, this will only get to be used about 1/2 the yr
here are my thoughts , and any advice or suggestions would be great - or if this is a bad idea- STOP ME NOW- LOL
for this year :
remove liner- plant 2 white mulberry trees ( for free range silks , so they can just graze at will )
plant ground cover ( suggestions? ) I want to try to stay away from grass for the most part - but what else would grow, and stay short? dragging a mower in there is something I will not do - fumes and all...or my other thought was to leave the bottom of the liner to keep the grass out, and only let patches of grass grow - but then what would I put over the liner? - need your input on this
set support poles ( those will be either on the deck , or set right inside - the center will for sure be a telephone pole - we have a stack of them )
thats it for this year - I have about 1/2 of the netting for the top, but no screening yet - I feel I need to screen the top to keep in what I want in ( silks, other bugs) and out what I dont want in ( the bad silk worms we already have here- the wild birds wont even touch them -they have like "hair" ?) but I know I will need a underlying support for the screening - again, suggestions ? the screen will go under a course , strong " netting" that is really used to keep landfill from going any deeper into the ground - so I think it will hold up to a bird- lol
I will use flies for pollinating the trees -
I used to build houses, ( "punch out " was my specialty ) and I met my husband on a overhead black pipe job - cutest boss I ever had we built our log cabin together, 18 yrs of marriage later, we are still building thing together
so...any ideas, suggestions are VERY welcome-
this is just my rough draft pic- lol I am sure it will change many times - I also plan to put a "bug house" in the center to keep all the feeders - it already has power and water supply to the area - the sad thing - UGH - I live in Ohio, this will only get to be used about 1/2 the yr