Cribbage
Fun memories of my favorite childhood card game, cribbage, but we need to practice more on the scoring piece of it. Cribbage Cheat Sheet
How to program home sprinklers
Replace 9v backup battery. Instructions below. Set for 3 day cycle, with day one on, days two and three off, being sure day one falls on the castle rock schedule for our house, or you'll get watering citations. Program stations 1-4 (there are only 4 stations) to each run for 15 minutes. Set two times for watering to 7 am and 10pm, unless extremely dry then add a third time for drought t weeks. https://www.rainbird.com/sites/default/files/media/documents/2017-06/man_PC100series.pdf In spring, get long keytool and turn on sprinkler system water main in hole in front yard. Test by running on manual, cycle through each station and replace broken sprayers. In fall, turn this off and blow out each station or lines will freeze. If cannot figure out, call sprinkler guy, Michael Olivas 303-877-0740 but it's expensive about $100-200 to have him turn on and check for broken ones or blowout in fall. Time to winterize All of a sudden, fall is here and that means it is time to prepare the irrigation system and our landscapes for winter. Hopefully, you have already decreased the number of days per week of watering. As temperatures cool, plants don't need as much water. Given our temps and a bit of moisture, once a week is probably sufficient. However, by the end of October, we could begin to see freezing overnight temperatures. Therefore, irrigation systems need to be blown out, hoses need to be detached from spigots and mulch should be added to plants. Blowing out irrigation systems helps prevent breaking of sprinklers and backflow devices. Drain hoses but keep them handy, perhaps hanging in the garage, ready for potential winter watering. Turn off (clockwise) the irrigation valve to the house in front
How to Reprogram lights if Power goes Out on Biocube
If the lights are off on your Biocube the proper probably went out. Set clock to 12hr vs hr and program time. Set clock to current time, paying attention to an vs pm settingPhase 1, Daylight timer: 9:30am – 8:00pm (10.5 Hours for full lighting) Phase 2, Sunrise/Sunset timer: 9:00am – 8:30pm. (White lights begin to come on gradually at 9:00am and will shut off completely by 8:30pm) Phase 3, Moonlights. These lights are the Deep blue night LED’s. I set mine to turn on from 7:00am-10pm.
HOW TO DO WEEKLY 4 GALLON WATER CHANGES ON BIOCUBE 32
HOW TO DO WEEKLY 4 GALLON WATER CHANGES ON BIOCUBE 32 There are two blue jugs of RODI water. Here is how it goes, and don't worry, you remember how to do it by yourself. RODI water can also be purchased at Neptune's, if you want to skip step four or cannot figure it out, but you have enough water for a little more than a 4 gallon a water change with each 5 gallon bucket. The green can is also filled with RODI water right now, not salt. p.s. You can also use the plain RODI water to top off the two freshwater tanks, as it is chlorine free. STEP ONE Turn off tank powerstrip. Get a clean bucket and use RO water in blue jugs (and right now the green jug has RODI water too). Do not use water in bucket on floor of basement shower, pour that one out, I was just cleaning it out. Pour RO water in bucket, add pump to bottom to stir and mix saltwater to 1.025 salinity. Mix really well with your hand and the pump before testing. STEP TWO Take siphon and get a bucket. Lightly move syphon just above bottom after putting cylinder under water to remove air and pushing on pump. Do not suck up sand (kink the tube if you get sand in it and it’ll drop back down). Fill bucket a ¾ full. STEP THREE (ONCE EVERY TWO WEEKS, NOT EVERY WATER CHANGE) Replace carbon filter in back of tank. You have one under the tank and I just ordered you more. STEP FOUR (ONCE EVERY TWO WEEKS--MAKING RODI WATER) To fill RO blue jugs. Hook up twisting on long cap of
How to Use Dried Chiles
Saveur recently published the best online guide to dried chiles. Chiles Negros, Mulatos, and dried Hatch NM chiles are favorites in our pantry, but here is the authoritative guide. Some of our favorite recipes featuring dried chiles follow. 11 Dried Mexican Chiles to Know and Love, and How to Use ThemThe ultimate guide for how to identify, shop for, and cook with the pantry workhorse of the Mexican kitchen: dried chile peppers.Read in Saveur: https://apple.news/AUMyQB1bZSZu6XVpToDz1vA I also came across this great article on the 7 moles of Oaxaca. Here are our personal recipes of three recipes with dried chiles: https://sportingroad.com/argentine-recipes/venison-carne-guisada/ https://sportingroad.com/fur/chili-mole/ https://sportingroad.com/argentine-recipes/tortilla-soup/ For more great recipes and sources of chiles, visit: https://thespicetrader.ca/collections/chilis https://www.manoymetate.com/
Great New Article on Blue Grouse
Forest Grouse in the Fall DigitalCommons@USU - Utah State University Utah has two types of forest grouse that inhabit our mountain forests and rangelands; namely ruffed grouse (Bonasa umbellus) and dusky grouse. While we don't have any ruffed grouse range left in Colorado, bue grouse which are now called dusky grouse are prevalent. Check out this great article. https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3098&context=extension_curall How to Hunt Blue Grouse https://projectupland.com/grouse-species/blue-grouse-hunting/how-to-find-dusky-grouse/?mc_cid=9e0aac54b4&mc_eid=012919f536 https://youtu.be/jWY_SC1RvZc?si=OPryGfMfH8LKeWxo Sage-grouse lek attendance decreases 13% compared to last year Ray Hageman, Wyoming Game and Fish Departmen Aug 28, 2026 Updated 49 mins ago 0Sage-grouse lek attendance decreased in 2026 according to data from the Wyoming Game and Fish Department’s lek tallies from this past this spring. Lek attendance was down 13% compared to 2025. Officials observed an average of 27 male sage-grouse per active lek. A little more than 27,000 male sage-grouse were observed on 91% of known, occupied leks. The annual observations are carried out by Game and Fish, agency partners, consultants and volunteers. Leks are observed from a distance from the ground and air during the birds’ spring mating. The appearance of fewer birds at leks is thought to be due to the natural population cycles of sage-grouse combined with habitat conditions. Wyoming’s sage-grouse population cycles every 7-9 years and a decrease was expected this year as Wyoming enters the downward portion of the population cycle. The downward trend in population can last from 3-7 years. The cause of these cycles is thought to be influenced by weather and climate, which impacts the availability of food and cover in the sagebrush ecosystem. External factors, such as extreme drought, wildfire and poor habitat can contribute to the trends too. Short-term weather trends, habitat
Navajo Medicine Pouch, Taos Drums, and Mountain Smoke
Nature is My Religion, The Earth is My Church Diné, means “The People” in Navajo, and is often preferred throughout the Navajo Nation. Located in the Four Corners area of the Southwestern United States, the Navajo Nation occupies 26,649 square miles on the Colorado Plateau in portions of Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. My great, great, great grandfather was a trading post owner in the Upper Sioux region and anyway this post will seem random to the uninitiated. The Navajo population was less than 7.000 in 1868 after the people barely survived removal from ancestral lands during the US Governments' campaigns against the Indian tribes of the American West following the Civil War. However, the Navajo proved remarkably resilient and the Navajo reservation is now home to over 200,000 people and nearly as many sheep. The Navajo are renowned for their belief in the integration of physical, mental and spiritual functioning, which we have fallen in love with as well. In January 2020, we bought two winter muskrat pelts for our friend, Chief, to make us a couple of medicine pouches. Chief says he is happy to do so, as we also bought a couple of pelts for him, as his children took the last medicine pouch he made after we saw him buying a pelt last year. Maybe we can get him to make a coyote arrow quiver some day as well. Anyway, it’s all good medicine, as they say. There are some other First American crafts, that our daughter is up to these days, after just returning from Santa Fe, Taos, and the Navajo Nation, which somehow I identify more with these days. Perhaps because we have several Dine’ friends. The Pipe
House of Hardy
Just watched the documentary, The Lost World of Mr. Hardy. It was really interesting they had 100 fly tiers at the factory, who started at age 14, tied for a year as an apprentice before any of their flies were not stripped back down to a bare hook. He said, "Everything changed when we went from being a manufacturing company to a marketing company and there was no going back." Rim praised some of their reels over the years, but they have largely become cheap fakes of what they once were, back when they were made by hand in England. They also haven’t had any good new innovations since then either. Much the same as happened to our Orvis over here. When Orvis went from being a manufacturing firm for the outdoorsman to a marketing company for stuff made in China, everything changed. It no longer has the passion, design and innovation which made it famous amongst outdoorsman. The same can be said of L.L. Bean, Eddie Bauer, and many of the formerly great American outdoor companies.
RS3 Fly-Imitation is the Best Form of Flattery
Over on avidmax.com, they just recently posted the following article about the RS3 fly, which is a supposed adaption to create a bulkier nymph than the RS2 fly which was devised by my very good friend, Rim Chung, some 30 years ago. Not sure why you would want "a bulkier nymph" but perhaps he's on to something, I don't know. To me, it looks more like the emerging Alien out of the movie by that title than an improvised RS2 to me, but everyone is entitled to their own tyings and who knows what works until you experiement with it, which Rim would approve of doing as many experiments as possible on the stream to find what works best for you and the trout in your area. There have been many commercial attempts to duplicate and/or improve the RS2 since Rim invented it, as he has never sold it commercially or attempted to keep the pattern to himself in anyway, including Rim's own Avatar fly. So as Rim always says, imitation is best form of flattery. Here's the article by Max Pavel on his RS3: How to tie the RS3 Max writes: The RS2 is a classic pattern that was created by Rim Chung. RS stands for “Rim’s Semblance”. The fly pattern was designed to imitate an emerging mayfly. If you have fished in Colorado the chances are you have heard about the RS2. The RS3 is a spin on Rims pattern that I developed because I wanted something that was tied on a heavy wire hook with a slim profile to be fished on bigger CO rivers where the average mayfly is a bit bigger then on the tailwaters. This fly has been very
Cowboy Hats and Fish Boots
Rick Bishop at Western Traditions has been our hat guy for twenty years now, but Rick and Diane Bishop, who own and run Western Traditions, recently retired. They had a great booth at the rodeos that sold quality cowboy hats, along with cleaning and reshaping most other cowboy hats for just $15. They travel the country with their products and services, setting up at numerous events, including the National Western, Houston Stock Show, Cheyenne Frontier Days and the National Finals Rodeo in Vegas. We used to buy all of our western hats from Rick. Now Bobby, who worked for them for 10 years, owns and runs a Bailey hat store in the Livestock Arena, called Chevarria Hat Co. Same great service and knowledge. And we love Lucchese and Anderson Bean boots, from fish boots, to Cape Buffalo cutters (10EE is my favorite size in Bean cutters), elephant in traditional square toes (order one size down, such as 9EE for me in Bean), all the way to roper or Buckaroo styles. Top it off with a 100x felt or an American Hat Company straw. In 2026, the legacy is carried on by his longtime employees Bobby and Heath in Exhibitors top floor near the new NW club. Guide to the Different Types of Cowboy Hats from www.langstons.com Get the skinny on the Western hat with this handy cowboy and cowgirl hat guide. From classic men's cowboy hats inspired by famous big-screen ropers like John Wayne to traditional Calamity Jane style cowboy hats for women, this guide covers the gamut of Western hat styles.Types of Cowboy Hats You may think a cowboy hat is just a cowboy hat, but that's not so. There are many unique types of