Climate change

Thank you, John, for exposing the climate change fallacy (Issue #153, May/June 2015).
I remember in the 1950s we had a very severe drought in California. Our source of surface water was curtailed and we were concerned that our fruit trees and vineyards might have trouble surviving. At night, sometimes, we could look toward the mountains and watch the flames from the forest fires nearly double the height of the mountains. We put in a well for irrigation but only had to use it for about three years until the rain and mountain snows returned. People may say that the current drought is worse, but there are other contributing factors. Either way, in 1950 the population of California was about 10 million and it is now about 40 million. These additional city dwellers, who depend on what the farmer grows for food, are tapping into the same water sources, and as their population has increased, have had a large effect on the water supply.

Marty Milanese
Minneapolis, Minnesota

Re. John Silveira’s piece on so-called Global Warming (Issue #153, May/June 2015). He’s right on. While I know little about weather, I worked as a human engineering specialist in the aerospace industry and of one thing I know quite a bit — human error rates in the many means of handling digital data. The idea that digital data can be read, totaled, transmitted, and otherwise processed by the millions of bits across hundreds of humans and machines to produce a single, fractional number (i.e. global temperature) in which anyone can have any belief is an impossible task.

Meanwhile, one cannot forget the church of Global Cooling — prominent in all the 60s and 70s news magazines and newspapers of the day.

John Dinan
Topsfield, Massachusetts

Please don’t go paperless

You have by far the best magazine. We live in a remote area of Arizona with enough solar to do lights at night for two hours. Propane fridge, etc.

We order magazines to have something to read and do when we can’t go outside.

Please do not go paperless on your magazine. I beg of you, please don’t.

A magazine I have a three-year subscription to has gone paperless, and I have one and a half years left on it. They don’t give refunds. This is the second time a magazine has done this because the cost of printing and mailing are so high …

The Kumpes
Arizona

Stock panels for tomatoes

We enjoyed Jackie’s article in Issue #152 March/April 2015, “Same garden — more food.” I don’t have any questions. Just wanted to add some things we use in our garden.

You used welded stock panels for cucumbers, we do too. But we also use them for our tomatoes. We plant our tomatoes in a row about two feet apart. Then we drive posts about seven feet apart down the row. Then we place panels down both sides of the tomato row, one foot apart and tie them together in a tepee at the top to form a continuous cage, stronger than individual cages.

We also use panels to keep the deer and raccoons out of the garden. We electrify the panels around the sweet corn to keep the raccoons out. We insulate the posts with 1½” PVC pipe and set the panels on short pieces of 4″ PVC to hold them off the ground.

We also use stakes and twine to make trellises for our peas. They climb just like cucumbers. We place the stakes about three feet apart down the row. Then we tie the twine to the end post 6 to 8 inches above ground. Then loop the twine around each post down the row and tie to the other end. Adding more twine as needed 6 to 8 inches apart. This makes the peas a lot easier to pick.

We have gardened over 50 years, raising most of our food. But we learn something from every Backwoods Home.

Lowell Brown
Unionville, Missouri

Mas on Charter Arms guns

Please tell Massad Ayoob that he’s the greatest. And ask him to do an article on the Charter Arms Police Bulldog 4 inch .38 special, 6 shot revolver #73860 charter catalog.

If he can’t do that, ask him to do an article on the current crop of Charter Arms revolvers. An honest opinion, have they come back up in quality where a person can depend their life on one?

Steven B. Rigdon
Monroe, North Carolina

It has been my experience that Charter Arms guns have good sights and can be surprisingly accurate, but they are not the most long-lived handguns with heavy use. The company has gone through multiple generations of management/manufacture, and I haven’t seen enough of the current ones in action to form a specific opinion on that generation. — Mas

Legacy to grandchildren

… I think one of the most important things I can leave my grandchildren is my library of how-to books. Backwoods Home is a very important part of this. Is there an index for all the years of BHM?

John Hendrix
Farmington, Arkansas

There is a free index on our Article Indiex page that you can download and print. Or, we can send you a print or CD version for $6. — Jessie

Raised beds built from pallets are cheap to make, but look very nice.

We built raised beds

With our somewhat rocky soil, we have had a difficult time growing the root vegetables like carrots that our family loves. The article in issue #150, Nov/Dec 2014 “Three Raised Bed Designs” by Joe Mooney gave us the perfect solution! This is one of several raised beds my husband, Tim, has made for me using the pallet wood design. Easy to follow plans and inexpensive to make. Thank you, Joe and BHM!

Cathy Pawloski
Barton City, Michigan

Living under a rock

I subscribed to your Kindle edition. I’m wondering every time I read an issue, why I never knew about your magazine before recent time. I must have been living under a rock! I wholeheartedly agree with your philosophy and politics.

Jo Broetzmann
Menomonie, Wisconsin

Longevity award

Renewing my subscription; I may well be your oldest (longest) subscriber. I have every issue of BHM, well-preserved in three-ring binders.

William Boughton
Missoula, Montana

More relevant articles

I dropped Mother Earth News because I find your articles more interesting and relevant.

Stephen Shaffer
Luckey, Ohio