The Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy states that you should always know where your towel is. Well if there were a Camper’s Guide to the Galaxy, surely the #1 piece of advice it would give would be to always know where your bucket is!
A 5 gallon bucket – or three – is the most versatile of any camping gear, whether you’re a barebones backpack camper, a car camper, or prefer to bring a motorized RV to the campsite.
Plenty of hose length is the modern homestead equivalent of the irrigation channels the Egyptians dug into the banks of the Nile when they were inventing civilization. But unlike the Egyptians’ floodwater ditches, garden hose can get out of hand!
So for just as long as we’ve had garden hoses to tangle, we’ve been thinking up ways to keep hoses neat and tidy so you don’t trip over them or run them over with the lawn mower. And wouldn’t you know it, many of them are sized at five gallons. Continue reading
Yesterday we covered using 5 gallon buckets as protection from flooding. Today I have a little bit more to say on protection from the elements with buckets.
A 5 gallon bucket can protect against just about any weather condition that can cause damage – including wind, rain, sun exposure or even hail.
This is the chicken plucker we used last week to butcher a couple dozen old hens that aren’t producing eggs anymore.
The chicken plucking process needs a strong and steady stream of water, which due to our motor design, has shorted out the engine when it got just a bit too wet.
In the last 10 years, we’ve seen some of the worst flooding in American history. In 2005 New Orleans was drenched by Katrina, then in 2012 Hurricane Sandy filled up New York City’s famous subway system. Today, June 23 2013, floods are washing away great portions of Calgary – even though the city itself is nowhere near the ocean. So almost no matter where you live, floods from an increasingly bipolar climate can affect you.
I’d like to propose an uncommon strategy for dealing with flood waters – keeping sealable 5 gallon buckets around to hide your possessions from water inundation.
While not an actual “spiral,” many of the brilliant principles behind an herb spiral are present in this bucket-based garden tower.
