Is there a "special" tool for moving dead brush 100 feet away?

[Dan Espen]

Sounds like a plan.

[Danny D]

I realize that. They were half-way through their combination of stone age/bronze age, while the Spaniards were gifted with guile and sharp steel swords.

Yet, the numbers were so astonishingly lopsided, 200 Spaniards to 4,000 natives at a time, that the natives had only to learn, and they wouldn't have been defeated.

Point is that applies to the USENET, where we learn from everyone else, or, as the somewhat mythical Sun Tzu would say, know your backyard, and know yourself, and in a hundred skirmishes with brush and poison oak, you will prevail.

:)

[DD_BobK]

And break the law?

[DD_BobK]

Important piece of information missing... What prompted the desire to create the debris?

[DD_BobK]

Don't believe the premise of Guns, Germs & Steel? It seems as though it would have been inevitable in any case.

[DD_BobK]

[Danny D]

I don't know if it's legal or not, but police cruisers drive by every single day. They can't help but see dozens of these guys standing in the Home Depot parking lot, day in and day out.

Nobody doesn't know what they're doing.

So, while I don't know the laws, I don't see that the people *paid* to enforce them are doing anything about it that is having any success.

Plus, I've never ever hired someone that way. If anything, I'd hire out the local kids; but the point was that the work was immense no matter how you look at it, to lug the brush *uphill* a steep 50 feet to the roadway.

[Danny D]

I realize you know weapon delivery systems better than anyone else here, so I won't argue with you on that!

[Danny D]

I believe in Sun Tzu's premise of defeating the enemy by knowing both your enemy and yourself, and then using strategy to win.

Guns, horses, germs, cunning, guile, &, I might add, very sharp swords were formidable; but the real advantage the Spaniards had were a better strategy than either the Incas or the Aztecs had.

Had the North & South American natives met the invaders on the beaches, allowing no foot on land, they *might* have prevailed.

However, I've read about every battle in history that I could find, so I do agree that, in history, repeated attacks by small forces

*have* sometimes defeated overwhelmingly large forces; but, in general, 200 men at a time shouldn't win a battle against 4,000 opponents - if the natives had only spent the time and energy to *understand* what they were up against - and then to formulate a detailed strategy for defeating that enemy.

Easy for me to say, but, these comments, in relation to the USENET, simply imply that the goal of fully *understanding* the task at hand is, essentially, the means to a successful conquest of home repair issues.

Knowing the enemy's weakness, and knowing your strength, is the key to defeating thousands of those teeny tiny California ants in your kitchen; or ridding a hillside of a fortress of Poison Oak; or clearing out the litter of the dead bodies of the Spanish Moss & Scotch Broom invaders, pulled out, at their weakest point, during the winter rains; or removing cooty stains from toilets using chemical warfare to attack where the enemy has his base of support.

[DD_BobK]

DADD-

Do try & keep up....

most local jurisdictions are proscribed for one reason or another from enforcing laws related to immigration. Think about the unintended consequences thereof....

So as an example... if the police aren't enforcing vice laws, it's ok for you to pick up a street walker?

On second thought....never mind.

[DD_BobK]

I guess you should be contacting Jared Diamond and informing him of his wrong thinking....

Ya, like this could work?

"if the natives had only spent the time and energy to *understand* what they were up against - and then to formulate a detailed strategy for defeating that enemy."

How successful would any of your home repairs have been "in a technical vacuum" & with people shooting at you? My guess.... not very.

History (& Jared Diamond) proves you wrong again & again... I suppose you could find some rare examples to support your premise but LARGE technological differences are nearly impossible to over come when warfare is involved.

And please do not give me modern examples. Most technological differences that exist today are small compared to

500 years ago. Plus the "leakage rate" is much higher today....

You're amazing.

[krw]

Across prairies, mountains, and through forests? Likely not. I-80 hadn't been built yet. ;-)

[krw]

I hope you pay the unemployment insurance, your end of FICA, and everything CA adds to your employer's misery, too! ;-)

[Danny D]

I'll snap a picture of it for you, but there is a white-and-black sign posted at the very entrances to that Home Depot strictly forbidding pick up of workers.

White and black signs, are, you may recall, for legal use only (at least when on public roadways).

I tried to google street view it for you, but they appear to have blurred out the signs, for some reason:

I don't remember exactly what the sign says, as I see it every time I go there - but next time I go there, I'll snap a photo of it for you.

[Danny D]

Know thine enemy, and know thyself, and in a hundred battles, you will prevail (Sun Tzu).

I am trying to eradicate three enemy combatant species which have taken over acres of chaparral in my control, namely:

1. Scotch Broom

[dennisgauge]

It's called a wheelbarrow.

[chaniarts]

removing groundcover sometimes leads to massive erosion problems.

[Danny D]

Your approach is called the Federale Transform approach. The guys who run? They're called the Federales Series.

[Danny D]

Bummer that nobody brought this up until now.

If that's the case, I perhaps should have followed this suggestion: "bundle the pulled plants to create 8- to 12-inch wattles that can besecured to slopes to prevent erosion."

Paradoxically, these pests were originally planted to

*prevent* erosion:

Unfortunately, all parts of the plant are poisonous:

And, the CDFA says they're a Class C pest, which means they're: ?troublesome, aggressive, intrusive, detrimental, or destructive ...and difficult to control or eradicate.?

Here is how I removed the scotch broom in the winter season:

1. The task was to weed about an acre of these weeds:
2. I first got below the weed on the hillside & grasped low:
3. Then I pulled DOWNWARD with all my strength, always downhill:
4. With the ground saturated by rain, the weeds came out:
5. As predicted, the Spanish Broom was the hardest to pull:
6. Some of the plant roots were as thick as a fat thumb:
7. However most of the thousand of plants pulled had thin roots:
8. And now the muddy hillside is devoid of the weed plants:

[Danny D]

Hmmm... looking at this picture of just one of many collection points, would *you* use a wheelbarrow on that tangled mess?

The wheelbarrow *did* come in handy though, near the end, when all that was left are these gnarly bits and pieces: