North Idaho Cat Juggler

I thought I'd try one of those pump oil extractors for my next oil change on my wife's 2018 Subaru Outback 2.5L. I bought the EWK 6.5L unit off Amazon and gave it a shot. After about 45 minutes of pumping it, I got about 1.5L of oil out of this engine that holds 5.1L. I did measure the oil level before starting and it was full. What am I doing wrong? If you've used this type of extractor before or if you have this same year model vehicle and know why an extractor won't work or what you have to do to get one to work, please let me know in the comments. Thanks for watching!

The Ryobi RM480ex mower, being a battery electric machine, doesn't require too much in the way of maintenance, but the manual does say to change the transaxle oil every 100 hours. Here's a quick video showing that process, once you have pulled out the battery tray. If you dig this sort of quick and dirty mower maintenance video, please consider liking and subscribing. Warning: the occasional barn cat may appear in my videos.

If you neglect to check your tire pressures before taking a ride on your riding mower, you could be in for a nasty surprise. That happened to me several weeks ago. The tire can come off the rim. Then you have to try to get the tire bead to contact the rim before you can air it back up. In years past I have been able to use a Harbor Freight ratchet strap to force the tire bead back in contact with the rim. That didn't work this time. I eventually had to take the wheel off and put it in the house where the rubber could warm up. Then I used the old rope technique to force the tire bead onto the rim again. Once that was done it was trivial to get the tire aired back up and back onto the mower. I also had a flashing red light on the battery charger before, but that seems to have resolved itself today. These batteries are six years old and still limping along but who knows how long that will last? Lead acid batteries are not known for their longevity. I'm getting myself mentally prepared for the inevitable replacement of these batteries with the LiFePo (LFP) batteries sometime probably next year.

Just a quick unboxing video for the QNAP TS-133 NAS. I also install a WD 10TB drive inside it. Thanks for watching and if you found this useful or interesting please consider to like and subscribe!

Fall has come to North Idaho. The leaves are changing color, the fruit is ripe and ready for harvest, and wild turkeys roam the land. I hope you enjoy this brief snapshot of life on the farm up in the mountains of North Idaho. There's no music or talking. Just the sounds of nature. If you like this type of video, please let me know by liking, subscribing, and sharing the video with your friends and family. Thanks, as always, for watching!

I like to train my barn cats to go on walks like dogs. First we start by walking the quarter mile driveway out to the mailbox and eventually work our way up to miles-long hikes out on the county road. The cats love it. If you enjoy this type of cats-walking-like-dogs video, please like and subscribe. And as always, thanks for watching!

When we bring new kittens to the farm to become barn cats, their first week is spent in a predator-proof kitty cottage. This is a former utility shed that we have critter-proofed with chicken wire. The kittens spend their first week in safety, with plenty of food, water, and a fresh litter box. They scamper and play, climb up three different levels of play area and of course we come visit them to play several times a day. They even go on short supervised walks outside the cabin just for a change of perspective. After the week is over, they are released onto the farm, ready to explore and begin the hunt. These three kittens were craigslist finds offered by our neighbors a mile away down the county road. Their barn cat had a litter and they were having trouble finding homes for the kittens. We picked out three happy and energetic males. Two black cats, one with green eyes we call "Greenie," and one with brown eyes we call "Brownie." The third is a tuxedo cat we call "Tux." If you like this sort of kitty kontent, please like and subscribe. And as always, thanks for watching!

My name's Mark and I live on a 24 acre property in the mountains of North Idaho. This year we decided to try a new type of garden called a Keyhole Garden, so-called because when viewed from up above, it has a structure in the center resembling an antique-style keyhole. The center of this circular raised garden bed contains a basket where you put compost, and there's a small cut-out so that you can more easily access the center basket. The garden has been planted and for several weeks now has been growing and producing vegetables. It's also a home for birds and insects of all kinds. In this video I show you the progress of our garden as well as the amazing 3D electric fence construction that keeps deer and elk from jumping in and eating our lunch. If you like this sorta garden update video, please consider clicking the like button and subscribe to the channel for more North Idaho gardening, tractor, homesteading, recumbent trike riding, and of course, the occasional barn cat that wanders in. "Scraping off the Straw Bale Garden" Keyhole Gardening Series (Part 1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFbBK7VK_gE&t=626s&ab_channel=NorthIdahoCatJuggler "Scraping The Straw Bale Garden" Keyhole Gardening Series (Part 2) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4lFUFOG8Tc&ab_channel=NorthIdahoCatJuggler "Building our Keyhole Raised Bed Garden" Keyhole Gardening Series (Part 3) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUktyOjjn94&ab_channel=NorthIdahoCatJuggler

My name's Mark and I live on a 24 acre farm in the mountains of North Idaho. Back in 2015-2017 my wife and I had a passive house (passivhaus) designed and constructed on this land. Due to the difference in our ages (8 years) plus the wonderful tendency of folks in her family tree to live to their late 90s while mine struggle in many cases just to get to their 80s, we figured (barring accident or misadventure, with all things coming to their natural end) she might easily outlive me by 20 years or more. And in that instance, we wanted the house to be as maintenance-free as possible, so that she would not have to (as a 90+ year old woman) be out in the forest chopping firewood or behind the house fueling up or fixing a traditional generator. So instead of installing a combustion-driven electrical backup generator, we opted for a 7.5kW solar array plus a SonnenBatterie ECO 12 12kWh LFP battery backup. In this video I'll give you a tour of our backup power system and you can learn what we did and why we did it. Normally in our area no one would put up a solar array because our power cost is a very low ~7c per kWh. So no one would do a payback period analysis on something like this. But as a backup generator with a requirement to be essentially maintenance free, it makes sense. It also helps that I'm an electrical engineer who enjoys this technology. As usual, if you dig this sorta content, go ahead and hit the like button and subscribe to the channel for more of the same. Hopefully I get a little better with the video skills each time. Thanks for watching and hope you enjoy the video.

Recumbent trike riders as well as motorcyclists can experience the "Wobble of Doom," also known as the "Wobble of Death," or the "Tank Slapper," and that's when the front wheels wobble violently left and right, potentially causing loss of control. I had fixed this problem awhile back with an inexpensive motorcycle steering damper but for this video disconnected my fix and managed to capture this phenomenon on four different cameras. After re-attaching the steering damper, I took a short ride up the hill behind the church to the Pleasant View Cemetery to enjoy the view and visit some of the graves. As usual, if you dig this sorta recumbent trike tank-slapping content, go ahead and click the like and subscribe. It helps me decide which kind of videos to make in the future, and somehow helps the algorithm do its thing.

Just a quick video showing how I diagnosed and repaired a recurring problem I was having with my Land Pride RCR1260 mower. One of the draw pins kept working its way loose. With the help of an online tractor forum and by reading the manual, I was able to solve the problem. If you dig this sorta tractor related content, please like and subscribe. Costs you nothing and it helps this channel stay online. Thanks for watching!

There's a magical part of our land in the mountains of North Idaho, where three parcels come together at a point. It happens in a forest of ponderosa pines and when viewed from the air, it looks like a triangular forest. So we call it "The Triangular Forest." Like other areas of the property, this is one I don't mow down completely, rather I just mow a path about five feet wide so that I can walk up there and enjoy the land without having to bushwack through woody and thorny plants. The proper tool for this job is the Kioti CK3510SE HST with a rough mower, sometimes called a Slasher or a Bush Hog or Brush Hog. This type of mower doesn't care if there are branches or small trees in the way, it just chops 'em up without missing a beat. If you like this sorta tractor video, please consider hitting the like button and subscribing to the channel. Thanks for watching and we'll see you on the next video!