New uses for the trampoline

This blog is just a short fun one, mainly about, you guessed it, my new favorite game. 

It's called how many new ways can I find to use a trampoline.

A gate post for the light wire gate I had to make to keep Dude out of my vegetable garden while allowing me easy access.  He does MUCH more damage hunting rats then the actual rats do.

Two of the thin, springy wire supports for the trampoline safety net hold up this bit of fence wire to protect the Day Lilies from, you guessed it, Dude.  He thinks sleeping in the flowers is just the bestest ever place to sleep.

 
Seriously, he may keep the bears out of the yard - which is a really good thing - but Dude can do more damage just by being a dog than most things can by trying really hard to wreck things.  Between them, he and the chickens destroyed weeks worth of work in the vegetable garden.

So the chickens now live in their 10 foot by 10 foot pen (there are only 7 of them, soon to be 6) and I have had to fence the vegetable area off totally to keep Dude away from them.  His sleeping all over my baby beetroots was the final straw, the entire bloody yard to sleep in, even under the house, and he sleeps in the beetroots?!?

I could almost forgive him digging for rats in the lettuce - out of an 8 by 4 foot lettuce bed, he left only 7 lettuces alive.  Oh, and the rat, of course, Dude is an enthusiastic ratter but not very good at it, they mainly live to eat another day.

"Aw, can't I go in there anymore?"

Two trampoline legs, three 4 ft by 4 ft by 5 inch thick pieces of styrofoam and the trampoline mat turned into a hunting blind.  I tend to sing "Up On The Roof" while sitting in it but other than that, it has proved to be a vastly peaceful spot, even if, so far, all I have seen from it are squirrels.

Bright sunny days are not good for my camera but you can just see one of the trampoline frame pieces wired on as extra support for a cage that is hanging from the chicken pen.  Hippy is a very big girl indeed and the cage was sagging under her weight.

As we are now stuck in Florida for the next five years - thank you Florida 50-mile rule, I don't have the words to say how much I hate you - I have bitten the bullet and gotten myself some new rabbits.  Will do a blog just on them so pictures of the stunning buns will delight the eyes sooner rather than later.

The trampoline safety net being used to keep my frogs in the pool.  The bits of pipe holding it up are mainly the bits that held it up on the trampoline itself.  I have now taken it down so the frogs can escape easily but so far, most of them have stayed put.  Frogs have proved to be smarter than either rabbits or chickens which, I will admit, was a surprise!

A newly planted floating island I made as an experiment.  It worked so well I am about to make another one, this time for celery instead of Penny Plants and Papyrus.  You can see the safety net folded down to allow the frogs to leave if they chose to.

After a full summer of use, I came up with a better way of attaching the net to the pool but as we are free now to at least return to the coast, I will not have to raise my fish anymore, I will just sit on the dock and catch them. 

But for anyone interested, a nice long piece of rope wrapped around the entire pool, woven in and out at the pool support frame uprights and tied tight, will easily keep frogs in. 

And instead of the metal poles - which are much more useful elsewhere in the yard - 4" x1" x 6' boards slipped in the slots where the pool attaches to its frame and tied to the support frame will work to hold the net in place, either stapled to the boards or tied to them, both will keep the net up.

Two trampoline legs and two bits of the frame make a wonderfully solid cage stand.  I wired safety net support poles to it to hold up the roof.  If I had had bolts it would have bolted together but as I have lots of scavenged wire, I tend to wire everything together.  It works just as well.

The roof over the cages.  I used three very light aluminum beams I picked up thrown away not long ago so I could use my 16-foot long roof metal pieces as the roof, that way I could cover 6 cages AND keep me out of the rain as well.  The safety net support poles worked a treat to hold it all up with.

The final trampoline leg, two bits of the frame and one of my livestock panel cages come together to support three cages, one facing the camera and two facing the back of the house.  It may look a bit redneck but the styrofoam helps keep them cool and the bit of roofing tin covers the join to keep them dry.   

Guess what I am keeping my eyes out for on Craigslist?  Another free trampoline!