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We hope you have a happy Thanksgiving too!

I have owned the EB3A since July 27th 2024. At the time of purchase, I paid 198.00 and that was the best 198.00 ever! I use it every week. Instead of hauling extension cords everywhere, I take my mini solar generator everywhere and simply plug in. I am amazed for a 600 watt machine all it can do. Thanks for asking.

Thanks for asking. I used just a typical drill bit that matched the size of the screws that came with that lock. It was fairly simple to drill the 2 holes thru the pipe tubing. To start the holes in the pipe, I used a hole puncher at first with a hammer to get a indentation in the slippery rounded tubing. Then a very thin drill bit to create a small hole. After that, I matched the screw size with the drill bit and the rest was super easy. That lock is fantastic and solid. We have a lot of black bears here on the mountain. With the extra hard cloth I wrapped around the chicken run and that lock, I can sleep at night knowing the birds are safe. The lock was installed last July. Its now the end of October and the birds are safe and all is going great. Hope this helps. We were affected somewhat with Helene and I hope soon to be posting many more videos. Thanks for watching!

This shelter was incredible and gave us the safety of knowing we can survive a tornado hit at anytime. Plus I wanted above ground version as back then our family were care-providers for my elderly mother who care hardly walk. She has now passed but I'll never regret doing this storm shelter. Hopefully your parents are doing and purchased one that will keep you all physically safe. Wayne

Hey, not quite sure what you meant. something about the black mesh? Ant? All I know is that we have ants, insects and tons of poison ivy that I just recently got plagued with. Yikes. Ich ich ich. Never had a brush in with poison ivy before. Now I understand why you need to avoid it at all costs. lol

I can't type lol what I meant did you plant your berries in the black mesh or plastic

I'm glad this video was able to help out in your search. It sounds like you have Quail outside? I once thought about that but our last house had very little space outside and we lived in an area with restrictions. That no longer is an issue as we purchased some acreage and now live on a mountain. Our Quail business before we moved last year was very successful. Selling eggs to 2 different market places. I may want to rethink about raising quail in the future here outside with an appropiate housing for them. Take care. God Bless. Wayne

@@sparksfamilyhomestead Cheers i started with 6 now iv nearly 40 + 😆

We are! Thanks for caring. We love and appreciate you also. Hope all is going well with you. Yeah... This land is a lot of work but I love it and thank God for allowing us to be here.

Are you in Texas? We sold the house that you see in that video back in 2019 and moved to North Eastern Tennessee. We are on a mountain with gorgeous woods and a live creek year around water fed by a local waterfall/ground spring. Life has not been easy but Im never looking back. I am so grateful for our home here and the beauty of it all. Its like a camp ground but I live in it. :) Please consider coming to Tennessee. You will never regret it. We get all 4 seasons and Chem Trails have be outlawed in the state. Breathe deeply here. God Bless, Wayne

Your comment is interesting. Please realize, the Icelandic birds are cold hardy. This last winter, we where snowed in and could not get into town for over a week. These birds are well equipped to handle fridgid weather and still lay eggs below 🥶 freezing. Having Quail for 2 years and realizing they slow down laying eggs after the first year of their short life span, and normally do not live beyond 2 years, yeah.. These chickens live up to 15 years, constant egg layers while others slow down in their 3rd year, Icelandic from my research will still be laying eggs beyond 10 years. Yup, I loved doing Quail when we had a garage and lived in a subdevision but living on several acres on a Mountain changes a lot of decisions regarding food production and being self sustaining as much as possible. I still will promote raising Quail but for our new situation, Icelandic birds are incredible. Wishing you the best. Wayne

i have to change my birds every year to keep up eggs, so i understand your plan

Glad you saw it. Thanks for being a subscriber. Appreciate it. Ive had a couple of surgeries but will be getting back to uploading current video's soon here. :)

@@farmasaurus Awesome! I believe I will do just that soon. I just had some surgery and I'm doing fine. As soon as I feel up to it in the next few days I'll be working on it. Thanks for the advice.

@@sparksfamilyhomestead no problem man! Heal up quick!

@@farmasaurus Trying. It was a ugly kidney stone that had to go by by. Lol.. Glad it's out me..

Yeah, When I last communicated to their customer service a couple of years ago, indicated that they were considering doing sides to their cages in the near future. And... that hasn't yet occured. With what I created was awesome and worked. Quail are very messy and I am glad i did what I did back then. Clean up became simple. Thanks for your insight and comment. Wayne

Hey Kenny, your comment is well taken. I was new to the youtube family back 7 years ago. Was still learning doing videos and adding back ground music. With the thousands upon thousands of views on this video, even with the irratating repitish music, it's been educational and I'm sure the manufacturer has made many sales off of this video. So... I've taken my TH-cam channel very serious now in regards to homesteading. It's growing and I'm grateful for that. I might be able to take that 7 year old video and edit that music. Not sure yet about doing that but I promise I will try. Plus, now living on some acres on a Mountain here in North Eastern Tennessee, I'm planing on doing a audible story account on the storm shelter delivery and why we had to choose the above ground model. That storm shelter was a life saver to our family and to this day, I'm forever grateful that back then we had it installed in our Texas home which was located in Tornato Alley. Thanks for your concern about the background music. Wayne

Try getting your 85 year old non abmulatory mother down an underground shelter with seconds to spare. That was my situation. Thus we did as you see in the video with documentation that a f5 can hit but we'd be safe. So many videos of the above ground shelters such as ours , saved lives. It gave me the care provider of my mother, a peace of mind while residing in that house. But in your situation, a below ground sounds and will be great! If we did not care for my mother, I most likely would have also done a below ground. Do the research regarding above ground from the manufacturer there in Texas. Their documentation and others nation wide are incredible. Wishing you safty and good judgement if you get one of these.

@@sparksfamilyhomestead I do agree with u & yes take care of Mom. I am from Texas ✌️

Perhaps Tornado master in Texas, the builder of the storm shelter would like to hear your recommendations.

It did 7 years ago. That's when I filmed it. My family moved to North Eastern Tennessee back in 2019. We sold that Texas house. That shelter was installed back in 2015. The shelter was awesome and the family that purchased our home in North Texas where very grateful for that storm shelter. Thus, It was and Im sure to this day a wonderful feeling of physical security to have something like that when you reside in Tornado ally. Here at the Eastern end of Tennessee, I no longer have the worries of tornado's and that huge Texas humidity and heat for so many months of any year. Thanks for your comment.

That shelter is rated for a catagory 5 tornado. The walls and its build are very heavily steeled. It is bolted directly in the cement foundation. If a tornado was to ever destroy the house, Id rather be in tornado Master above ground verses a bathroom tub anyday. It was well worth the 11K we spent on it back then.

This solar light is incredible. I live on a mountain thus, at night it really gets dark out here. Lol.. But to answer the question, No. There are settings I actually have never played with. It comes with a remote controll also. But for me and my family, we use it only for dawn to dusk. It stays on low all night long yet when you walk near its radius, it goes to full brightness. The low setting is also bright enough to see very well in. I have yet to experience the batteries ever running out or to low to run for hours and hours. Ive seen it turn on recently around 7pm and it stays strong to till the sun comes out. Incredible. Thanks for the question...

I once tried to locate my background with the Sparks family. If you do a google search, there are multitudes of Sparks nationwide. More than likely, blood wise perhaps not. Sparks is a very widely used last name as I have discovered. I wish you the best in your search. I can say this though, my family is from Texas but there are Sparks in all 50 states. Take care and God Bless.

If you look on my youtube channel, you'll see my family and I relocated to Eastern Tennessee a few years ago to get out of the heat. Lol... We love it here. Blessings. Wayne

Agreed. I did this video several years ago. It was one of my first vids. Since those days, I’ve have learn better on background music. Thanks for watching and you’re doing the right thing with your shelter. Congrats..😊

Thanks for the question. Since Ive only housed Jumbo Quail in the Hatching Time cages, approx 3 per section is very comfortable. Thus if there are no deviding walls, up to 10 to 11 for freedom of range. Hope this helps.

One rooster to 6 hens is safe. You could probably have comfortably 8 to 10? Roosters do not like competition. The one layer will have 3 sections that can be divided. Each section id have no more than 3 hens, 1 rooster. Thus approx. Up to 12 birds. 10 would be more comfortable. You'll just need to experiment. FYI, i always enjoyed seeing more freedom in each layer. So i took out the deviders for each section and opened the cages up. The birds loved their freedom.

3 jumbo quail per 1foot. So with hatching times cages, for them to be comfortable, Id have 9 to 10 in a single layer.

hatchingtime.com Go to their website. They have the quail 1 layer at a fantastic sale price right now. I believe its only 239.00. But, if you order it, request the flooring of the quail cage to be the flooring they use for chickens. Its slightly larger thus allowing their poop to drop thru easily for jumbo quail. Its only a slight increase price wise but so worth it. Its what ive done. Super easy on the clean up. Again, its a suggestion only. The regular flooring is smaller for regular quail. Thanks for adking. Wayne

Thanks so much!

Thanks 👍

Courtney, Wow! Is not this life living kinda exciting? I'm excited for you and your dad. Thanks for subscribing. Truly appreciate it. And yes, I thought about a fence structure too. I guess our 3 dogs sort of keep the black bears and dear away from our home. Anyway, that's what I suspect. I'll be more observant since you suggested that. Thanks!

@@sparksfamilyhomestead The smell of three dogs definitely helps keep the critters away! Happy homesteading!

Thank you for the compliment! It truly is a beautiful location for our homestead.

Thanks so much Margaret. We are doing well and tomorrow I will be planting those Muscadines. We are also in preparation to invest into chickens and soon I will be sharing about that as the breed of chicken is on an endager list here in the states. We may change our name from a homestead to a farm. Who knows. Just believing and dreaming for our future here. We love it so much.

Thanks for the compliment😀 Hope to start next week the developing of our new Muscadine grape Vinyard. And planting of several raspberries, blackberries and blueberry plants. I've been intrigued with your solar add ons. It looks exciting. Congratulations on all your hard work. Plus, love your channel.

Thanks for coming on board! And being apart of our small community here in North Eastern Tennessee.

Thanks Margarete. I'm fairly certain its a self pollinated tree. Yet, I will look into that. I'd like to get another peach tree that will bloom late so these spring articblasts will not affect the trees. I'm excited about planting our muscadine vinyard soon.

It's gets my apple tree about every year or part of it you have a beautiful place

Yup! I hear ya. We grew 4 apple trees at our other home near Tusculum. After 4 years in the ground, we finally began to see them bearing apples. Then, decided to sell the house and start from scratch again here on the mountain. Hope to really expand our homestead this time. So much potential here now. Love your comments😄👍