Showing posts with label bleach. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bleach. Show all posts

Sunday, April 28, 2013

Did a really stupid thing Friday

But hopefully learned my lesson. It's all about learning about this pool. After two pool parties with kids in and out for hours ... the pH of the pool went thru the roof. To bring down pH you add acid. I bought a powdered pool acid but it does not dissolve quickly so sits on the bottom eating away the plastic ... or at least the color.

I didn't buy a floater but those are usually used for Cloro tablets. So I made an acid floater out of a yogurt container. A bunch of ice pick holes in the bottom, put some powder in and enough water to float it upright. The mistake came when I checked it the next day, opened the lid with my face about a foot away. It nearly knocked me down with the fumes. I didn't feel it in my lungs but coughed for half the day and I'm sure it brought on the allergic type cold I had for two days.

So now I read that with a really high pH you are probably better emptying 1/2 the pool or all of it and starting over. I'm also reading that a pool can be maintained with cheaper and easier to use products like; sodium bicarbonate, muriatic acid and bleach and if I can't maintain a balance with them then empty the pool and start again. When the rains start the battle should be constant.

pH and Cloro test

Thursday, February 25, 2010

Man, I got bugs

As if the leaf cutting ants weren't bad enough - now I have these, whatever they are. They're in the avocado tree. Not all the way up (big tree) but on the trunk about head high. With the 1000 or so tightly grouped it looks like a nest just burst - or do they swarm and stick together ?? Not sure they are old enough to fly but look like winged creatures to me. They had started eating leaves on a small branch so I sprayed them.

BTW ... the ant powder I've been using on the leaf cutting ants works but without bodies I can't tell if it's just chasing them away. While I was in Melaque for a week my house keeper ran into another nest and poured a 1/4 bottle of Cloro (bleach) down the hole. Hundreds of bodies lying around when I came back


I'm tempted to call them aphids .... but this is Mexico


So .... they are stink bugs.  Not much to worry about.  They do eat fruit but I have no fruit now.  They also may stink but I didn't smell anything. Neighbors recognized them because they've had them
The construction of the house finished in April 2011 and I'm pretty much settled in. As of March 2014 I'm in preparation for rain mode for this coming summer. That includes sealing and painting things and dealing with drainage issues from last year.

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