On Mon, 15 May 2006 18:03:52 -0700, Grant Erwin
wrote:

We grow strawberries, and the birds get a lot more than we do if we don't net
the beds. This year Karen built a raised strawberry bed about 3x10', and she now
wants to put bird netting over it. It has to be something you can also take the
netting off of so you can work on the bed, pick berries, etc.

I was thinking of a sort of quonset hut arrangement with some long skinny whippy
bendy things bent into half-hoops over the bed, and we could just lay the bird
net over the frame. I was thinking of something like the stuff they make mobile
ham antennas out of. Only problem is I don't have a clue where to buy it. Green
bamboo would be nice too, if it will bend in a 3' diameter, doubt it would. I
was thinking of heavy electrical wire, but I don't have any, and 100' or so of
say 6 gauge copper would run some do-re-mi.

Ideas?

Grant Erwin
Kirkland, Washington

1/4" dia steel rod weighs 0.167 lb/ft. A semicircle of 3' dia would
be about 1.58 lb or about a buck's worth at today's prices. A 10 ft
length would be about the same. So, 3 semicircles and 5 lengthwise
members ("ridge pole", two bases and two intermediates would cost
about 8 bux. It is real easy to bend 1/4" rod into a 3' circle, takes
only a minute to stick a frame like that together with MIG, and it
would last for several years even if unpainted. Weight would be
about 13 lb, easily managed but enough not to blow away.