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THURSDAY AUGUST 16, 2018
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WATTLE FENCES
In the Garden
Rose of Sharon: not a real rose, but worth growing An unsung hero of the late summer garden is rose of Sharon (Hibiscus syriacus). This shrub’s branches are studded with pastel blossoms year after year, despite drought, poor soil or general neglect. Cold winters or sweltering summers similarly leave it unfazed. Despite its tolerance for frigid winters, rose of Sharon has always seemed to me a “Southern” shrub. Perhaps that’s because I was inundated with this plant during the two years I sojourned in the most southern county of a barely Southern state. More likely, I connect LEE REICH rose of Sharon with the South because of its family connections. Rose of Sharon is not a rose at all, or even distantly related to one. Rather, hibiscus, cotton and okra are its kin — all “Southern” plants, even though some species of hibiscus, like rose of Sharon, are perfectly at home in cold winter weather. They do like sun and hot summers, though. FAMILY MATTERS Rose of Sharon and its relatives are part of the Mallow Family. The most famous “mallow” plant is the wetland marsh mallow. Marshmallows were originally made from the candied roots of marsh mallows. Only a glance at rose of Sharon’s blossoms reveals its kinship with other members of the family. From the center of each flaring trumpet of petals protrudes a tubular column of male and female flower parts, the male parts bristling out along the column and the female parts splayed out at the far end. Those petals might be purple, red, pink, white — on some plants even blue. And those trumpets, on some varieties of rose of Sharon, are made up of more than a single row of petals. You surely are familiar with the plant I’m talking about, but if not, let me clinch recognition with additional description. Rose of Sharon is an upright shrub, perhaps 8 to 10 feet tall. It’s not a delicate shrub, fine with twigs, but one with branches that are relatively thick and few. The shrub rarely sends up new shoots (“suckers”) at or near ground level, so it tends to become like a small, low-branching tree having a single or just a few main stems that live for a long time. BEAUTY WITH LITTLE TROUBLE This growth habit tells you something about rose of Sharon’s pruning needs. They are, in a word, few. Like PeeGee hydrangeas and climbing roses, all that rose of Sharon needs is very occasionally to have a decrepit stem cut back low in the plant. If flowering seems too sparse, shortening some stems in the upper part of the shrub will provide the necessary invigoration. Rose of Sharon blossoms on new growth, so the time to prune it is in late winter, before new growth begins. The plant’s glory goes on for an extended period, but only once a year. If you plan on planting it, don’t expect to pay any attention to it in autumn, winter, spring or early summer, during which the plant is drab but, thankfully, inconspicuously so. Wait! Before you dismiss rose of Sharon for its single season of glory, think of forsythia and lilac, both popular and both also at their best in a single season, a short one at that. No female of passing beauty gave rose of Sharon its name. Rose of Sharon was named for a place: a fertile plain along the Mediterranean coast in western Israel. The plant growing there, the “rose of Sharon” mentioned in the Bible, was probably a wild tulip. Our rose of Sharon’s native home is in India and China, but it was originally thought to originate at the Middle Eastern location. http://www.leereich.com/blog http://leereich.com
This undated photo shows a rose of Sharon shrub in New York. Not related to rose, rose of Sharon is a tough shrub that bears colorful blossoms, they look like hibiscus blossoms, even under urban conditions. (AP photo)
LIZ WESTON
Your home is not a piggy bank
on Pinterest and Instagram lately, where a lot of DIY decorators get their ideas,” she says. “Lighting manufacturers have responded with stylish options for every budget.” The right sconce can create a welcoming glow, and accentuate furniture and archi-
By LIZ WESTON NerdWallet Your home equity could keep you afloat in retirement or bail you out in an emergency — but not if you spend it first. U.S. homeowners are sitting on nearly $6 trillion of home value they could tap as of May 2018, according to data provider Black Knight. Lenders are eager to help many do just that through home equity loans, home equity lines of credit and cash-out refinancing. The rates are often lower than other kinds of borrowing, and the interest may still be deductible, despite last year’s tax reform changes. But you can lose your home to foreclosure if you can’t pay back the loan, which is why financial planners generally frown on using equity for luxuries, investing or consolidating credit card debt. Many planners point to the foreclosure crisis that started a decade ago as an example of what can go wrong when people binge on home equity debt. “Having equity in your home is a huge financial advantage that can provide for significant flexibility, security and peace of mind,” says Howard Pressman, a certified financial planner in in Vienna, Virginia. “It is not an ATM that can be used to supplement your lifestyle.” YOU MAY NEED THAT MONEY LATER Retirement experts predict many Americans will need to use home equity to support them when they stop working. They may do that by selling their homes and downsizing or by using a reverse mortgage, which doesn’t require payments. Reverse mortgages give people 62 and older access to their equity through lump sums, lines of credit or a series of monthly checks, and the borrowed money doesn’t have to be paid back until the owner sells, dies or moves out. Home equity also can be used to supplement emergency funds, planners say. Pressman recommends home equity lines of credit to his clients who don’t have debt problems and who are disciplined and won’t spend the money frivolously. PUT YOUR OWN LIMITS ON BORROWING Before the Great Recession, several lenders allowed people to borrow over 100 percent of their home’s value. These days, the maximum is typically 80 percent. (Black Knight used this 80 percent loanto-value standard to calculate how much tappable equity people have, based on current home values
See Sconces p. 2D
See Piggy bank p. 2D
This May 4 photo shows a wattle fence made to protect a garden on a property in Contrada Petraro in the mountains of northern Sicily. In northern Sicily, fences are essential to protect gardens against wild pigs. (Cain Burdeau via AP)
Weaving branches takes time, yields rewards By CAIN BURDEAU Associated Press CONTRADA PETRARO, Sicily — They come in the middle of the night and are gone by morning. But without fail, they leave their calling cards: Pronged footprints and gashes in the ground where they’ve dug with natural abandon. This nocturnal troublemaker in mountainous northern Sicily is the “cinghiale,” the wild pig, a bane to those who tend a garden. When I came to live with my wife and two boys on a small abandoned farm that we bought here in the Madonie Mountains, the locals quickly instilled a fear of the cinghiale in me. According to many people, these animals have made gardening nearly impossible. The wild pigs disappeared from Sicily around the end of the 19th century, but their numbers have exploded since they were reintroduced more than 20 years ago and crossbred with domesticated pig species, authorities say. Plant a vineyard? Don’t bother, locals told me. They’ll eat all your grapes. Put up a fence and they’ll find a way in. These pigs can jump 3 feet off the ground, I learned. One neighbor told me he
This March 26 photo shows writer Cain Burdeau hammering into the ground a post for a garden wattle fence he’s making on a property he lives on with his family in Contrada Petraro in the mountains of northern Sicily. In northern Sicily, fences are essential to protect gardens against wild pigs. (AP photo) was removing his vineyard due to the pigs and their bottomless appetites. “They’re terrible,” he said with regret. But I had visions of turning sections of our three acres into garden spots overflowing with carrots, tomatoes, cucumbers, herbs, artichokes. I began to think harder about fences that would keep out the wild pigs. Our farm, like much of the countryside hereabouts, is patchily ringed by wire fences threaded with strands of barbed wire. These fences weren’t designed to keep wild pigs out but to keep flocks of sheep in. Held up by withered sticks and even sec-
tions of plumbing pipe, they were old and falling over. They were useless, and a nuisance. One section cut across our land and had to be removed both for safety and ease of passage. I didn’t want my boys to get caught on the barbed wire while they were running and playing. With wire cutters in hand, I removed these obstacles. Many people string up electric fences around gardens. But there are problems: Besides costing a fair amount, they can malfunction, and pose the obvious problem of causing nasty electric shocks. Sturdy wire fences with See Fences p. 2D
RIGHT AT HOME:
Don’t forget sconces in your lighting plan By KIM COOK Associated Press Lighting a room seems simple: Plug in a lamp or flip a switch. Not so fast. “Nothing enhances a space more than a thoughtful lighting plan,” says interior designer Michael Wood of New York City. Many buildings in the city don’t allow channeling into the ceiling to add lighting, so as a workaround, he often uses sconces. “The right sconce at the right location, inside or out, can act as much as a statement or art object as a light fixture,” he says. “There’s an opportunity to personalize and add richness to a space.” There are practical considerations, as well. “Sconces free up space on night tables, or reduce clutter in a room with too many floor lamps,” says Wood. “For smaller spaces in particular, the less on the floor the better.” Donna Garlough, style director for Joss & Main, has noticed growing interest in sconces in the past few years. “It’s not that they’re new, but spaces featuring sconces have become extra-popular
This undated photo provided by Brendan Ravenhill Studio shows Ravenhill's Ada sconce. The fixture can be mounted horizontally or vertically, indoors or out. (AP photo)
2D The Mining Journal
Thursday, August 16, 2018
House to Home Mortgage Index 30-YEAR Rate-Fee/Pts.
15-YEAR Rate-Fee/Pt.
High rate
4.750
1
4.250
1
Low rate
4.375
1
3.750
1
Average rate
4.562
1
4.031
1
Scon ce s
clad in gold metallic for a mix of rusticity and elegance. And, available in both a swing-arm and fixed arm version, the Bautista’s round opal glass shade casts a warm glow. Wood praises Los Angeles designer Brendan Ravenhill’s new ADA sconce, which debuted during design week this spring at the ICFF in New York. “I was impressed with the flexibility — it can mount vertically or horizontally — and the finish and size options,” he says. “It would work with contemporary, industrial or classic decor.” At Pottery Barn , the Adeline sconce brings sparkle to a space with a faceted crystalline glass shade. Translucent milk glass and a riveted bronze, nickel or brass frame give the PB Classic sconce retro charm. And for a sophisticated bathroom, consider the Sussex tube sconce, with a frosted glass shade mounted on a polished nickel base with Art Deco-era elan. Finally, from West Elm, there’s a lovely adjustable sconce that plugs in. It comes in both long- and short-armed versions, with one or two shades. Brass and a curvilinear black shade give it a cool midmod vibe.
from 1D
tecture, Garlough says. “Used to frame furnishings like beds and sofas, sconces can give your room a high-end, custom feel, and they make furniture look like it really belongs in the space,” she says. Popular locations for sconces include the master bedroom, where they create a hotel-chic vibe, next to bathroom mirrors, around kitchen cabinetry or in hallways. Outdoors, a sconce provides great mood lighting on a wall or fence. Wood likes sconces with an articulating arm. “It frees the light from a single illumination point, in a similar fashion to a task lamp,” he says. There are also versions that reach some distance from the wall, illuminating corners that other lighting can’t. “Brass and oiled bronze sconces are especially popular, as are midcentury-style globe sconces,” says Garlough. At Joss & Main, the Gulvason articulating sconce comes in several metallic finishes, including brass and polished nickel; it can be installed or plugged in, which is handy if you aren’t able to hard-wire anything. The Sabinal perches a little black shade on a resin post shaped liked a tree branch,
Piggy ban k
This graphic represents a Tuesday survey of regional lending institutions. Figures are based on rates at Range Bank, First Bank of Upper Michigan, Marquette Community Federal Credit Union and mBank.
This undated photo shows Joss & Main's Bautista sconce, which pairs a luminous opal glass globe with a warm brass finish for a sophisticated wall lamp with a midcentury vibe. (AP photo)
from 1D
and existing home loans. The answer: $5.8 trillion.) Homeowners would be smart, though, to set their own limits lower to ensure they still have access to equity in an emergency and are able to pay off all of their mortgage debt before retirement. IS THE POTENTIAL BENEFIT WORTH THE RISK? Financial planners generally frown on using equity for luxuries such as vacations, high-risk ventures such as investing in the stock market or starting a business, or for debts that should be paid off more quickly. (The typical mortgage lasts 30 years, while home equity loans and lines of credit can stretch for 20 or more years.) “If the money is being used to pay down credit cards or buy a car, then think twice about doing it at all,” says Monica Dwyer, a certified financial planner in West Chester, Ohio. “Those kinds of debts should be paid off in the short term, not with long-term borrowing.” Many people use home equity to pay college bills for their kids, but planners urge caution since it’s easy to overspend
on higher education. In general, parents shouldn’t borrow more for college than they can pay off before retirement, and the debt shouldn’t prevent them from saving enough for that retirement. Federal education loans may be a better option, since they have fixed rates and consumer protections such as forbearance and deferral. Investing in home improvements can be a good use of home equity, financial planners say, as long as the projects add value to the home. (The IRS has said that interest on home equity borrowing may still be deductible if the taxpayer itemizes deductions and the money is used to “buy, build or substantially improve the taxpayer’s home that secures the loan.”) Even then, Kristin Sullivan, a certified financial planner in Denver, likes her clients to have a plan to pay off the loan within five years. That’s “a reasonable time period to pay off something you don’t really need,” she says. EDITOR’S NOTE: This column was provided to The Associated Press by the personal finance website NerdWallet . Liz Weston is a columnist at NerdWallet , a certified financial planner and author of “Your Credit Score.” Email: lweston@nerdwallet.com. Twitter: @lizweston.
25359 Branch Rd.
This March 26 photo shows writer Cain Burdeau cutting to length a branch to make a post for a garden wattle fence he’s making on a property he lives on with his family in Contrada Petraro in the mountains of northern Sicily. In northern Sicily, fences are essential to protect gardens against wild pigs. (AP photo)
Fe n ce s
from 1D
cement posts are common. But I found them unattractive, expensive and boring to look at with their uniformity in shape and purpose. Besides, I was told that pigs will get under them eventually. As spring approached — and with it an urge to sow seeds and plant vegetables — we still had no fence. And on several crisp winter mornings, I found the telltale signs of wild pigs: big holes dug around olive trees and along muddy trenches where rains drained off our hillsides. The power of their snouts was impressive. The pigs root in search of tubers and other buried delights, and can make it look like a mechanized tiller guided by a phantom got loose overnight. As it happened, one evening as I read Leo Tolstoy’s masterpiece “Anna Karenina,” I paused halfway through one of his descriptions of Russian country life. He depicted a countryside strung with wattle fences. What exactly IS a wattle fence? I had a vague notion, but needed to look it up in a dictionary. It was a eureka moment: A wattle fence is made of sticks driven into the ground and interwoven with twigs and branches. Then I did the next obvious thing: an internet search. Sure enough, a few people out in the world were wattling, and happy to show
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how it is done on homemade videos. A wattle fence is simple. It’s made by pounding posts into the ground — say 12 inches deep — and then weaving twigs and branches in and out of the posts. At the very least, a twig needs to be woven around three posts so that it stays in place. The fence’s robustness — and it does become surprisingly robust — comes from weaving twigs in opposite directions around the posts. So, if you start one twig on the inside of a post, it then gets woven around the outside of the next post, the inside of the next one, and so on. The next twig fed into the fence goes the opposite direction: outside of post, inside, outside. It was quiet work. I cut and stripped branches pruned from olive and ash trees, and listened to the water in a river running far down along the valley bottom. The bells of sheep and cows in far-off pastures twinkled in the air; the wild shouts of herders were incomprehensible riddles that kept me company. Sometimes, I paused in my slow, steady work to catch sight of a screeching bird rushing through the trees. I started my first fence in early March, and six weeks later I stood back and admired my handiwork. Definitely, it had been a lot of work. But I was satisfied. Aesthetically, it was pleasing in its inexactness, rambling and irregular lines, its woodiness. I was happy to have used
twigs and branches that otherwise would have been burned, either in the wood stove or as bonfires. The wattle fence, I learned, was an ancient technique in use until the 1900s. Wattle panels are still intact inside many British homes built centuries ago. Archaeologists have found wattle fence remains dating to the ninth century A.D. in Britain. “It’s such a cheap and versatile material,” said Christopher Dyer, a historian at the University of Leicester in Great Britain who specializes in medieval agricultural life. “You can do lots of things with it — the problem of course is the labor.” This year, I started a second wattle fence for an even larger section of garden. It’s been slow going. But I’m convinced it’s the way to go. Now, I’ve found that the diggings of wild pigs on our land reach my first wattle fence and stop. And the pigs haven’t jumped over the 3foot-high fence — not yet, at least. Just the other day, the importance of fences was starkly impressed on us: A flock of sheep escaped their enclosure and ate almost everything I had planted — with an overabundance of optimism — outside the wattle garden spot. Gone were tomato plants, arugula, peppers and parsley, as well as the leaves of baby citrus trees and grape vines. Ah, fences. Unfortunately, this is a land where they’re needed.
The Mining Journal 3D
Thursday, August 16, 2018
Real Estate Classifieds
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4D The Mining Journal
Thursday, August 16, 2018
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6343 F Road, Bark River
MLS#: 1109966 $215,000 NATHAN BRABON
COUNTRY HOME & ACREAGE
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4479 12th Road, Escanaba
MLS#: 1089456 $549,900 BOB SULLIVAN
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2384 W Co Road 432, Gulliver
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N9450 Manistique Lakes Road, Curtis
MLS#: 1106009 $799,000 ROB SULLIVAN
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MLS#: 1099205 $749,900 SUE FELDHAUSER
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8298 W Swanson Road, Iron Mountain
406 Acres, Beaver Trail Road, Mass City
MLS#: 1108986 $675,000 BOB SULLIVAN
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MLS#: 1108453 $250,000 NATHAN BRABON
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WATERFRONT CHALET
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ACREAGE ON THE BIG GARLIC
MLS#: 1108220 $49,900 BRIAN OLSON
LAUGHING WHITEFISH RIVER LOG HOME
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TBD Woodland Drive, Copper Harbor
MLS#: 1108125 $299,000 NATHAN BRABON
MLS#: 1108361 $299,900 BOB SULLIVAN
TBD Big Garlic Headwater, CR510, Big Bay
MLS#: 1108668 $199,900 ROB SULLIVAN
FRONTAGE ON COPPER HARBOR
5389 Champs Elysses, Gould City
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12651 Goodreau Road, L’Anse
MLS#: 1108757 $250,000 SUE FELDHAUSER
N106 Corner Lake Road, Wetmore
MLS#: 1110328 $67,900 BRIAN OLSON
CAMP AND 140 ACRES
The Club 28, Sunday Lake Street, Wakefield
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N8969 Deerton Road, Deerton
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86 Acres, Thomas Lake, Michigamme
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HOME ON FARMER’S LAKE
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128 Kawbawgam Road, Marquette
MLS#: 1104094 $130,000 SUE FELDHAUSER
Love the Land!
B o b S u lliv a n
A s s o c ia te B r o k e r / O w n e r C e ll: 9 0 6 - 3 6 1 - 4 2 1 2
MLS#: 1109952 $225,000 ROB SULLIVAN
R o b S u lliv a n
A s s o c ia te B r o k e r, O ffic e M a n a g e r C e ll: 9 0 6 - 3 6 2 - 3 3 3 7
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2011 County Road 456, Gwinn MLS#: 1107316 $339,900 BRIAN OLSON
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C h a rle s D ru ry A g e n t C e ll: 9 0 6 - 2 3 5 - 3 1 9 8
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