I know you're not supposed to take pictures of Amish. I couldn't help myself had to sneak a picture. This young guy was in a cloud of fog cutting ice when we drove up. I didn't know they had a set up like this pond they made on a deck by their building. I seen couple others with sleds pulled by horses loaded with ice. That ice I could tell was pond cut by the layers in it. Is neat saw rig this kid was running. Looked like maybe 5hp Honda motor on it. Got wonder it they will put sides back on the box and flood it again. Or if what they cut from this will fill their ice house? It is right by the Amish store so maybe they even sell some.
Was interesting to see..



Mac

I stopped by the Amish neighbor the other day. He was doing the same thing. He said that their ice box/cooler was about 8'x8'x8' and they filled it this time of year, and it still has ice left from last.
He also said that there was a shelf around the inside near the ceiling that they would use to store and keep food cold. They do cut ice on ponds if the conditions are right, but most years they use the box in their yard.

That's Cool...never knew that about boxs

I don't know a lot about the Amish, none down here in Texas that I know of, but I thought they couldn't use internal combustion engines.

Most of the families in our area have started using the panels from commercial refrigerator/freezers. They are usually just out side the rear entrance to the house and are sided to look like a shed..

Many kinds of "Amish"
Some from Pennsylvania have women driving cars and use velcro
Others by me are horse only. Buckles and buttons

They can use engines but if it’s a moving machine (tractor) it must have steel wheels.

I see, thanks for the enlightening.

They got all kinds of things run on gas and diesel engines. Guy that made my furniture had motor out side shop ran a dive shaft into the building. All saws and drill press planer had belts running to them.
I've seen them run the ice saw like the one in picture on ponds.
I actually had two big hand ice saws that I used to cut holes for diving. One belonged to commercial fisher back in 1920s. I sold both my saws to an Amish man about 5-6 years ago. Easier to use chainsaw for cutting ice. I'm guessing they don't use chainsaw because of oil on ice.

Mac

Each Amish community has there own set of guide lines, decided on by the elders/leader of the community. (from what I have been told by them) There are 3 communities in my general area and they each do things that the others do not. The guy that owns a general store near me has two huge LP tanks outside of one of his buildings. They look a little different because there is blue pex type tubing coming from the place where the valve would go. I asked him about it one day and he told me that the store and huge shop (old dairy barn) have in floor heat. He then went on to say that the LP tanks have been converted into air storage. He runs a gas powered compressor to fill them up every few days. From there the air circulates the fluid for in floor heat. He also stated that his well and the rest of the farm is all run off the air system. I asked (indoor plumbing?) He just smiled and said if theirs a will theirs away. The family down the road runs a bakery. They run gas engines to supply water to the kitchen. Also they have a dough sheeter and commercial mixer both run from flexible shafts run through the wall to a gas engine that is just outside. I know 2 different guys that run machining business .... They are a very nice and resourceful group.

Some Amish just bought land on the Niobrara River in the Sandhills of Nebraska. Will be interesting

around here they can use anything, they just can't own it they borrow everything, from electric generators to air guns.

Others may more earlier information, but from a book I read that was published in 1988 called, "After the Fire the Destruction of the Lancaster County Amish", the Old Order use of electricity came from government mandates that if they were to sell their milk commercially, it had to have modern coolers powered by juice. That, and probably just the passage of time and growth of the overall Amish population gave way to the lot of "shall not do" things when it comes to electricity.

South Dakota has always had Hutterites since Euro-American settlement. The Hutterites are a fellow Anabaptist sect to the Amish that came out of the Protestant Reformation. We never had Amish until about maybe 20 years ago when the group bought land about 100+ miles southwest of Sioux Falls. I now occasionally see them in discount stores.

We had Mennonites in Ohio and Wisconsin that were kind of modern Amish. Some of them even worked for a Trucking company I used to drive for named HO Wolding in Wisconsin. I can tell you to NEVER buy a riding Horse from the Amish. They are wore out and Broken down!!! Most are butted up and lame!! They pump them full,of Butte to sell them but when the Butte wears of the horse is a cripple.

Amish have a lot of different rules and most of them are about lining their pocket books just my opinion and I've got some good stories from real world experience with them.

Where I am from there aren't just "amish"... there are german baptist, meninite, and I don't even know what all but one don't like to be called the other and they all have different rules on their way of life and how they live.

I hunted with a guy that had a truck but didn't have a radio in it. He was allowed to have a CB for hunting but it was mounted to a board that came in and out of the truck and was allowed b/c it wasn't permanent. He always had a cool whip tub of homemade candy.

A kid I went to school with grew up on a self pickem strawberry farm and drove a red camero to school but I think thats b/c he was in his teen learning years and hadn't been made a full member yet.

Just like any other group of people in our world... there are some good and some bad and some in between.

There not bad but are extremely shrewd business people and I do admire them for not paying much taxes or so I am told

Here in Michigan if there is a store or place of business, their never open on Sunday or Thursday (Family work day).

We have Hutterite colonies here in Montana. One not too far from me and don't seem to have any issues a hard-working bunch people. They keep their nose to the grindstone and are very resilient and sustainable.

Hutterites have been a force in Montana agriculture, producing 90 percent of the state's hogs and 98 percent of its eggs and milk somewhere in the 80% range.