Fortune Small Business:

Jim Bintliff supplies special mud for Major League Baseball. The story goes back to when pro baseball teams began using new balls for each game. They wanted to remove the factory gloss and make the balls easier to grip. The umpires tried in-field dirt, shoe polish, and tobacco juice, but everything damaged the ball.

Lena Blackburne, a Philadelphia Athletics coach, remembered the rich mud at his fishing hole in southern New Jersey near the Delaware River. He started experimenting with the mud, mixing it with varying amounts of water to try to achieve a consistency that was thick enough to adhere to the ball yet didn’t gum up the laces. In 1938, Blackburne eventually delivered a batch to the Athletics, whose chief umpire at the time liked it.

American League opponents found out about the mud and asked where they could buy some. The National League followed. Blackburne, who didn’t have kids, left the business to my grandfather, his childhood friend. My grandfather gave the business to my father, and today I run the company with my wife, Joanne. In a good year we make about $22,000 a year selling mud – I earn my living as a night-shift printing-press operator.

Every MLB team buys the stuff, which we ship in plastic three-pound containers. Umpires used to be the only folks who could apply the mud to balls, but today the job falls to clubhouse managers. The league doesn’t officially endorse the product but says it’s the only substance that works. It’s also about tradition – essentially the MLB wants today’s players to apply the same mud that Ted Williams used.

The mud is on public land, but we’ve always kept the location a secret to keep people from trampling it. I make about five or six trips to the mud hole a year. When I get the mud to my house, I rinse it with tap water and filter out debris. I’d like to expand the business. Recently I sold a few buckets to a few NFL teams, which have found that the mud makes footballs easier to grip. We’re hoping to hear from more of them.

Photo by Nathaniel Welch.

I think that these gold vending machines might do really well in the United States, especially as more people figure out that paper money is basically worthless:

Long attracted to the safety of solid gold, Germans will soon be able to sate their appetite for the yellow metal as easily as buying a chocolate bar after plans were announced on Tuesday to install gold vending machines in airports and railway stations across the country.

The venture by the TG-Gold-Super-Markt company, based near Stuttgart, aims to build on soaring retail interest in gold purchases after a loss in confidence in a range of other investments as a result of the financial crisis.

More from the NY Times:

Within three months, Mr. Geissler’s company, TG-Gold-Super-Markt, plans to have “a substantial number” of machines up and running in Germany, Austria and Switzerland with hopes for 500 around the world. He is aiming for a franchise model in which clients buy the machines, which cost 20,000 euros, or about $28,000, and then pay to have them serviced by TG-Gold.

National Geographic:

Bamboo is among the fastest growing and most adaptable materials on the planet. It can grow up to two inches per hour and matures in about five years, providing a constant and never-ending supply to the marketplace without endangerment to countless species (as long as native forests aren’t mowed down to make way for bamboo plantations, which isn’t common because bamboo can be grown on marginal and already worked-over lands). Compare that to hardwoods such as oak, which can grow about 12 inches per year and takes up to 120 years to mature.

Another possible cause for the dominating positive buzz for bamboo products is the fact that it is so versatile and can be used and made into almost anything, from flooring and paper to clothing and building materials. It’s soft and durable when woven, is extremely durable when made into clothes and boasts anti-bacterial and anti-fungal properties. Since it also has a tensile strength stronger than steel, bamboo is popular in building materials. Essentially, you can build your house, your office, your décor and your wardrobe entirely from bamboo.

Photo by mattscoggin.

Seven News Queensland:

Surf Life Saving Australia says unmanned aerial drones will patrol some Queensland beaches this summer.

The organisation’s head, Brett Williamson, says the drones will be used on North Stradbroke Island in a trial of the technology.

He has told Radio National’s the drones, which have a wingspan of one metre, use cameras to search for swimmers in distress.

Mr Williamson says the drones will be fitted with flotation buoys that can be dropped down to the ocean.

Photo by Marion Doss.