Articles

People asked for updates, so here is a quick ramble. I tried to make a video, but today I messed up with the camera and nothing was actually recorded to the floppy drive. I’ll try again soon.

Biggest change is the stem wall. I had built an earthbag stem wall as an experiment a couple years ago. It sat out in the weather for too long, and a few of the bags developed pinhole leaks and filled with water and deteriorated.

So, we removed the earthbag wall and built a block wall on top of the stone foundation. CMU block is not very “permaculture”, but it makes the most sense for a lot of reasons and is a reasonable compromise.

I have a wrecked back and shoulders, so I’m not doing much Adobe laying. I hired some folks from a nearby farm. Their family has been building with Adobe since New Mexico was part of Spain. So cool to work with them.

So, a few more weeks of this to go. After that we move on to the bond beam.

Hi all – I just built a new no-till bed on top of some existing grass (cardboard + 4-5 inches of compost). I finally got my soil report back and it recommends I add dolomitic lime because my clay soil has a ph of 3.9. I hoped to get the report back before the compost came, but that didn’t happen. How do I do that with the bed? Mix it in? Hoping to begin planting this week. Thank you!

The bottom leaves of the planter on the right are yellowing, while the leaves on the left planter are still dark red. Mind you, they are different cultivars (right one is country gentleman corn, left is Mandan Bride).

If you were given 100 hundred acres for an agroforest, how many trees would you use minimum for genetic diversity in your orchard— rather than air layering a monocrop?