Dillon Crew

Neat design! I like the looks of that clay based membrane; do you have a notion of what it will cost you?


I like the idea of the compartmentalization... to a point. It would certainly be nice to have that degree of sound insulation between bedrooms and living areas. But doing it for 6 spokes, sure, it lets you use 8" logs of relatively short length... but man, you're going to need a lot of them with all those walls!

As far as wind resistance goes, it seems like once you add in the sloped, outer portion of berm extending out past the 'spoke' ends, you're starting to form a partial wind-trap; the ability of the building to let the wind flow past, was better as a simple dodecagon...

As far as energy efficiency goes, I`m not sure you`re doing yourself any great favours with spokes in all 6 directions, especially not if the intent is for full height exposed outside walls on the end of every spoke. Why not either skip the 2 northern spokes in favor of a semicircular rear wall bermed all around, or berm around the spokes? Either entirely, or enough that only a window opening remains? You're still going to pick up lot of light from windows starting 4 feet up. I think I would try for at least 1-2 windows, quite short but as wide as practical, around the bottom edge of the central hogan. I think you could lose a lot of your outer spoke glazing and still 'feel' brighter/more open with a fraction of that glazing in this location. Do you have much snow to worry about?


(And if you're berming around them... why not use the in-between spaces for additional interior space..?)


My limited experiences with structures with lots of thermal mass, suggest that it's not that necessary to have so much surface area, to see the benefits. And if you don't need the surface area, its more time/money/hassle/risk than the same space, with less surface area, all else being equal. You can pick up thermal mass outside the structure, with your membrane, drainage, and maybe some insulation...


..I guess I should note, I'm picturing an excavator and ground that is possible to excavate. If you've got a mattock/wheelbarrow, and bedrock, I don't think my suggestions apply very well unless you can find some dynamite...

Hi Elizabeth,

I've built a small hugel bed in Victoria, it's probably 3 years old now. It's maybe 14 feet long by 3.5 feet wide, dug down 2 feet and built up 2.5 feet above the surface. Wood used was a mix of maple, alder, fir, logs and large branches, mostly reasonably rotten.

The soil from the excavation was by no means sufficient. Also tends to lose a lot of soil from the top in rain. If I bother with any more, I'd likely design it as a conventional raised bed around the hugel for longevity.

Despite addition of more soil and manure/compost to the top, it's been far less productive than other areas of the garden, and the wood inside does not seem to be decaying rapidly. Doesn't seem to do much in the way of holding moisture despite adding a LOT of water during initial construction, several times. Given that the wood had to be carried up out of a nearby gully, log by log, it was a lot of work for the small size and poor results.

I've also seen hugels used in a food forest where the water table was on the high side in winter, @ Mossy Banks farm, North Cowichan. Planted in 2012, individual mounds for each tree/bush in the lower portion of the food forest. Mortality in these trees/bushes has approached 50% at this point; I would credit issues with the hugels for at least part of this problem, as I observed similar problems with insufficient soil on top, settling/washing away in rain... both exacerbated by the Muscovy ducks until they were fenced out entirely, as individual fence circles for each tree did not protect the base of the mounds enough.

So, in my experience:
1) You'll need loads of extra soil.

2) Keeping a 4 foot wide bed 4 feet high sounds tricky.

3) I'd be hesitant to plant trees *on* the hugel due to stability/erosion issues. Maybe next to it would allow any moisture/nutrient benefits to be accessed by the roots with less risk? Or do you need the height above the water-table?

At least with annuals, you can patch up the mound when you plant. With perennials, you have to keep on top of things to avoid losing trees when the soil washes away.

4) I'd be planting nitrogen fixers first and foremost, and I'd definitely want a cover crop ASAP to keep the bed from falling apart in the winter rains; clover? I must admit I did not do this when I first created mine, and hope it will help next time round. However, this *was* done @ Mossy Banks, and didn't seem sufficient.

I'd be very interested to hear how it works out, hopefully the larger size of yours makes it much more effective.

Don't have a solution to the ownership issue, but a couple anecdotes:

1) Drove by a few acres of nice cleared fields; good soil, easy road access, 10 mins from Duncan on Vancouver Island. Was with an experienced farmer from the area, and she commented that the owner kept trying to rent this land to new farmers, but was asking the 'outrageously high' sum of $150/acre per year, and thus having no luck. Now, I don't think there was any expectation that the renter would be living/building on this land, but I'm not sure which way that would move the price...

Are you sure that $150/acre was per month? Sounds completely insane! On a 60 acre property that would equate to $108,000 per year!!

Don't know where exactly your property is, but I do see remote acreages, often old homesteads, with a dwelling, come up for rent now and then. Usually on the islands. Cheap prices, due to the inconvenience factor of being somewhere relatively out of the way. Somewhere between $600 to $1600/month, though I can't say I recall any being as large as yours.

2) I know of two people who have built a house and otherwise improved a property that they did not own. In both cases, the exchange was pretty complicated, but in rough outline:
-Tenant got to live on the land for a long while, ~15 year range. No rent, or a work exchange of some sort beyond the homesteading/housebuilding.
-Property owner keeps house/improvements when term ends. In one case, property owner agreed, pre-construction, on an amount to pay for the house. I think in the other case no payment was made either direction.

Seems like you'd need a very good relationship between the landlord/tenant, as writing and enforcing a contract to cover all the possible issues in this sort of setup would be a real pain. As you say, you need a way to kick off a problem tenant, but the tenant needs a way to be confident you(or your heirs) won't suddenly boot them off as soon as the house is done...

Out of curiosity, where in BC is your land?