Matt McKechnie

I live in Chelsea Quebec, zone 4, so I put their movable roost and nesting buckets I inside an unheated movable greenhouse with piles and pile of leaves as deep mulch.
No matter how cold it gets the chickens keep on keepin' on. The only slow down in eggs is photoperiod related. We get weeks at -20 Celsius so I keep their water on a seed starting mat.
Makes ridiculously good soil.
The down side Is that the entire thing needs to shovelled. Just had 50cm (20") of snow.

I am a total newb.

Some specific things above water harvesting etc I would like to do is to grow rice and fish.

Was thinking that I would like to do a sacrificial water cleaning pond (water comes from road and neighbours') that is relatively deep, but then have number of ponds with relatively high surface area to volume ratios (i didnt see much water infiltration happening at all in some test holes).

My concern is the nature of my clay - it is leda clay - a soil subtype that is inherently unstable, can suddenly liquefy and, according to Natural resources Canada, is “vulnerable to catastrophic landslides.”
-dam construction nightmare?

Many thanks,
Matt