John Suavecito

I haven't yet intentionally planted them, but I've had some grow into plants from berries that fell.  It gets so hot here now in the summer, that I think I"d have to water them a bit for them to survive and grow up.

John S
PDX OR

Eucalyptus is a very particular kind of wood, like Cedar, BLack walnut or Black Locust.  None of the others are recommended for cultivating mushrooms.  I would definitely look into that if I were you.
John S
PDX OR

My end goal has changed a little bit with biochar.  At first I thought I'd give extra biochar to the plants that were struggling.  I also want to give biochar to plants that only occasionally struggle. My pineapple guava shrubs did fine for 20 years, then struggled when it was really hot and dry one year.  I biocharred and mulched them, and I added ollas for the hot part of the summer. They did better and resumed fruiting.  However, that was the bare minimum amount of biochar.  It was just a circle around the dripline that was about 2 inches wide.  Since they clearly suffered in that drought and almost died, I want to avoid that situation.  I am adding more biochar around them so that they don't just barely survive.  I want them to be resilient and thrive.  Hopefully, this will help them even more.

John S
PDX OR

Giselle Burningham wrote:so I moved to logs; drilled the holes and filled them with pellets and cover them with wax two years later, still no mushrooms Why can’t I grow mushrooms?

Covering the dowel spots with wax should happen right away or in the next few days. The idea is to stop worms, slugs, etc. from wiping them out before they can really get going on the wood.  Also, make sure that you drill your mushroom spawn encased dowels within a few weeks.

Otherwise, I agree with the other posters that mushrooms can dry out easily. Most cultivate them in shade or put a cover on them.  I am going to spray them with water from a misting bottle this summer.

John S
PDX OR

There are tradespeople who know how to build exactly one way.  There are owners of building companies who only want to see things built that they can make money on. There are government regulators who are only familiar with a narrow range of building styles.  There are many journalists who have very limited life experience, so they just repeat what some lobbyist is saying.  We have influencers and lobbyists who have very particular motivations to encourage their companies profits.  We have a lot of old, cranky HOA regulators who don't like anything they've never seen in their neighborhood before.  NIMBY!   You put them all together, and you get a lot of arguing, denials and ultimatums.  What you need is people carefully opening each others' perspectives on how things work and how they might work for the benefit of all.

John S
PDX OR

I agree with the posts above. Also consider that sometimes, when a graft isn't perfectly done, it can make a bulge like that, when the tree was deciding if the graft was an invading pathogen or the new tree itself.  I've seen all of the above happen. I wouldn't be too worried.

John S
PDX OR

Still the champ.
John S
PDX OR

Both good points.  There are so many different kinds of media, including permies.com, that I think we need to share across different media.  Many people are stuck in an amazingly narrow niche, and think of everyone else as crazy.  If we can get a broader perspective of people to understand natural building techniques, we can explain that this is a solution to a few different problems:  the housing crisis, climate change, affordability, and pollution, among others.  Just as we need to cultivate the process of having intelligent and respectful dialogues among ourselves, so too do the government agencies and journalists who are trying to cover them.  Perhaps those in the media are not really understanding the depth of the situation.  Just because they have a respectable job in the government or media doesn't mean they have the life experience or connections to a broad range of the populace to understand these issues.

John S
PDX OR

This is an article from the New York Times on an experimental village they made of straw about 120 miles North of NYC:

John S
PDX OR

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/10/nyregion/straw-house-hudson-ny.html?unlocked_article_code=1.hlA.g5iw.aU9pCEYKTGUM&smid=url-share

The Indigenous here,  when they held dominion over these lands, had a lot of trading processes.  I would argue that people are part of nature, but that currently, most human societies are not in good harmony with the natural role of humans in the ecosystem.  People from the Cascades would trade obsidian with people who live near the Columbia river, who would trade salmon, who would trade shellfish with those on the Coast. People in the Willamette Valley would trade wapato and camas, two abundant vegetables.  I believe that the Indigenous had much better sustainability practices and understood their role in the ecology much better.  Because we are currently so out of balance with the optimal state of nature, we need to try to get it back to a situation in which we help nature and are helped by nature.  I believe that these biochar practices can build on the natural biochar that is created by fires, to make our ecosystems productive again for people and wildlife.  My use of biochar is in line with this ultimate goal, but I have much to learn in this journey, and I thank everyone on this list for helping me to understand how this might work.

John S
PDX OR