Brian Cady

That's exciting. I wonder if there are any sweet-pit genes within these seeds, as are in: https://raintreenursery.com/products/chinese-sweet-pit-apricot

Hi Lissa Malloy,

I understand that carrots can store well in moist sand, but lemme check
I'm checking 'Root Cellaring' by Nancy and Mike Bubel, Garden Way Publishing, March 1995...
They write that carrots like cold and very moist storage conditions (32-40F, 90-95 % relative humidity), and that June-planted carrots store better than early-spring-planted ones. The Bubels store carrots in damp sawdust, with carrot layers separated by the sawdust. They say sand, peat moss, moss or leaves also protect stored carrots well. They address garden storage as well.

Brian
-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allium_stipitatum has information on Persian shallots.

Pearl Bigelow wrote:Re: eucalyptus as firewood....about 50 years ago my family lived at the edge of about 30 acres of eucalyptus trees and we used the branches that blew down and various thinnings as firewood.  My father later told me that when green it was some of the wettest and heaviest wood he had ever handled but it cut and split very easily.  However, once it dried it was like trying to split a rock.  Very hard and burned very hot.  So be sure you work it up before it dries out.  

Aren't there many, many Eucalyptus species? Each species might have different splitting properties, I imagine.

Brian
-

There are many plants called 'Buckthorn': https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_plants_known_as_buckthorn

Maybe you two are seeing two different types of plant.

Frangula alnus = Rhamnus frangula = Alder Buckthorn / Glossy Buckthorn - USA range map: https://plants.usda.gov/plant-profile/FRAL4

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frangula_alnus

Frangula caroliniana = Rhamnus caroliniana Carolina buckthorn - USA Range map: https://plants.usda.gov/plant-profile/FRCA13

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frangula_caroliniana

In Wendell, in Western Massachusetts, there are loads of Glossy Buckthorn plants. I haven't noticed it in nearby Colrain yet.

Carla, I hope someday to explore the 'Two-Can' TLUD stove, to see if I could make a bunch of them for folks living in the woods around here. Maybe I can, if I make one, show others how to.

Brian

HI Carla,-

First off, I recommend a search for a used down sleeping bag or two, to survive the cold in. I've used big plastic bag vapor barrier ( rule of thumb: Put VP on warm side) within a sleeping bag in very cold weather to great effect  - I was waking up with cold feet, ankles and calves; with bag, woke up with warm toes. Warning - suffocation hazard.

Second, don't rocket stoves burn fast and clean? Don't TLUDs burn slow and almost as clean?

I imagine a two-can TLUD stove might be slowed down by covering its primary air intakes with a sheet metal band ( from another tin can or beer can?) that could be slid up and down to adjust primary intake air. Secondary air, always unrestricted, completes combustion.

About TLUDs (in case some haven't heard of them):
Microgasification: What it is and why it works  https://woodgas.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/BP53-Anderson-14.pdf [2007]
See two-can TLUD in photo on page 6 of : https://woodgas.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/TLUD-History-V2-17FEB2016.pdf
Some videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rzu3BxiZpGg Dr TLUD 2013
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmkadnjjO5k
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAzAeZZDQhg

I think TLUDs can be fueled with wood pellets, a cheap, easy fuel that could store in that ammo box and stay dry. Sawdust won't let through enough air to allow continued  burning, I believe. Wood chips, dried, may be ideal, Or pine cones or pine dead branches, snapped off.

Brian
-

Here're two snippet videos, one sped up, of vibrating a test block form containing a very dry, thick refractory concrete mix using a recipricating saw and a blade with a hole drilled in it, screwed to the form, that, if not informative, might be amusing.




Brian
-

Lists Portugal, Bulgaria, South Korea...
https://www.npr.org/2025/01/03/nx-s1-5246186/farmers-are-abandoning-their-land-is-that-good-for-nature


Brian
-

I tried a tlud dakota firepit for kicks once, and took these photos:

http://hopefulvision.blogspot.com/2021/05/make-biochar-with-merely-shovel-dakota.html

Brian
-