John Suavecito

The upside of having a yard full of healthy food is I get great, nutritious food almost for free.  The downside is that I just eat too much.  I continue to find that I need to fast in order to not get too fat.  The discipline of it definitely helps.  When I'm not working (I'm mostly retired now), I find I need to make an extra effort to fast.  Fasting while working is easy for me.  I am just very busy, so I focus on that. When I'm not working, I go out in the yard and graze, or stare into the refrigerator.  It probably sounds rather shallow to say that my wife is such a great cook, that it's hard for me to resist.  That's why committing to fasting works for me.

John S
PDX OR

The shock of the cold water also activates it, meaning it puffs it up and makes it a better home for the myriad of microbes that we're trying to nurture.
John S
PDX OR

Good post, Matthew.  Some TLUDs are retorts, and thus less efficient. My TLUD is not a retort. I couldn't make enough char that way. I just fill up the 55 gallon barrel and light it from the top.  I use the heat to super dry the wood on the chimney shelf before it goes into the fire.

JOhn S
PDX OR

It depends on your soil.  If you already have soil that is highly alkaline, I would be wary of adding a lot of ash.  You could add it to your compost, or your chicken area.  If you have highly acidic soil, I wouldn't worry about it.

I do think it's a better idea to douse it at the time of max char before it turns to ash, in general.

John S
PDX OR

One really nice thing about showing all of these different methods is that you can apply the best method to your situation.  I can't make an open fire at my place.  I live in the suburbs.  They've already called the fire department on me a few times. The fire department realizes what I"m doing and it's not only that they aren't worried. They're impressed and want to learn about it.  Some people can make open fires on their acreage.  

I can get unlimited wood for free. Not everyone can do that.  I have to prune my orchard to balance out the sunlight and plants.  Most of it is already the right size for a TLUD barrel.  

Some people need more biochar for their acreage, some need less.  Some don't want to haul wood all the way around their acreage. Makes sense.  My yard is fairly small, so it's not an issue.  

Some are mostly into cooking and making fires.  I use the heat to dry the wood just before putting it into the TLUD barrel.  

Some like to burn in the winter, because it is dry there. I can't, because it is way too wet here in the winter and the days are too short to get that done.

The beauty of everyone showing what works for them is that each of us can apply these concepts to our individual lifestyles and make it work the best for us.

JohN S
PDX OR

I guess it all depends on your scale. If you have a small amount, crushing by hand in a bucket will probably work.  

On my "medium scale", I want enough char to cover my suburban yard within a foot or two of every plant.  Using the bucket method will wear me out and prevent me from trying to crush it.  Running it over in large burlap bags works great on my scale. I don't want to wait a few years for the biochar to become helpful.  If it doesn't get charged/nutrified it will take nutrition out of your yard for a few years until it reaches homeostasis.  In a fairly small yard,  I put more biochar out and I don't want to hold back my yard every week for years in those areas.  There is research showing that the charging only goes into the biochar a very small distance, until it gets crushed into smaller pieces.  Yes, it's porous, but only by water and air, not by the nutrition and microbes we need.

I understand that for people with a lot of acreage, they can't focus on that small of a scale.  The trench method is great for large acreage.  Maybe some of those large areas can wait a few years.  You are still sequestering the carbon.  In a few years, it will work great.  

I can't wait that long. I'm already pretty old.  I need my whole yard to work.  I have noticed that several of the trees and bushes are improved in their nutrient absorption and flavor the next year.  

The crushing that you do or don't do depends largely on your scale and what will work for your property, IMO.

John S
PDX OR

Great response to a particular situation, Timothy.   As my grandpa never said, "If life gives you lemons, make hay while the sun shines."

John S
PDX OR

Like many outdoor sports, such as hang gliding, backpacking, cross country skiing,  windsurfing, and sailing, ww rafting used to be much more popular.  There used to be manufacturers like Stansport that made neoprene rafts that regular families could afford.  They were about $100, so a regular middle class person could buy one and not have to have a mortgage on it.  People went on many rivers in the class II-III range. Many even made wooden frames for them inexpensively. Sometimes they would leak a bit and you'd have to repump them back up, but they worked.  

Then people decided they needed to buy really fancy rafts that cost $5000-$10,000.  They were much better rafts. They were better for multi-day trips or class IV rivers or even harder!  They didn't leak, but they were huge and you needed a big space to put it in.  Many people decided they weren't going to buy in at that level and like the other sports, it kind of died out and not as many people go now.  Some people will just buy a trip for a day or two on a river on a commercial trip, rather than buy their own raft.  

There is also a niche group of people who bought these expensive rafts and that is their main recreation.  There are several multi-day trips that these rafts are good for.  Some of them go very slowly down some rivers in multi-day trips.

John S
PDX OR

I am improving my soil.  It holds more water during our dry summers. It drains better in our wet winters.  The microbes hold onto more nutrients in the winter when the frequent rains wash out nutrients.  It enables more communication electrically, through the mycelium for nutrients to be shared among members of the soil food web.  It also tends to neutralize our naturally very acidic soils.
John S
PDX OR

I have been making my biochar in a TLUD for years.  It has a chimney. After it has been burning, you need to put out the fire, so that it doesn't all turn to ash.  In my first attempts, I think I let it go on too long.  I got a lot of ash and not so much biochar.  Obviously, I'm not talking about retorts, because they put the fire out by themselves. Eventually, I settled into quenching the fire with water when the flames were about 5-8 inches above the char.  I would get lots of char, almost no ash and some wood that wasn't completely burned.  Not a problem.  I would just save it and burn it in the next biochar burn.

However, yesterday, I was reading something interesting and didn't get to it until the flame was about 1 inch above the char.  I got tons of char.  There wasn't much more ash.  How much unburned wood did I get? None. Absolutely none.  This seems to be a better outcome than previously, but it makes me want to ask you people out there.  How do I know if that outcome is better or worse?

When do you quench the fire from your biochar?

John S
PDX OR