D Pecot

Howdy!

I'm going to be hiking north on the Pacific Crest Trail in 2026. I'm starting early in the season, and I anticipate reaching Kennedy Meadows South early in the season before it's traditionally passable. Given I may need to wait 1-3 weeks (or longer) for the snow to melt, I wanted to put feelers out and see if there were any permies in the area that would be willing to host me while I wait out the snow to melt. I'm basically working off of this https://www.postholer.com/snow/Pacific-Crest-Trail/1 to estimate my entry, but I won't really know until I've reached Kennedy Meadow South what the actual situation is.

I'm currently anticipating arriving there late May/early June, with the average entry time into the Sierras around June 15th.

I currently am living on my family's homestead in South Louisiana. I've been down here the last two years helping out on 10 acres. Some of the things I've worked on down here:

- Hugelkulture mounds, I'm obsessed with them!
- Lots of experiments with polycropping
- Electrical for our workshop/office
- Automated chicken coop (water, food are covered up to two weeks alone, door that automatically lets them in and out at night/morning respectively)
- Currently rebooting a citrus orchard after a particularly bad winter last year
- Converted my Chevy G30 van into a camper van w/ solar
- Built a drone

My day job has been as a freelance web developer, but I've also worked with other small farms in the area with various projects like helping out with their livestock, digging canals w/ excavator, repairing boats, repairing and using farm implements, basic metalworking skills, etc.

I'm a pretty handy guy and am comfortable with minimal training on most tools, but I primarily have an affinity for electrical projects, permaculture/garden stuff, and mechanical repair (tractors, cars, appliances, etc). Also of course happy to help with any tech related problems

Given that I'll be coming through off my hike on the PCT, I won't have any of my tools with me, but my intention is to meetup with like-minded people and spend some time meeting others and sharing stories and skills while on my hike across the west coast.

Even if you're not exactly around KMS but are near the PCT corridor, feel free to reach out!

Not experienced in much at all here, but throwing in some food for thought anyway cause I like the idea 🤔

If had access to wood, would be interesting to build a demilune/hugelkulture mound hybrid of sorts. Not only would it give you some nutrient release into the mound, but youd get a little bit more height on the demilune for wind capture/redirection. And I guess in sandy soil the carbon material could "hold" water more efficiently than just the dune alone?

As for thoughts on companion planting and natives, I'd think that trying to track down some native legumes to act as ground cover, nitrogen source for other plants, and green mulch would be a good "foundational" plant. I've had fair success planting into white clover, which was essentially acting as a living ground cover to block weeds while also providing nitrogen.

Doing a quick Google, Astragalus crassicarpus aka Ground Plum seems to be a native legume in your region, no idea how aggressive it is, tho I guess aggressiveness isn't too much of a concern when just starting in barren land.

Love this, glad we are focusing more globally.

When I lived abroad, I learned to introduce myself as being from the Southeast USA. Broad and also specific enough to give people an out if they just wanted to know my country, and an in if they knew about our legendary Cajun food

American is a misnomer as anyone from North and South America is an American technically. My Latino friends would get a bit irritated when I introduced myself as American out of habit.

Also, LA is very contextual. You have to listen to their accent to infer whether it's Louisiana or Los Angeles they're referring to.

Agree with Tyler. I've primarily had issues with invasive fire ants in my mounds, particularly when they are freshly built mounds.

If you Google "termite predators", AI and a lot of pest control companies indicate that ants are a major predator of termites. Couldn't find any scientific literature at a quick glance so verify first.

On that note, I use borax/sugar poison to keep ant populations in my mounds under control. Boron the active ingredient in Borax is, to my knowledge, a beneficial trace mineral for plants so ants eating it and dying within the mounds is probably more helpful than harmful.

South Louisiana here.

1. Evangeline sweet potatoes really hate heavy clay. Whole harvest was pinky size tubers 🙄

2. Plastic lined + raised garden beds are a great way to bake all your plants in a drought (zero access to deeper moisture).

3. Outdoor mushroom growing doesn't work down here. Innoculated willow, white oak, and red oak with oyster and shitake mushrooms only to have them taken over by native non-edibles and ants. I'll just stick with foraging oysters from now on in the swamp

4. Heavy hay mulching attracts fire ants to build their nests directly underneath the hay, making seedling planting a potentially unpleasant process.

5. Horse manure can be chockful of rhizome grass, leading to extra time weeding

6. Planting on hugel mounds before they have "settled" doesn't leave enough carbon for young plants, and cave-ins consume whole seedlings.


Can I throw in a few unexpected wins?

1. Ginger and turmeric I discarded in an unused heavy shade bed not only grew but probably 5x the original plugs I threw aside.

2. If your soil stays wet and holds water, hilling your rows is vital to success. Also gives you foundation for flood irrigation

3. A healthy dose of cayenne pepper powder on your plants seems to deter the deer. Maybe I should just make a pepper spray and use that next?

At the hunt camp I go to, we have a smoker we generally use for hog meat. After cleaning my hog/deer and removing all the meat this last year, decided I'd try to smoke the bones prior to making them into stock.

Y'all, this alone completely changed my chilli game.

If you got access to a freeze dryer, it makes a nice instant broth as well, though be aware it can leave a bit of a strong smokey smell in the dehydrater, so ideally have something planned after that wouldn't be hurt by a slight smokey flavor.

For deer specifically if you're in a CWD area (we aren't yet but probably in a few years), be mindful of using spine/neck.