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“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.” — Abraham Lincoln
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Jen Fulkerson wrote:My chicken yard is a long ago horse corral. It was so dry and hard most weeds wouldn't even grow there, and forget about digging. A few months ago I finally got my son to dump a load of wood chips into the chicken yard. I started to spread them out, but stopped deciding the chickens would enjoy spreading them around. They did a pretty good job spreading them over the yard.
Yesterday out of curiosity I pulled the chips aside, and under was dark damp digable soil. We have had basically no rain, and I don't water. Yet in only a few months the wood chips have transformed the soil from dry hard pan to beautiful soil. Not to mention giving the chickens endless hours of entertainment. I am a true believer! Wood chips are a miracle soil cure.
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“Uncertainty is an uncomfortable position. But certainty is an absurd one.”
― Voltaire
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Other people may reject you but if you lie in the forest floor for long enough the moss and fungi will accept you as one of their own!
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List of Bryant RedHawk's Epic Soil Series Threads We love visitors, that's why we live in a secluded cabin deep in the woods. "Buzzard's Roost (Asnikiye Heca) Farm." Promoting permaculture to save our planet.
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Bryant RedHawk wrote:I would simply use the Chips, as they decay they will build you soil. They are great for Potatoes since the chips can be the growing medium and weigh less than any soil covering, which makes harvest easier.
Redhawk
“Uncertainty is an uncomfortable position. But certainty is an absurd one.”
― Voltaire
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Other people may reject you but if you lie in the forest floor for long enough the moss and fungi will accept you as one of their own!
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$10.00 is a donation. $1,000 is an investment, $1,000,000 is a purchase.
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List of Bryant RedHawk's Epic Soil Series Threads We love visitors, that's why we live in a secluded cabin deep in the woods. "Buzzard's Roost (Asnikiye Heca) Farm." Promoting permaculture to save our planet.
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Travis Johnson wrote:A few years ago we lost 3 of our papermills in a single week, in total we are down to six from a high of 145 in 1947. The problem is, those paper mills would consume 2500 cords of wood or more per DAY. That sounds sad, but Maine is a big state, and the most forested in the Nation, and the reality is, we grow a cord per acre, per year, sustainably. Maine will NEVER run out of trees...
But our economy is based upon wood, our second largest export after electricity.
So my idea was, to keep our logging industry going, why not put that wood to good use. Organic Matter in the Midwest is around 1%, but transportation is cheap, and we have so much stinking wood, and now no place to send it.
All it would take is a planter that would deposit wood chips as it was engaged in planting crops. It would not flood the field with wood chips all at once, but over time, every year, more and more wood chips would be added to the fields of the midwest increasing soil fertility. Good gravy, if they can transport wood chips from Sweden to make paper in Maine economically, then they sure can ship wood chips by the trainload (or ship load through the Great Lakes or Mississipi) to increase mid-west soil fertility.
It really makes sense. As it is right now, with the loss of our paper mills, landowners (and Maine is 95% privately owned), is clearing forest to put it into fields because we have to pay our property taxes somehow. Many thought that shutting down paper mills would make our forests better, but it really has just eliminated their value as a forest altogether. I have cleared 100 acres myself, and I am not alone in that endeavor. Wood chips for the mid-west would make forests in Maine viable again.
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fokir said, "We had to remove a good deal of mud and old woodchips before adding two loads of sand. Even since we still need to do it again this year to get rid of some that we omitted right in the front of the shed entrance
fokir said, "The wood will digest some of the water, trying to make the area drier, but doing so as well causes it to deteriorate.
Invasive plants are Earth's way of insisting we notice her medicines. Stephen Herrod Buhner
Everyone learns what works by learning what doesn't work. Stephen Herrod Buhner
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fokir luis wrote:It will be wonderful "for now" and maybe for next winter as well, but anything natural is a terrible idea for highly trafficked (or wet) areas. We had to remove a good deal of mud and old woodchips before adding two loads of sand. Even since we still need to do it again this year to get rid of some that we omitted right in the front of the shed entrance, the amount of mud has decreased significantly. We proceeded from mud that would literally bite your boot off your foot to mud that is only at its relatively shallow 4 inches deep.
The wood will digest some of the water, trying to make the area drier, but doing so as well causes it to deteriorate.
$10.00 is a donation. $1,000 is an investment, $1,000,000 is a purchase.
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Anne Miller wrote:
fokir said, "We had to remove a good deal of mud and old woodchips before adding two loads of sand. Even since we still need to do it again this year to get rid of some that we omitted right in the front of the shed entrance
May I ask your reasoning for removing the mud and woodchips before adding the sand?
fokir said, "The wood will digest some of the water, trying to make the area drier, but doing so as well causes it to deteriorate.
Isn't that the idea or am I missing something?
https://permies.com/t/167722/soil-building
$10.00 is a donation. $1,000 is an investment, $1,000,000 is a purchase.
Invasive plants are Earth's way of insisting we notice her medicines. Stephen Herrod Buhner
Everyone learns what works by learning what doesn't work. Stephen Herrod Buhner
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Jen Fulkerson wrote:Here I am again. Help My latest load of wood chips I think is from a sweet gum tree. Besides the very strong smell which will dissipate over time, oh I hope soon, there are tons of sharp seed pods in the mix. My plan for the chips are the start of a food forest. My concern is if I use the chips this way, will I end up with a sweet gum forest instead of a food forest?
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List of Bryant RedHawk's Epic Soil Series Threads We love visitors, that's why we live in a secluded cabin deep in the woods. "Buzzard's Roost (Asnikiye Heca) Farm." Promoting permaculture to save our planet.
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Community Building 2.0: ask me about drL, the rotational-mob-grazing format for human interactions.
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List of Bryant RedHawk's Epic Soil Series Threads We love visitors, that's why we live in a secluded cabin deep in the woods. "Buzzard's Roost (Asnikiye Heca) Farm." Promoting permaculture to save our planet.
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Community Building 2.0: ask me about drL, the rotational-mob-grazing format for human interactions.
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Joshua Myrvaagnes wrote:Thanks Bryant. It's white pines, minimal black walnut if any, and certainly we don't have any eucalyptus around here.
I should have mentioned our soil is super-super-well-drained, it is basically a sandbox that drains all the water down into the aquifer somewhere or something. And it's been rather droughty.
The idea I've got now is to build a woodchip highway between the edge of the woods so that the insects have a way to get there from the woods. And I'll add some water. If I have enough spare milk I can try that too, but I don't really have any that's spoiling and I'd rather try for the cheaper solution first. I'll post an update.
$10.00 is a donation. $1,000 is an investment, $1,000,000 is a purchase.
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Joshua Myrvaagnes wrote:I should have mentioned our soil is super-super-well-drained, it is basically a sandbox that drains all the water down into the aquifer somewhere or something. And it's been rather droughty.
Cécile Stelzer Johnson wrote:That's an odd situation. You do not mention how long ago you piled these chips. It does take time, especially if the pile is very deep. I live in a sandbox myself but under the woodchips, [6" worth,] it feels moist and I have plenty critters, especially ants.
Central WI receives between 34-62" of moisture yearly. What do you get?
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$10.00 is a donation. $1,000 is an investment, $1,000,000 is a purchase.
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Joshua Myrvaagnes wrote:I need a slug problem.
That is, I have a duck problem and a lack of slug problem.
I have 3 huge piles of wood chips from the highway dept, they were very sure there is no herbicide or pesticide in anything they cut, and it’s a nice mix of some conifers, some leaf bits, and a lot of being free.
But no one has moved in. Pull bugs? Ants? Alien invasive from Arcturus? Anybody? There is one tiny ant on here, one , and plenty of carpenter ants in the bathroom of our house. I don’t see earthworms underneath, mushrooms i planted in there have not fruited not potatoes sprouted out. There’s one spider web in the side but otherwise it seems like a ghost town. Any ideas of how I can get a bug or slug problem???
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Bless your Family,
Mike
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Other people may reject you but if you lie in the forest floor for long enough the moss and fungi will accept you as one of their own!
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Wally Jasper wrote:Bryant, you mentioned your wood chipper in this thread. I'm looking to buy a wood chipper. Any recommendations for good quality, durable chippers? Many thanks.
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“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.” — Abraham Lincoln
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“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.” — Abraham Lincoln
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Joshua Myrvaagnes wrote:I need a slug problem.
That is, I have a duck problem and a lack of slug problem.
I have 3 huge piles of wood chips from the highway dept, they were very sure there is no herbicide or pesticide in anything they cut, and it’s a nice mix of some conifers, some leaf bits, and a lot of being free.
But no one has moved in. Pull bugs? Ants? Alien invasive from Arcturus? Anybody? There is one tiny ant on here, one , and plenty of carpenter ants in the bathroom of our house. I don’t see earthworms underneath, mushrooms i planted in there have not fruited not potatoes sprouted out. There’s one spider web in the side but otherwise it seems like a ghost town. Any ideas of how I can get a bug or slug problem???
List of Bryant RedHawk's Epic Soil Series Threads We love visitors, that's why we live in a secluded cabin deep in the woods. "Buzzard's Roost (Asnikiye Heca) Farm." Promoting permaculture to save our planet.
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Wally Jasper wrote:Wow, am I ever happy that I found this thread. I found a free and abundant source of fresh wood chips and I've been hauling load after load to my land and spreading it thick around my land, around some fruit trees (but not too close), in my raised beds, everywhere. Then I went to a local permaculture training and the guy teaching the course said that we need to compost the chips before spreading them; otherwise they will never decompose. So I've spent the last few days raking up all the chips I've spread out, collecting them in piles so I could compost them. I went to this thread today wanting to find out the optimal dimensions of a composting heap of wood chips and lo and behold, Bryant says, no, don't compost them.... just spread them out thick. Well, I know who I'm going to listen to. Now I'm out with the rake, shovel and wheelbarrow spreading them all out ....again. It's a good thing I really love doing this work. And I've learned something very important: when in doubt, come to the Permies forums first.
$10.00 is a donation. $1,000 is an investment, $1,000,000 is a purchase.
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My name is Inigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to read a tiny ad:
Heat your home with the twigs that naturally fall of the trees in your yard
http://woodheat.net
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