Weekly cycles of biochar creation

I have been getting into weekly cycles of making biochar.  On day one, I burn the wood in my 55 gallon TLUD barrel with chimney,  and my method of crushing it is between two panels of plywood.  After about a week of crushing it by driving over it, I can take out about half of it that is smaller than marbles. I can see the pattern of what was crushed well and incorporate that into my driving over it methods.  I get out my biochar rake and evenly lay out what remains to be crushed for the next week.

I then inoculate what I took away, by putting it into a 5 gallon bucket with compost, worm compost, rotten fruit, rotten wood mycelium, whole wheat flour, worm compost and crushed oyster shells.  I have usually been saving up urine in wine bottles for the week to have enough when inoculation is due.  The first day of the week, I let it soak, for maybe an hour.  Then I stir it, because I found out that when I don't, the flour doesn't really mix in well enough with the whole mixture.   When I didn't store up urine beforehand, I was astonished at how the char would just soak up the liquid mixture like a sponge. I would have to wait for several days until I had enough.  Then I drain it with a plate on top, and continue to drench it once a day for that week. After that week, that bucket becomes the "old biochar bucket", and I gather the other half between the plywood, inoculate it, and it becomes the "new biochar bucket".   Then I burn a new barrel full of biochar. After the second week, I figure that it's plenty inoculated and I dig it into the soil, mostly along the dripline of fruit trees so far.  Then the bucket that was new becomes old and the cycle repeats.

Most of this process I have developed by listening to the likes of you all and adjusting by observing how well it has worked.

John S
PDX OR

Your inoculation process is mighty impressive. Do you keep the char from the initial burn essentially dry (absolute minimum quench) with the objective of keeping its "sponge powers" at their maximum for the inoculation process?

Thank you.  It's dry from the burn, and I am just focusing on crushing it first, then inoculating it.  I think it might be really messy to try to crush it after I inoculate it with my method.  This way it's a pretty sequential process.  It really does soak up all of the nutrients better after it's crushed, I would think, because it is crushed to increase surface area.  It is able to draw in the nutrition well before putting it into the soil.

John S
PDX OR

Hi Douglas,

I think I misunderstood your original question.  With my TLUD, I completely drench it, once it has gotten to the point of burning away volatiles, tars, etc.  There is no holding back on water.  I don't want it to continue smoldering and gradually turn into ash.  That would miss the point.

However, since it really is almost pure carbon when done, it dries out very quickly.  I have actually taken to lifting up a panel, and mist spraying it a little bit while it is between the two panels, because it will slip out from between the panels during the crunching process.   When it does, the wind can carry it away, across the driveway.  I want it all to be inoculated first before going into the soil. I also want it to be put into very specific locations, as I am continuing to experiment with my "drip line" placement hypothesis.

It stays pretty dry if I don't mist it at all.  Its sponge powers are very strong when crunched especially, and since it dries out so well, I don't hold back on the water.

John S
PDX OR

Good info. Any excess moisture would quickly drain out of a TLUD barrel anyway.

I have done a semi-dry quench, just a quick spray of water on top and then an airtight lid over top, sealed in with clay, sand, cold ash, whatever I have handy. But it has to be a darn good seal, and closely monitored for days, or it will start up again.

I have noticed over time, a big difference in the inoculation of the biochar buckets from week one to week two.  I was putting the same amount of biochar into equal 5 gallon buckets. I consistently noted that the new week 1 biochar can take more of the liquid inoculant.  I first pour in enough inoculant to just cover the same amount of biochar in the week one bucket, and then I pour the liquid from the new container of week 1 biochar into the week 2 older biochar bucket.  The second bucket floods way over the same level of biochar.  I think this makes sense.  The liquid enters the new biochar and over a week's time, feeds life into the biochar, so that by week 2, there is more life in the biochar and less room for more inoculant.   The hotels for microbes start to fill up.  This gives me confidence that they will have enough nutrition in them that they won't suck out all of the nutrition in the soil into which they are placed.  I have since started to put a little bit more biochar into the week 2 bucket so that the same amount of liquid inoculant can just barely cover the top of each equally.

John S
PDX OR