Visiting Sepp Holzer's Farm - Taking Questions

All,
I'll be visiting Sepp Holzer's Farm the Der Krameterhof in Austria on 3 July and taking the day tour.  I've appreciated all the knowledge I've gotten from this site and I want to return the favor.  So, if you have a question for Sepp or want me to take a photo or video of something please post it on this thread and I'll check back in before my trip (27 June).  If you are asking for something that may need his approval, I'd appreciate if you get that ahead of time.  I don't speak German, but I will gleam as much as can and report back.

Regards,
Patrick

  WHat fun.
I have an idea for Sepp Holzer, he could put in a shute and then it would be easier to collect vegetables, he would put them on the shute and they would go to the bottom of his hill.
  I probably have lots of questions too but they have not popped into my mind yet, I think they are a lot longer. Looks from the videos like he takes round large groups and it will be hard to ask him a lot.  rose.

this might be found somewhere (I haven't yet...) I'm curious about

elevation
latitude
direction of exposure
direction of prevailing winds
average rainfall
depth of snowpack
last frost/first frost
range of temps(summer hi, winter lo)
deer? bears? etc big wildlife? (I don't remember any fencing)
I'd love to see a complete list of what he grows, including any forage for livestock

Hope you have a wonderful time, I would also love to see photo details of stuff he makes--cabin, furniture, garden structures etc, any traditional architecture/building techniques that are realy well suited for the Alps.

I'd like a more definitive answer as to what his *Russian corn*/perennial grain is botanically.  Also if he could point to a source for the seed that would be excellent.  If that happens to be your pocket, excellent as well .

I would like to know more about how he controls his animals, how many he keeps and when and where he applies them. It seems like he doesn't run a lot of animals for such a big acreage.

I would like to know a bit more about his ponds:

1. Does he have any ponds that are fed by rain/snow fall only?  It appears to me that he has redirected small streams to feed his ponds.
2. Does he do any bio-filtering of the water?  i.e. is the water directed through water plant roots or some other filtering system?
3. Have the plants/trees at the pond's edge ever caused a pond to leak, from their roots piercing the impervious layer?

Thanks!

I wonder how things might have gone differently if he had begun operating before the great pine desert was planted around him. It seems like the over-abundance of one species has been a helpful resource, and maybe a large influence in other ways.

adunca someone says in one video that Sepp Holzer bought his neibors wells. i don't supose hee needs to filter rain water he is at the top of a mountin he must have fresh water unless there is aacid fain or their is a smelting works near by which fills the air full of lead or other poison metals.  rose.

rose macaskie wrote:
adunca someone says in one video that Sepp Holzer bought his neibors wells. i don't supose hee needs to filter rain water he is at the top of a mountin he must have fresh water unless there is aacid fain or their is a smelting works near by which fills the air full of lead or other poison metals.  rose.

I was thinking more of filtering out suspended algae, and also what is the water quality like where it exits his property.  I have a small closed pond (no inflow or outflow) and without some kind of filtering the water turns green with algae in the summer.

you need to introduce species that suck up nutrients in the water. Duck weed is a good and easy choice
.

Emile Spore wrote:
you need to introduce species that suck up nutrients in the water. Duck weed is a good and easy choice
.

I put a few pieces of duckweed in the pond one spring and it covered the entire surface in a solid mat, all summer.  It stuck to the frogs & other creatures that live in the pond, and nothing seemed to be eating it so I finally got sick of it after a couple of years and carefully scooped it all off.  I like seeing the water and the creatures in the water, not duckweed.

I'm sure there must be some good use for duckweed - biomass or something?  I scooped mounds of it out of the pond for months until I finally got every last speck, and it has not come back.

Duckweed is a good replacer of soybeans for all manor of livestock, though snails could give harmful parasites to sheep and goats, it would be great for all sorts of fowl, pigs and cows.

I think there is a thread called all about duckweed.

I was under the impression that the vast majority of algae in Sepp's ponds go toward a food web that supports edible fish.

Joel Hollingsworth wrote:
I was under the impression that the vast majority of algae in Sepp's ponds go toward a food web that supports edible fish.

I would really like to know exactly how he does this algae food web cycle... how does he create the algae?

Manually by adding manure?... or some other way? .... does he have a system that recycles into the pond naturally that stimulates algae growth instead?

What fish is he using... tilapia is the best fish for algae but is a warm water fish... although with Sepp nothing would surprise me if he is using tilapia  .... but probably not.

Does he feed anything else to his fish... other than algae?

HAVE A WONDEFUL TRIP PATRICK!!! Safe travelling....

Chelle

Any details on growing the citrus successfully there would be good. I know it has to do with the larger body of water/rocks etc, but surely the sun doesn't shine all the time and how large exactly do these things need to be to be effective energy deposits. Have a great time, you are very lucky!

I'll see what I can do - remember it's all in German and my people haven't spoken German in 200 years.  I'm looking forward to the trip.

I too would like to know what kind of symbiotic relationships you observe between plants particularily food producing trees and shrubs and small stock like poultry, rabbits, pigs, goats and sheep and of course honey bees.

From your observation are there rotated pens or 'tractors' or more specific permanent designed paddocks or habitats? 

Hi Patrick,
I am going to austria this fall and really want to visit Sepp. How did you arrange the tour?
thanks

I am going to visit Seff 7th september and I will try bringing some of these questions, as well as growing species adapted to cold climates, although I have a much more extreme and colder climate than he does!!!

I lived in Austria for a few years, and I know well the region, so I can answer some of the climate questions:

His elevation is 1100 to 1500 meters.

Summer temperature average is a pleasant 20ºC and sometimes up to 30ºC.
Night temperature is about 8ºC, cool.
Weather is often sunny, but with frequent thunderstorms every few days.

May and September are 4ºC to 15ºC average low and high. Minor night frost while not common can occur, afternoons are cool to mild. Snow is not common on these months.

Snow occurs just a few days in April and October, snow usually starts by late October and lasts until March. Spring can be sunny, autumn can be foggy. Average first frost is around late September, average last frost around late April. Hard freezes occur between November and February, when snow becomes also common, average low -8ºC average high 0ºC. Weather is snowy but generally calm wind-wise. Sometimes strong winds can be from SW or NW, east is dominant in cold weather but very calm. Snowpack is around 50cm but changes from year to year.

No problems with big wildlife, bears or deer.

Precipitation is rather uniform throughout the year. Summer is wetter due to thunderstorms, about 150mm per month. Winter has an average 15 days of snow, but usually not large amounts of snow, around 60mm.

I used to say that Austria has a perfect weather during its growing season, a nice mix of hot, mild and rain. Seff definitively enjoys a good climate in my opinion.

Also the spring is rather reliable. growing season is about 6 months, April to September, and frost free about 5 months (around 150 days). Compare that with my cold and short summer, a growing season of 3 months, with occasional frosts I think many in the continental US (or states like Maine) have a worse growing season that he has.

Hope this helps.

wyldthang McCoy wrote:this might be found somewhere (I haven't yet...) I'm curious about

elevation
latitude
direction of exposure
direction of prevailing winds
average rainfall
depth of snowpack
last frost/first frost
range of temps(summer hi, winter lo)
deer? bears? etc big wildlife? (I don't remember any fencing)
I'd love to see a complete list of what he grows, including any forage for livestock

Hope you have a wonderful time, I would also love to see photo details of stuff he makes--cabin, furniture, garden structures etc, any traditional architecture/building techniques that are realy well suited for the Alps.