Adrien Lapointe

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Summary

Credit: Eric Tolbert

Paul Wheaton, instructors Alan Booker, Jessica Peterson, and most of the graduates of the just completed PDC course gather to discuss the class, their experiences and lessons learned. This class differed from previous classes in that it focused on more advanced topics and the students typically had more technical backgrounds in engineering, the sciences or had pursued significant independent study prior to attending the class.

The first topic discussed is "Should a person take a PDC"? Alan and Paul briefly go over the format of the PDC, how the changes this year worked to improve the class and possible changes for the next PDC followed by a short conversation about Paul's loathing of goats. Alan then expands on the differences between teaching an intensive two week course compared to his normal method of teaching weekend classes over a fourteen week span.

Paul shifts into a mini-rant about the difference between "engineering speak" vs. "politician speak" and the difficulty in translating and relating to normal questions from non-engineers. Alan discusses the difference between "Permaculture Toolbox Rattlers" and actually using the principles of Permaculture in the context where they might actually be applicable. Jessica brings insight about how Systems Thinking is more about the connections than the specific design elements in the systems and how important your individual bio-region influences the connections and techniques that can be applied.

The newly graduated students then discuss the advantages of taking a PDC and the wealth of materials and resources covered in a class. Some students thought the course would be a "good refresher" but were pleasantly surprised to find it was more comprehensive and inclusive with a large amount of new information. Most attending felt Permaculture Design Courses are a good way to find out how things work together and can certainly be recommended for people who are interested in Permaculture, Design or Gardening and acquiring memorable and actionable information.

The discussion wraps up with a summary of the items and projects the students were able to examine while they were at the lab, including the solar dehydrator, the rocket mass heaters, the rocket heated shower, the rocket oven as well as many of the other experiments currently occurring at the Lab.

Relevant Threads

Wheaton Labs 2018 PDC
Eldenbridge Institute (Alan Booker)
Inside Edge Design (Jessica Peterson)

Support the Empire

Help support the empire and get all of the podcasts in a bundle here in the digital market at permies.

To support production of these podcasts, make a donation here at Paul's Patreon page.

This podcast was made possible thanks to:

Full Name
Bill Crim
Josh Phillips
wade L
James Tutor
Suleiman ALAQEL
Jocelyn Campbell
Jason Hower
Ash Jackson is The Scrollbard
thomas adams
Julia Mason
Dominic Crolius
David Ingraham
Miroslav Ultrama
Lisa Goodspeed
Bill Erickson
Keith Kuhnsman
Wayne Fajkus
Eivind W. Bjoerkavaag
G Cooper
Dylan Butler
Cody W.

4 days ago

podcast 400 - Rocket Oven

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Summary

Credit: Julia Winter

Paul and Fred sit down to talk about rocket ovens. Also cherries. Folks picked 12 gallons of cherries this morning (!) Fred’s been pitting the cherries in preparation for drying them (in the super solar food dehydrator - Kickstarter stretch goal!) and he’s going to plant the cherry pits all over the place.

Go support the rocket oven kickstarter! It was funded in 18 hours, so it’s definitely happening. It’s well over the minimum, so that’s great. Paul figured he would not earn any money unless the funding went over $13K. Money is needed at Wheaton Labs. Many vehicles are in need of love.

So many morel mushrooms were picked and dried in the big solar dehydrator - Fred picked over 40 pounds of morels. (Did I mention that a documentary on how to make one is a stretch goal for the Kickstarter??)

Three rocket ovens have been built at Wheaton Labs. The first one is part of the 4 DVD package “Better Wood Heat.” The design has been improved. The second build was again by Tim Barker at the innovator’s event. Next, they pulled the engine from it and built a grate for it, so you could put a pot of water on the flame.

At last year’s ATC Tyler Morrison built a new and improved rocket oven. He went back to Seattle and built #4, then he built #5 and they video’d the whole thing. This last build requires NO welding, and it goes pretty fast.

Getting ready for the Kickstarter, Paul made some videos of how fast it heats up and how that compares to other ovens. A cob oven takes many hours, and a lot of wood, to heat up. A modern oven takes over 11 minutes to get to 350 degrees. Fred went up to see how long the rocket oven would take to get to 350 degrees - he didn’t do so well on his first try. Erica got it to 350 in 7 minutes 30 seconds. Usually it got there in 9 minutes.

Paul feels like the rocket oven could go to 900 degrees, for traditional thin pizza, no problem. Not sure that’s been done yet. (Note from the typer: we got our rocket oven to well over 600 degrees and it made great pizza!)

They did multiple trials where they weighed how much wood it took to cook various things in the rocket oven: pizza, cake, roasts, cornbread, banana bread, etc etc and pie. A lot of this was for the peasant PDC, as they prepared their own food. Almost everything could be cooked with 2 to 4 pounds of wood.

Really. Not much wood.

When we cooked 8 pizzas in half an hour, we used 5 pounds of wood. This took half an hour. The rocket oven makes a Friday pizza party a real possibility!

Paul has a cool recipe for polydough, where you make a gallon of dough and keep it in the fridge. You can pull off chunks of dough to make different things: pizza, cinnamon rolls, pigs in a blanket, fry bread.

“Propane is not really off-grid.” If you are cooking with propane, you are bringing the grid to your place.

If you have 4’ x 4’ x 4’ of twigs and branches, that’s half a cord. Paul guesses that you could cook for 200 days with half a cord of wood, if it’s in small pieces.

If you have a cob oven, you’re going to produce a massive amount of smoke as you heat the thing up. If you build Ernie’s cool double chambered cob oven, you burn the smoke, but the heat produced just goes straight up into the sky.

When you cook in the rocket oven, there’s hardly any smoke (generally only at the beginning while it’s heating up). Your neighbors will not know that you’re burning, other than smelling the pizza!

Carbon footprint. The biggest thing you could do to decrease your carbon footprint is switch to a rocket mass heater. Maybe the rocket oven can be a gateway drug to rocket mass heaters! (Paul’s goal is to improve people’s lives so much that they don’t feel like using their car. They don’t want to go anywhere. Thus shrinking their carbon footprint.)

The rocket oven Kickstarter is going on now (until July 26, 2018 ). There are lots of cool things that you can get at the $1 and $5 level. A couple of the stretch goals will add things for everyone who is in for $15 or more. ($15 gets you streaming access to the rocket oven instructional documentary, which will definitely be more than 75 minutes long.) At higher levels, you can get the 8 DVD set, and video of the ATC from last year, and other cool things - check it out!

Relevant Threads

Rocket Oven Kickstarter
Poly Dough
The Rocket Powered Oven: how to build your own super-efficient cooker
Rocket Oven Kickstarter thread at permies

Support the Empire

Help support the empire and get all of the podcasts in a bundle here in the digital market at permies.

To support production of these podcasts, make a donation here at Paul's Patreon page.

1 week ago

podcast 399 - Hugelkultur at basecamp

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Summary

Credit: Eric Tolbert

Paul and Fred discuss the history and report on the progress of the hugelkultur berms at basecamp. The podcast starts out with a brief history of why the berms were created, how they were created, the components included in the berm itself, and the part the berms are playing in improving soil conditions.

In the first couple of years there was a lot of animal pressure from deer, turkeys, chipmunks and rabbits until the chipmunk population started to ease and there is some speculation between Paul and Fred as to why that might be. Once a feral cat, aptly named Gert, appeared on the hugel scene the animal pressure mostly disappeared and the hugel beds begin to grow lush and "jungle-ly".

Paul and Fred move on to discussing the soil conditions, or lack of soil, at basecamp and the state of the property when Paul acquired the acreage. They explain why the main hugelkultur bed near the Fisher Price house is very tall, narrow and should be physically impossible except for the fact that it currently exists.

Paul explains the concept of "Bootcamp for Perennials" and how that program pertains to hugel berms and the plants that have been installed on the berms. Organic matter is being increased on the berms through different means, including Chop and Drop, Mulching, planting and other means to keep the material in place on the berms. Discussion turns to the types of plants that have gone through Bootcamp, Paul's appreciation for Rhubarb, transplanted fruit trees, seasonal conditions and the impact on trees and plants around wheaton labs.

Fred and Paul then talk about the plants found on the berms including Sepp Holzer's perennial grain, volunteer potatoes, wild buckwheat, rhubarb, sunchokes (Jerusalem artichoke), prickly lettuce among others. They then segue way into the advantages of indigo clothing, tall fescue and the ability to fertilize the property in a natural way. The discussion moves on to a lengthy list of fruits and vegetables that are now growing on the hugelkultur beds, including buckbrush, serviceberries, lemon balm, comfrey, vetch, mustard, mullein and many more.

After the cataloguing of growth currently on the berms there is an overview of the intention and reasoning about establishing a polyculture environment without a large amount of actual effort. Now in the fourth year the hugelkultur beds are improving the soil and beginning to produce food and the hope is that in the next year it will be possible to grow a full hugelkultur garden with minimal-to-no watering.

The Podcasts winds up with a summary of the 2018 PDC for scientists and engineers taught by Alan Booker of the Eldenbridge Institute.

Relevant Threads

Wheaton Labs Hugelkultur Forum
Eldenbridge Institute
Peasant PDC
Patreon

Support the Empire

Help support the empire and get all of the podcasts in a bundle here in the digital market at permies.

To support production of these podcasts, make a donation here at Paul's Patreon page.

1 week ago

podcast 397 - Review of Gracie's Backyard - Part 1

I just posted part 2 HERE

2 weeks ago

podcast 398 - Review of Gracie's Backyard - Part 2

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Summary

Credit: Eric Tolbert

Part two of a two-part podcast by Paul Wheaton and Julia Winter discussing the movie "Gracie's Backyard". "Gracie's Backyard" is a documentary about Richard Perkin's Ridgedale Permaculture Farm in Sweden, by filmmaker Olivier Asselin, that follows Richard, his wife and their daughter Gracie around Richard's farm and describes some of the things they are doing on the farm, why they do things that way and plans they have for the future.

Paul and Julia pick up the discussion with an in-depth overview of the chicken processing operations and Paul's take on chicken raising, the pros and cons of using Salatin-style chicken tractors and the possible advantages of paddock shifting chickens in the same manner as recommended for other, larger, farm livestock.

The review progresses and we discover that Paul's current mission is "Gardening Gardeners" and how his current passion and vision for expanding community occasionally bring his views and observations into conflict with some other people's level of knowledge about particular jobs and skill sets, what their expectations of intentional community life should be like and how to best achieve that.

After a short discussion about Ant Village expectations, realities, infrastructure and food systems Paul and Julia return to the film and talk about Richard Perkin's Keyline plowing techniques, the limitations of the types of trees that could be grown at the location of the farm, and when Keyline is and is not appropriate based on land and environment. Milking cows, proper use of electrical fencing, transforming a coniferous forest and how to properly store an intern (intern housing) are also covered.

Later in the documentary Richard Perkin's wife's discusses her experience with prior farming community which leads to a lengthy discussion of the impact of community, how best to try and work within the community structure and minimize the stress on community by neighbors that have drama. Paul explains it is understandable that Richard has "thrown out all the old community building models" and discusses the benefits of community with a central leader model.

Wrapping up the podcast we find out Paul's opinion on scything of hay, why it would probably be of value if Ridgedale Farm installed some berms, the near-glamourous facilities available and changes to the infrastructure at Wheaton Labs, a recap of some of the recent and upcoming events and a shout-out to Justin Rhodes and his "adorable family" (Julia's words).

Paul and Julia agree that Richard's stated motivation, of being able to move to the farm to be able to raise his family on the land, is a worthwhile goal. In summary while Paul finds that he would do some things differently he thinks "Richard is an artist of seed and soil" and the film has many positive and uplifting messages and is well worth watching.

Relevant Threads

podcast 397 - Review of Gracie's Backyard - Part 1
Ridgedale Permaculture Farm
Joel Salatin & Polyface Farm
Justin Rhodes
Patreon

Support the Empire

Help support the empire and get all of the podcasts in a bundle here in the digital market at permies.

To support production of these podcasts, make a donation here at Paul's Patreon page.

2 weeks ago

podcast 397 - Review of Gracie's Backyard - Part 1

Get all of the podcasts in convenient, giant zip files

Summary

Credit: Eric Tolbert

Part one of a two-part podcast by Paul Wheaton and Julia Winter, a permies follower and Pediatrician by day who is visiting Wheaton Labs to participate in the Schmoozaroo. Paul and Julia will be discussing the movie Gracie's Backyard and how difficult it is to actually be around Paul in person.

They start with a short discussion of what Wheaton Labs was like in the very early days and the progress that has been made since the start of Paul's dream of World Domination and working community and how it compares to the vision of the Kickstarter documentary "Gracie's Backyard".

"Gracie's Backyard" is a documentary about Richard Perkin's Ridgedale Permaculture Farm in Sweden, by filmmaker Olivier Asselin, who also created the film "The Permaculture Orchard: Beyond Organic". The discussion starts with an overview of some of Paul's three pages of notes, including growing things in rows, the advantages of no till, Paul's vision of ideal food systems and an exploration of some of the people who inhabit and work on the Ridgedale farm.

The discussion takes a sharp turn into comparing Missoula and Portland and the social environments and goes into depth about the World Naked Bike Ride in Portland before they bring it back around to the farmland and environment found at Ridgedale Permaculture Farm, including the animals, processes used to manage the livestock, interns and how many people are on the farm and the roles they fulfil.

After an interlude to digress about what can be done during winter and the challenges a farm faces the discussion returns to the market garden processes at Ridgedale and some observations about processes that are of a concern in the farm setup and moving on to egg safety, No dig/no till farming, gnarly carrots and makeup.

To be continued in part 2.

Relevant Threads

Purple and Brown Schmoozaroo
Patreon
Rocket Oven Kickstarter
World Naked Bike Ride
Ridgedale Permaculture Farm

Support the Empire

Help support the empire and get all of the podcasts in a bundle here in the digital market at permies.

To support production of these podcasts, make a donation here at Paul's Patreon page.

3 weeks ago

one giant gob of podcasts, videos and stuff

paul wheaton wrote:
As for the glitchy file in the zip, I am asking adrien if he can repair it - but he is particularly busy now, so it might be a day or two. But it sounds like you are already set in that department.

I checked podcast 184 on my end and it seems fine.

Penny,

Could you try downloading the zip file that contains it and trying the podcast again?

Seth Gregory wrote:
Sorry, I meant 216-218. Thank you for the link. I am grateful for all the good that you do.

I added 206, 217 and 218. It might take a few hours before Paul gets around to uploading the new version. As for 216, it never existed. Not quite sure what happened (https://permies.com/t/18690/Podcast-Symphonies-Seed-Soil-Permaculture#158945)

1 month ago

digital market

What wood to use and when to cut logs for mushroom

I have been doing mushroom inoculation for the past few years and someone sent me these questions via email. I thought I would answer here rather than repeat myself over and over again in emails.

Can you advise on how late in the spring logs can be cut? I checked today and it seems that some sources indicate that early spring is best.

We usually try to cut our logs before the trees leaf out. It apparently helps the bark to stay attached longer, which in turn helps to keep the moisture in. One problem we have had with cutting the logs too early is that they can start drying out, which can make it harder for the mycelium to run through it. I have been told by some people to wait 2 weeks after cutting the logs before inoculating, but we have not always waited and it worked anyways.

Also can the poplar tree be used with good results? My farm has a plethora of them but I wonder about using them as I only found spotty references to their viability. I do have oak but it makes good firewood.

For shiitake, oak is the best. Hard maple is good. Poplar does not seem to be suitable from what I read, but I haven't tried it.

There seems to be oyster mushroom strains that do well of poplar (genus populus).

I like this chart for suitable species for different strains here

3 months ago

fungi

podcast 396 - Jumpstarting Community

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Summary

Credit: Craig Dobbson

In this podcast Jocelyn, Fred and Paul are talking about jump starting community and reaching a critical mass of community member such that it's a self-sustaining entity. They touch back on a past podcast series where they talked about the ickyness that occurred up at the lab last year. There were some troubles with sticky locks on the gate and mice in the willow feeders. Fred explains the details of what happened in these situations and Paul and Jocelyn make observations and comments about how things could have been better handled. All in all, it seems as though the troubles up at the lab were minimal but enough of a catalyst for things to end poorly for some of the residents. Fred notes that the mice were actually taking the toilet paper from the willow wonka.

Paul begins the discussion about community by noting some of the things that have been positive factors in getting to where Wheaton labs has gotten. Of course the first thing is that they have land to call their own. This now gives them the opportunity to experiment and try new things. They talk about how many rocket mass heaters they have on the land. There's twelve of them! WOW! Paul also notes that there are 7 people currently living on the land. The permies.com forums are still growing as well. At the time of this recording, the forums have received 22 million page views in the last month.

There's also a couple of Kickstarter projects in the works. When they are ready, there will be many announcements.

There is still a position available for a "rental coordinator" and there's a 50% commission for all rental fees so there's some potential for the right person to make a little mountain of money if they can make that project sing. For the next few months, the commission is 80%. Know anyone? A position for an assistant instructor for the upcoming PDC is also open.

There are many challenges to building this community. For a while, they talk about building a well, and all of the struggles they've had in getting a functional well going because of lots of comedy in people's lives. They cover some points about renting structures and how that could be a serious income for the right person. That person has to be familiar with a lot of social networks, technology and emails so that they can reach a lot of folks that might want to rent a structure.

Later on, there's some discussion about how there seems to be a big difference between certain communities. Paul talks about this in relation to his knowledge about the computer coder community and the permies community. He notes that there is significantly more drama in the permies community and that it creates special challenges to building a good, stable community in the physical world, such as the one he's trying to create on Wheaton Labs. Jocelyn and Fred agree that people who are bonkers about permaculture also tend to have other curiosities in their personalities and some of those quirks can be a hindrance to community building.

They touch on the idea of symbiotic relationships between the lab residents so that everyone can make their own hours and develop their own ways of doing business, very similar to the idea that Joel Salatin came up with when he spoke about fiefdoms.

Paul also reflects on his PDC experience and how it influenced him to build community. They have a good talk about how a lot of folks attend more than one PDC just for the community experience. They want to hang out with other permaculture people and share a nice experience. Jocelyn takes a second to note that Paul is actually a pretty nice and sweet guy, once folks get to understand his patient yet boisterous personality.

They finish up by talking about how they can spruce up the different events that are coming up. Jocelyn talks about the simple act of taking a walk and learning about wild things. Paul also wishes to have guest instructors for the Peasant PDC. There's a lot of opportunity and many different ways that you can get involved with Wheaton labs. Check it out.

Relevant Threads

Building community
Wheaton labs Main Page
Peasant PDC
Homesteader PDC ATC

Support the Empire

Help support the empire and get all of the podcasts in a bundle here in the digital market at permies.

To support production of these podcasts, make a donation here at Paul's Patreon page.

This podcast was made possible thanks to:

Lisa Goodspeed
Keith Kuhnsman
thomas adams
Jocelyn Campbell
Julia Mason
Bill Erickson
Dominic Crolius
Josh Phillips
wade L
Suleiman ALAQEL
Ash Jackson is The Scrollbard
Jason Hower
Bill Crim
Full Name
Miroslav Ultrama
James Tutor
David Ingraham
Scott Reid
Wayne Fajkus

3 months ago

podcast 395 - Review of the Song of Increase

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Summary

Credit: Craig Dobbson

This podcast has been more than a year in the making. Paul and Jocelyn sit down to talk about it and right off the bat there's a lot to say. Jacqueline Freeman's book is called "The Song of Increase" and it's about raising honeybees without treatments of any kind. When he first saw the title, Paul thought it was kinda terrible, but once he finished reading the book, he realized that the title was a lot better than his original assessment.

Paul talked to Jacqueline Freeman about her book and he had some comments and questions for her to consider. The two big things that stuck with Paul were stories that are told in the book. The first story is about how bees live their lives and respond to the sounds and activities of the entire hive from the time they are a larva all the way until they make their final pollen collection trip at the end of their lives. Jacqueline spends an enormous of time watching, hearing and understanding the bees.

The podcast continues with a story about the old bee that comes back with a load of pollen. Jacqueline, can tell that it's an old bee based on the damage to their wings and their over all look. Apparently they also emit an odor that can notify the rest of the colony of their age. Because the colony is more important than any individual bee, there is a process by which the bees decide who can enter the hive and who cannot. The old bees eventually reach a point where they are no longer allowed in the hive and so they take a non-flying leap off of the edge of the colony platform and simply give up and lay on the ground until death occurs.

The second thing that was quite stunning was that when Jacqueline and Joseph were going about their chores they noticed that in the bee colony, there is no such thing as "fair". Bees contribute to the colony for the entire span of their lives and the colony will take as much as they can get as a collective, with no concern for the individual. The whole goal is to increase their numbers to the point where the colony is so large that they split up their forces and swarm to create a second colony.

The title of the book comes from the sounds of a happy, growing colony that could potentially split and swarm. Apparently the humm of the hive is a very dynamic and informative thing. Jacqueline has been able to discern the fluctuations in the hum in such a way that she can know what's going on in the hive without really needing to bother the bees too much. Some of the things they hum about are, growth, food, illness, stress and defense.

They talk about the different roles that bees play, such as taking care of brood, defending the gates to the hive, collecting food and capping cells. They all have the ability to do many jobs so whatever is of the highest importance, that's what they will do. Jacqueline believes that the bees really love to give back as much of themselves as they can to the colony. They work themselves to death out of love for the rest of their colony mates.

In the book, there are sections that are called "in our own words", which are Jacqueline's attempt to decipher what the bees are talking about. While this is something of a translation between species, Jacqueline believes that she's gotten a pretty good understanding of what the bees are "saying" with their collective humming. In the audiobook version of her book, Jacqueline has a friend named Robin help out with the bee sounds.

Later in the podcast, they talk about how bees determine which plants are best to harvest from and how they go about performing tasks such as fermentation to increase the value of the foods they collect throughout the season. Along with this they also go in depth about how honeybees have methods and tactics for stabilizing their colony in times of stress or uncertainty.

Jocelyn really enjoyed the book and found it to be amazing in many ways. Paul had an idea that if Jacqueline decided to rework the book, he thought that maybe a religion would form around the book. Jocelyn found that statement rather odd, but Paul has determined that "the book is that profound" and wonderful that some folks might find it quite useful in guided them in their own lives. Not that he'll be signing up for such a religion.

Part of the song of increase is about gratitude for thousands of right actions. This is what leads to a happy healthy colony that is able to split and spread it's awesomeness to new places in the environment.

Relevant Threads

Welcome Jacqueline
Jacqueline's honeybee techniques streaming video
Jacqueline's profile on permies.com
The bee forums on permies.com

Support the Empire

Help support the empire and get all of the podcasts in a bundle here in the digital market at permies.

To support production of these podcasts, make a donation here at Paul's Patreon page.

4 months ago