Adam Poddepie

While quite break-able, I'm rather fond of glass cookware. Anything from pyrex dishes to borosilicate chemistry glass has been proven quite useful. I'm not sure about its uses on the steaming front, but good glassware is a versatile tool.

Is this filtration system just for your house? If so, there are a couple of methods you COULD do for drinking water.

1. Reverse Osmosis filter. Things like a Sawyer filter is guaranteed for 1 million gallons. It's relatively quick at filtering, and will remain steady if you're doing a sand filter for particulate first. It will need to be backwashed every once in a while, and it isn't for high pressure systems. This option is meant for a gravity-fed system with half a gallon sitting on top of it. There are lots of ways to make this work, it's just one option.

2. Passive solar distillation. This is mentioned second because it is inordinately slower. Most setups only produce a maximum of 1 gallon of water on a sunny day. The larger it is or the more you have, the more you'll get out of it. On the plus side, this is DISTILLED, and you wont have any particulate or bacteria afterwards.

For non drinking water, I'd recommend adding a layer of charcoal. This will help filter more of the particulate. It'll work fine for flushing toilets, but I probably still wouldn't want to shower in it or wash my clothes. (just my two cents.)

That's very impressive! I can't even begin to imagine how much that must have cost to set up! When you say "no input", does that mean that you also haven't planted new plants in the meantime? What all does "no input" entail?

I'll be looking into semi dwarf trees, they seem very promising!

Does anyone currently operate a greenhouse including trees? I've long nurtured the dream of having citrus and other warm-weather trees in my zone 5/6 area. Dwarf trees would be fine to an extent, but slightly larger ones would be nice too. So, to that end, has anyone tried this? I can only imagine it would be a nightmare to keep heated having such lofty dimensions.

As a follow up to this, the idea was just too good to be true. The liquid and filter together form a barrier against incoming air, causing the top jar to make a vacuum and stop the coffee from flowing. If there was a removable plug in the bottom this would not be a problem, but that's just too much work. I decided to instead make enough coffee to last 2 weeks at a time. Works easy

For those who want to give it a try:

1 lb ground coffee
2 gallons water

let steep over night, filter, and then drink. I cut mine with milk and a little sugar. It's also quite good with hot chocolate mix.

Paul,

I'm curious about your lemon tree project. Is the problem for your area simply temperature dependent? Sunlight? I'd love to find a way to do an outdoor lemon tree in the central midwest, but I don't see it happening. My backup plan is to make friends with a welder and build a large greenhouse (my dream is 1.5 stories )

It's a new riff on an accepted idea. I like that they're always trying something new, but I'm doubtful it will lower prices any time soon. I can't imagine making silicate covered paraffin balls/pellets is cheap (as a process). If the design takes off it will undoubtedly get streamlined, so that's always good.

On the upside, sand is CRAZY available. Deserts, beaches, take your pick. I'm not sure it will work for a rocket heater as it gets way too hot and the spheres likely wont be able to handle it. My money is on using them for grow-beds. Can anyone else see laying down a layer of these as a "pseudo greenhouse" for your plants? Keep them nice and warm for longer periods? Plus, none of the ingredients should cause problem if they were to burst.

Anyone else have other thoughts for them? Embed them in drywall? Coating between glass layers?

Any news on the beer front?

Nuts. An interesting addition, but quite difficult if that is to be your main fermentable. I can see there being a couple of problems as nuts have oils that could ruin head retention, but at the same time they have quite a bit of proteins, so the effect could be more balanced (I simply don't know). I would wager that germinating them is definitely the first step, followed by baking them in the oven. The amount of time in the oven will depend on what kind of flavor you want VS how much sugar you want. If I had enough nuts to try this, I would start out with several pounds of nuts and attempt to germinate them. I don't know how this is done. I've germinated seeds, but not nuts (i know, nuts are seeds, but in my head it seems different). If someone could post a method for that step, then the next would be to roast and boil them. Boiling will help by both dissolving the sugars and processing some of the proteins. Hops will still need to be added as they help to preserve the beer.

If anyone is feeling especially gung ho about using nuts, I'd try shaving off the membrane directly next to the nut (beneath the shell, attached to the meat) and placing it in a solution or sterilized water with sugar (or brown sugar, or just boiled apple juice, or any kind of sugar infused liquid) to try and cultivate some natural yeast. Who knows, could be interesting.

If someone could correct me one way or another on germination, that would be appreciated

I actually know a few methods!! The only problem is that I don't know if it's an available solution for your location. In the Midwest (USA) we have cattle grazing on our land seasonally. When they start up each spring, the cattle are herded back and forth across the land to push the snakes out into a nearby body of water (as a favor to some of the permanent inhabitants of the farm). The snakes that don't run in fear are trampled! So if you know someone who needs some grazing ground (temporarily) you might give that a try. Plus, cow manure is really good for tomatoes.

The other option is to find a falconer, but that's kind of a solution with lots of holes in it. On the farm, owls hunt snakes and drop them onto either the electric fence, or the further out barbed wire fence. They have very good aim, I might add. So, these could cut down on the problem, but I'm not sure that either is a permanent solution. Best bet might just be to get a couple of really tough barn cats.