Erin Phillips

What a beautiful subject. We are considering a pond for our homestead, and are studying the permitting process with Wyoming's State Engineer's Office. We had a beautiful spring with seven inches of rain in a very short time, thus filling our springtime drainage, followed immediately by major top soil loss. Now it's summer and the rain has been long gone. I know a pond may not be for everyone but we think it could help solve a problem or two. Perhaps the SEO will work with us here. Perhaps not. Thanks for putting this on either way. We look forward to it!

Erin

Michael, My wife and I are building an Earthship in Wyoming. We are on year three, and may have much insight. Feel free to reach out to us. Just click on our name and send us an email. We would be happy to help!

Kyle and Erin

Each board of insul is 2" and Reynolds recommends 4" total.
Mike exaggerates a lot. I have worked with him on a build in Montana. While genius also eccentric. Members of his crew who live in Earthships openly tell us they have water hauled to their house twice a year, Or depending on the size of their family. The point Reynolds is making is the approach to self sustaininablity and self containment. But he makes it sound like it's been achieved by the earthships in Taos. It's not. Just closer than most Americans. At least water isn't pumped to their house everyday by the city! It's a starting point. Now watch the movie, Garbage Warrior. He says in the movie " A family of four could totally survive in this house without going to the grocery store." (paraphrase) He later put out YouTube videos of him and some of their crew trying to do just that. Not pretty.
Just the same, combine permaculture concepts and Earthship concepts and it will be hard to fail.
My wife and I are building ours out of pocket while working full time. We would love to form an alliance of information. Have a great day!
Kyle and Erin

Hi Bill, my wife and I are in the process of building an Earthship near Lander, Wyoming. We would enjoy sharing our experience wth you some time. How far along are you? We have finished the excavation, 6th course of tires and have installed the cisterns along with the necessary backfilling. Oh, and the thermal wrap is in. We plan to have the tire work, bond beam and footers done this year. Throw a line sometime.
Kyle and Erin

We are looking for an answer to this question as well. This is very difficult, and most likely a question for a master carpenter, or perhaps a Geometry professor? Any mathematical geniuses out there? Who can teach us angles: A squared + B squared = C squared, and how to physically adjust an A-Frame to fit these mathematical parameters.

We have built the A-frame with a plum bob, and it works GREAT!, if you don't live in windy Wyoming. Sure, one choice is to wait for a non-windy day, and another option is to wait until midnight, when the wind has died. Let's not stop there! We can get friends out who are willing to hold up plywood all day, against the prevailing wind, and the plum bob must surely be fine, but we are not on the plains, we are working in a valley at the base of the Wind River Range, and a funnel effect nails us from the occasionally, prevailing South-Eastern winds. Of course, this happens when our plywood holders, and the plum bob least expect it; right when we start laying out contours. Days now, we have tried to deal with this Wyoming wind. No contour success.

To be positive and realistic, we are very patient, and hard working, so we can continue on this path of one contour of 700 feet marked in a weekend. However, we are going to find a solution to making the spirit level, A-Frame combo happen, on account of the many acres we are going to swale. This is not only our property we are considering. Other interested parties in our area look forward to participating in these practices, and the winds of Wyoming will continue to slow our momentum.

No matter how this forum turns out, or how the many conversations with local professionals in our area go, we will be diligent in finding a solution to our problem, and will most definitely share our findings with the permies at large. We would like to keep in mind that it is ideal if this design is near free, and can be built with an individual that has a few basic carpenter's tools, and a little such experience. Does that not describe everything that we are trying to do here?

Thanks for any help!

Kyle and Erin

Thank you for the warm welcome Miles!

Our water situation consists of a perennial drainage with only four acres of water rights, which we have been approved by the State Engineer's Office for digging what they call "laterals" off of the ditch. We will likely dig "laterals" in the form of small swales. We have been trying to perfect our A-frame level with the addition of the spirit level, but seem to be inept in geometry. This has been more difficult than anticipated. People who have done it sure make it look easy in their videos. We have to go back to school. We have had ridiculous experiences with the A-frame with the plum bob on account of wind. We will need this tool to be a long term tool, and not shut us down every time the wind blows.

What else about water? We have a nice shed/lean-to with a metal roof that we plan to catch precip off of. Looking ahead, and absolutely our priority, is to build an Earthship. As soon as the snow and mud clear, we will be excavating, and beginning our build. We have the necessary plans to get this done, but it will take a while, as we are paying out of pocket. This will catch water from the roof, melt snow with a solar hot water system, and use the water caught 4 times.

We will try to start a thread in projects, and keep everyone posted. We have enjoyed learning from all of your projects, and hope that we can contribute to them. There will be many challenges along the way, and we are excited to continue to learn from them. This is, after all, greening a desert (low-precip, sagebrush).

Hello Dry/Cold land Permies! Let's talk!

Kyle and Erin

Hello windy friends. Calling from outside of Lander, Wyoming. We am looking forward to sharing ideas and actions with all of you. We are just getting started on 40 acres of loamy soil. First step: Excavate for an Earthship we are going to try to build out-of-pocket. Next, excavate swales and plant cover crops and perhaps a few locust trees, if the seeds we have in pots will sprout. All the while trying to build a sustainable community. Hope all is well on your fronts. We will keep you posted on successes and failures!

Kyle and Erin