Kyle D Burdick

You can keep digging to make the roof as low as you originally planned, even in clay.  As the other poster mentioned, make sure you have drainage and water management plans.

Also if you can design your roof such that the water and the slope drain in the same direction that will help reduce water coming from the high side.  Look up "Mike Oehler" for more design ideas and details for designing underground houses.

Larger overhangs on your roof will also help to reduce the need for drainage, you don't need to drain away water that never makes it to your foundation.

I'm a fan of Paul Gautschi pruning style.  Prune to keep trees short so you can get to the fruit, and make your pruning cuts such that they result in strong accessible branches, which are weighted down by the fruit and therefore stay low.  I have dwarf peach trees that I pruned to an open center that are almost laying on the ground at this point, everything is fully accessible (I would have thinned the fruit some, but for other reasons).  They're in town, so there's no risk of deer.
I'm also generally against providing support to trees, roots should be enough to hold it up, and lack of support will make it grow more roots to hold it in place, I just see trees with supports getting dependent on the support and not becoming strong in themselves.

I have one of these, but with just a wooden handle (not metal like they're selling now).  I've used it a couple times on really dirty items, or things I just didn't want to run through the washing machine.  It does a good job, but it's a workout.  The "breathing" effect is pronounced and is helpful for pulling out the dirt.  I use it in a 5 gallon bucket, I guess if you had a larger container you could wash more items at once.  I suspect that it would really only work for a few items at a time.

https://www.lehmans.com/product/breathing-hand-washer/

They get to be a problem when they tunnel under your foundation... a hav-a-hart trap is pretty reliable, especially when you can line it up with their hole, look for the one with two doors, so they will run through it.  They seem to be consistently fatty, dark meat, and they're mostly grass-fed, so that's a plus.  Some folks would say gamey, but I generally consider that a term for "meat that has non-zero flavor".  The flavor is more pungent than deer or wild turkey.

Thanks for the book recommendation, I'll check it out!

I'm also looking for a young single female Christian permaculture afficionado who wants to have a traditional relationship and eventually children.  I'm 38, located in upstate NY, I own my own home in town, I own 50 acres in the country with a small dry cabin and have started the process of making it more comfortable for eventual continuous habitation.  I've been a bible-believing non-denominational born-again Christian and interested in permaculture for over 15 years.  I've always loved the description of the garden that God made for Adam and Eve in the beginning.  If nothing else I'd love to discuss beliefs and see where you stand.  I've attached a photo of me clearing trees a week or so ago in preparation for the new driveway.

I didn't realize that there were specific threads for each of the podcasts, I guess that's what "come on out to the forums at permies.com..." is for, but I guess I took that as a general statement rather than a specific one.  Anyways, I've had comments I'd like to make on other podcasts and didn't know where to put them, but since you specifically mentioned it in this one I'm actually going to record the comment this time.

Early-ish in the podcast I think there was some discussion of structural/building designs and that there haven't been any/many that are regenerative and I wanted to post a link to one that is.  I'm sure you guys have heard of this, but maybe didn't think of it in the moment.

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20211117-how-indias-living-bridges-could-transform-architecture

My understanding is that they build the bridges initially from rope/branches/etc, but then weave living tree roots into the structure and continue to maintain them this way until the original "dead" components rot away and the bridges are almost entirely made of actively growing living materials.

Two matching 5 quart cast iron pots, wired together with 4 beef leg bone chunks on top, held up by a double layer of 1/4" hardware cloth, cut to overhang the outside edge all the way around, sealed with native clay.  I also wired the two pots together, which helped later when I used the wire to pick the whole thing out of the ground.
Baked for 3+ hours, initially hot full fire, then low flame with coals, left overnight covered with soil and opened the next morning.  Top of sauce was black, bones nearly charcoal and brittle, odor reminiscent of a really really dirty BBQ grill, very intense, brown colored underneath top black layer.

Yield ~1.5 pints.

I can't wait to try it out.

Bread Recipe (Makes three big loaves 4"x16", or a week of small loaves each morning):

 5 lbs bread flour
 6 cups water
 1.5 tablespoons yeast
 3 tablespoons salt

Egg Wash:

 1 Egg
 Splash of Olive Oil

Steps:

 1. Mix flour and salt in large container.  
 2. Heat water to "hot", just before it burns to put your finger in it (~110 degrees F), add yeast and whisk together.
 3. Mix water/yeast with flour/salt.
 4. Combine into dough and knead until smooth.
 5. Let rise for approximately 2 hrs (I usually let it triple in size or so).
 6. Refrigerate overnight to develop flavor (or as much as a week, note that as flavor increases, rise decreases).
 7. Weigh and separate into loaf balls, shape dough for loaves.
 8. Add dough to oiled pans.
 9. Whisk together egg wash ingredients and coat surface of bread.
 10. Move dough in pans to warm oven to rise for approximately 1 hr covered with moist towel.
 11. Pre-heat oven to 450 degrees F.
 12. Slice surface of dough for appearance and to allow bread to expand.
 13. Bake at 450 degrees F for 25-30 minutes.
 14. Extricate from pans, cool on wire rack, enjoy!