Paul Busey

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since Jun 01, 2017
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Recent posts by Paul Busey

I recommend you read some of Joel Salatin's books (polyface farms) and use some of his hard earned wisdom as a starting point. He is all about pasture and has some excellent info on the subject.

It sounds like you could stand to start with some goats, chickens, turkeys, and possibly some other grazers on your pasture, then do a little weeding followed by  some very basic seeding. Animals can and will do most of the work for you. Once the pasture has been corrected, you can then manage it with animal rotations and cutting hay for wintering your livestock.

But Salatin should definitely be your first step in your desired direction. Pastures are his life long bread and butter and he has a ton of experience renting neglected pastures and fixing them quick, fast, and cheaply. (He has a ton of video and material you can find online as well). His insights on letting the land determine your fencing is common sense brilliant, as is his use of portable electric fencing to get the job done. That same common sense land segregation translates perfectly to mowing hay. Meditate on his wisdom a few days while considering how to apply it to your world and you will have a very high chance of pitfall avoidance and first time success.


Good Luck,


-Paul-
7 years ago

Sean Dembrosky wrote:

So for me, if I have corse, branchy funky stuff that isn't great for firewood and would take forever to break down if just laid up in piles the biochar route makes a ton of sense.



Have you considered a rocket mass heater instead of your wood stove or fireplace? Forgive me if it seems like I am preaching to the choir, but small sticks, branches, twigs are the exact fuel you want for a RMH... And then you get to save and nurture your wood lot into mature trees suitable for lumber, log house, log barn, etc.

Or, for a different route, consider Hugelkultur, you might want to consider burying some of that brush... possibly under a raised bed in the garden (like if you are building a new bed). You don't need to go 6 feet high, but if you dig a trench for a new bed (think rototiller and excavate kinda trench), dump the brush in the bottom of the trench (possibly hit it with some compost tea to jump start de-comp). Amend removed soil, cover, and plant. It's not going to be enough of a sponge to soak up a ton of water, but when the brush rots, it will be enough of a sponge to buffer between waterings. Large logs are recommended for building traditional Hugelkultur beds (6 feet tall and as long as you like) because there is less surface area and the wood rots slower. Under a raised garden bed, slower rot might not be desired, especially if you follow crop rotation and want the wood to rot quickly, before you plant that bed with a root veggie.

If you really want the char (now) and less hassle, just light the brush pile and douse it when it settles to coals. If you have livestock, and have some old poop clumped bedding straw from cleaning beds, dump that on the coals just before you douse it. The coals will char some of the straw and poop (more char, yeah, but it's a good idea to stand upwind for that last part). Then turn it all into your compost pile and let it compost for a couple weeks until it matures into rich black sweet smelling compost.

I compost all my bio-char anyway. The whole point is that the char is full of tiny nooks and crannies that house all the good microbes... And those good microbes are most abundant in compost.

And Just to dispel a myth I heard or read somewhere, bio-char decomposes just as fast as wood chips in the soil. Go take a walk in and forest a few years after a fire and you won't find any biochar in the soil. It all decomposed. The only time it doesn't decompose is those very rare times when it is covered and sealed by mud (on its way to becoming a fossil).


-Peace, Love, and Hippy Thoughts-

-Paul-
7 years ago
I think some are making it far more complicated than it is. Anything charred that you throw into your compost pile is Bio-Char. The inoculation happens inside the compost pile. And that is all there is to it.

Straw or wood or any organic matter can be burned/charred and composted and it qualifies as bio-char. Straw or grasses that are sealed in a container and heated to charring are some of the absolute best bio-chars you can get. They easily powder, and disperse wider than anything else. Wood doesn't have to be charred in a kiln, there is no voodoo or mystery magic. Dowse a brush pile after it burns and settles to coals and you have the best wood char you can get. Once the wood burns to coals, all the gasses are out of the wood and it is just charcoal, if you took a lump and smothered it by removing oxygen, then you would have a piece of charcoal just as good as any other wood based char, ready to be composted.

It doesn't matter if you pull it from your wood stove, BBQ/Smoker, outdoor fire pit, burnt brush pile, or nearby recent forest fire. If it is charcoal, it has tiny nooks and crannies for all the good microbes to live in and flourish. Grind or pound it somewhat small, compost it, and apply compost anywhere you normally compost. There is nothing more to it. It has the ability to make your compost better.

And just to dispel a myth I see from time to time, it doesn't last a hundred years. Anyone that thinks it does needs to go walk in a forest a few years after a fire, they would be hard pressed to find any char in the soil because it all decomposed.

Copy off nature, she is always the smartest kid in the class. And she has been making bio-char for a lot longer than anyone else.
7 years ago
First the obvious question... Has anyone considered raising rats as a food source? They eat everything (not sure how efficient the meat conversion is, but I suspect it would be really good), they breed very, very, very quickly, they are very easy to raise, and can be very tasty. Some experts say we are quickly approaching a human population where we will not be able to feed everyone even if all available land is dedicated to producing food ( 9 Billion is that magic number). I suspect that when that time comes (12 to 20 years from now), that there will be bug farms and rat farms all over the world. Some food is better than none. Bugs being 40 to 60% protein is good and rat can be tasty as any survivalist can attest.

But onto rat control...


I'm a big fan of King Snakes, when they are small they will eat young rats, when they are big they will eat adult rats. I have seen king snakes in excess of 9 feet long and very capable of eating a NY subway rat. King snakes also eat other snakes, including venomous snakes like rattle snakes and anything else. They are on my list of future projects... I would like to start breeding them and then release the young all over the farm. Granted I would build them some winter habitats, possibly even a space in the barn and greenhouse. If they know it's there, they might come back to it, however King snakes will also eat other king snakes, so once the other prey is gone, it might become a balance of nature thing or it might cause them to wander off in search of more food. Regardless, I really like them and as long as they are around, you don't have to worry about dangerous snakes as they all become king snake food. And I would only consider this with a local king snake variety (which are all over north america and other parts of the world), not an imported variety.

I'm not a fan of cats, but I have had cats when I was growing up, a few of which singlehandedly killed rats larger then they were (adult cat takes out rat that is very big, like something you would see in NY). The cat leaves the head, feet, spine and tail and eats everything else (but you can still figure out the size based on what is left). I've seen this a few times. I have also seen cats that will watch a mouse run over them and not even care, so it all depends on the cat. I'm considering calling my local animal shelter/dog pound and asking if they have any feral cats that I can adopt. I would pay them to spay/fix the cat, and then take them home and keep them in a large cage in the barn for a few days, possibly try to feed them a couple live trapped rats during that acclimation time. I would give them cat food and water as well and would prefer they be well fed before offering them the live rat as that would tell me how interested they are in eating live rats versus commercial food. After a few days of acclimation, open the cage and hope for the best. But if the cats run off, then no big deal, hopefully they will hunt the local area for a bit before getting too far. I might even keep trying that approach to see if I can find a couple good mouser/barn cats that decide to stick around the farm (as long as they don't try to mess with my birds, it's all good).

If you are currently having problems with rats then I recommend an all out, multi pronged, full on war / assault. And if you live in an area where they replenish or migrate in, then you will need to have a rat war from time to time, especially if you compost (which I hope everyone does), and/or have a garden, fruit trees, nut trees, etc. One breeding pair of rats can overrun your home in less than 90 days. I don't like poison (I have a lot of owls and hawks in my area), if I had a really bad infestation I might consider adding some for the initial battle, but not after that, and I would be very hard pressed to do so. However, if you have rats in the attic, then those I would poison, smear some nut butter on some rat poison cubes and leave on a paper plate somewhere in the attic. For the rest, get many, many, many snap traps, I like to smear a dab of nut butter on the trigger plate (sometimes a rat sized snap trap will take out a squirrel which is a serious bonus if you eat them or consider them a pest). Get some rat zapper traps, get some sticky traps, get a lot of traps, get different types as some will work better than others and some rats may avoid a certain type of trap, think big numbers and big variety (you can also vary the bait). You can even set mini snares made out of thin copper wire along fences and areas you see them sprint along. The key is you want to put all of it out at once, and kill as many as possible as fast as possible. Don't set it and forget it, stay on it and get rid of the dead rats and re-bait those traps asap (when you hear one go off, jump on it immediately, clean, re-bait, reset). If you can kill mom and dad and the babies are tiny, then they will not survive to breed more. Rats are exponential breeders, and the more you kill quickly, the better. Once you have gone a couple weeks with no kills in any of your traps, take almost all of them down, leave a couple in places that would be very hard for anything else to get to, but where you can still check once a week (those will let you know if a new batch of rats migrated in and/or they are breeding again). Once you have an infestation under control (which is easy as long as you attack aggressively), then you might consider the cat or dog or snake or just have a rat war once you notice a rat in the area. (if you see one, then there are 20 to 30 you didn't see). Save the traps you are not using in a non humid place as they rust pretty easy, but even when rusty, they can still work and kill, so don't toss them until they stop working. If you hammer them hard with a ton of traps, all at once, then you should get almost all of them within a couple days. Chickens will eat the dead ones and they appreciate the protein and bugs, or bury or compost, but choose a smart place as the dead rats may attract other predators some of which may be just as unwanted as the rats.

7 years ago

Colin Nelson wrote:The people who are most critical of body hair on women are women, from my experience.



Wow! Sorry Colin, but I really have to disagree. Not with your perspective, which is unique and true to your own person. But as somone who is very well traveled in the world, I see just the opposite being true. Also, women's fashion and grooming trends are currently set by men (pretty much globally). I have never met a woman that would shave legs, pits, privates/bikini if it were not for social pressure and male expectations(just ask a few). Just a quick glance at porn through its brief history proves my point for grooming trends.

I also think we are at a unique time in history where more and more people are breaking free of mass trends and opting to individualise fashion and grooming. Many women are saying to heck with trying to please men by emulating the unnatural plastic women of porn. Also, enough retro fashions have come and gone that trendy has become a land of confusion and rendered itself more irrelevant than at any time in history.

I love seeing women who give trendy social expectations the finger and opt to rock the hairy legs/pits... Especially if they make it look good and they are happy. So cudos to you Cassie, and again, sorry Colin, not trying to pick on you, I just really felt the need to try and add balance to what you wrote.
7 years ago