connor burke

I asked matt powers how he would build a biodome and he said he would make 60% or so of it aquaculture.

craig howard wrote: Is this the process they use for propane camper refrigerators?
I think they are full of ammonia.

from my understanding, icy balls rely on the ambient temperature of the room to evaporate the ammonia then cold or cool water is used to condense or something along those lines. i recommend you check wikipedia or youtube for more specific information it took me a few months to get comfortable with such an item even existing much less how it worked

Catherine Windrose wrote:Possibly a zeer pot or similar?  India and other areas use smaller versions, but much larger ones are possible.  This is also on my experimental 'to do' list.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enOjVc-kN7Q


If you want much larger, as for a community, perhaps a yakhchal?

http://www.historyofrefrigeration.com/refrigeration-history/yakhchal-ancient-refrigerator/

I actually found out about the yakhchals a few years ago from searching about systems related to zeer pots, while this one is a bit small looking thats mainly because i dont have much skill with drawing though i am curious how small you can make one i would likely make this example full size or larger

Orin Raichart wrote: My approach is to put all the cold in one area and all the hot in another area with great insulation between.  Rather pointing out the issues with your diagram, I encourage you to build a model or just one of these full size devices. In this manner, you will learn the difference between theory and real time heat energy (if you pay attention). Then make changes to your system or model so you can notice what variables produce what so you can understand how.  Good luck.

 yakhchals have a history of functioning so while i will likely try to build a model version someday if i added a shallow cooling pool like the real ones  im sure it would work better, like the originals. The solar thermal ventilation and iceball were a matter of curiosity i doubt they would be much help unless i modified them into a solar dryer system like pauls and i would need to add more iceballs if i wanted to have anything more than a minor effect on the temperature. Though it would also likely be important to have a cooled water supply from a mountain stream and some shallow artificial glaciers for seasonal fish farming and ice to help cool the system. The system was originally made in a high altitude rainy area as well if that gives you a better idea of how they worked. Im also curious if a funnel shaped wind catcher like those used for wind turbines would be able to focus the wind enough to cool the system via lowering the air pressure a bit more. To be honest these posts are largely a matter of curiosity for the limitations of such a system and how one can make them function in less than optimal conditions

During high school my english teacher has us read a book called the kite runner that was largely about a city called kabul in afganistan, much of the time this area is what i imagine when i think of anything in permaculture. Chinampas for example could be used to store meltwater, ice and snow for part of the year and as the soil is often rocky mineral soils in the areas i see,  you would be able to add structure to the beds with minimal slumping and the risk of landslides and such would be fairly manageable.

Im curious if using those rocks to build cisterns for fish farming would be viable. So that the surface area would be less of an issue while conserving water.
Similarly to the Albadia project water could be funneled to selected more intensively managed areas for farming soaked into the ground while the chinampas act like sunken growing beds with poles and bushes above the water and growing areas to create shade

I've seen people living in incredibly inhospitable conditions via working jobs largely unrelated to agriculture. https://youtu.be/Cnvsj-rccHk
This video shows a landscape view of a low income area of the city of kabul where the locals are experiencing food shortages, war, water scarcity, scarce fuel for heating their homes amongst other issues that can be remedied to a degree via permaculture.
This video shows the problems and allows us to see resources we can use to better the sitation. I find this video interesting and i hope it brings you value.
https://youtu.be/FhXJRFYmKqk
This is a news video showing a rural area that was previously far more fertile, nowadays they are experiencing a drought. Some of the land in the drought inpacted area is still green so holistic planned grazing could still bring some of it back.
This video shows a degraded but still inhabited landscape that can quickly be restored. Its pretty there if i was working with a non profit i might want to live there for a while.
https://youtu.be/LYNUYDxOLXE
News Video showing some of the statistics and video about farmers being displaced by the droughts. This video gives a clearer description of the area and the issues it faces. I found it interesting to see how big of a problem there was.
https://youtu.be/TXcvg4y5IaY
Video showing the construction of artificial glaciers being used to reduce the impact ofvthe droughts. This video shows a water management strategy that can be applied to chinampas in cold areas. This might be useable in some areas of Oregon or farther north.
https://youtu.be/b5dx7jQF1WQ
Documentary about the Libyan Desert with 2.4 million views showing landscapes local Water Management strategies and conventional agriculture to a degree. This video shows another type of desert where the natives have doveloped their own interesting survival strategies. Its beautiful and interesting!
https://youtu.be/L6LmVDujYWY
Introduction video for the al-baydaha permaculture project  showing large acreage water management strategies this shows a form of permaculture suited to areas so dry that grasses cant provide enough feed to goats and such but trees can. Its a rare example of permaculture in a super extreme environment in cooperation with settled nomadic herders!

Though i describe chinampas it would most likely just be dreging the ponds rivers and water storage areas for biomass and less rocky soil.

This is largely for fun and to practice adapting permaculture to different environments feel free to mention as many suggestions as you like I'm 100% willing to improve this so people can use it to practice permaculture during PDCS or other settings.

I put this in the greening the desert form because that was the original inspiration and i figured this was the closest topic.

Most uses of "chinampas" outside of a swamp environment likely wouldent be financialy viable exect for folks in extreme situations/poverty to begin with

https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/extreme-weather-records/index.html

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atacama_Desert#Aridity

Clay, silt, loam, sand, pea gravel, road gravel, rocky, boulders, bedrock

Arctic, sub arctic, cold, temperate, sub tropical, tropical, death valley hot

Coastal, inland, mountainous, high altitude, lost at sea, salt flats, island survival

Mix and match id love to see where this goes!!! 😁

If you want to i would love to see short stories or super crazy scenarios like shipwrecked survival on a 90% rocky island (lets say you wont starve or anything but how would you dovelop the island with or without outside resources) fishing sea farming are cool importing seeds and critters is cool but not preferred.
Carnivore diet or vegan diet etc
Add or mention as many limitations as you like like the number of people or anything

More photos please! If you have a machete or are willing to add serations to a blade you might be able to harvest alot of biomass to feed your soial and make compost tea/liquid culture fungi

Nathanael Szobody wrote:

Julia Winter wrote:I am eagerly looking forward to seeing pictures of that gorgeous pit garden (I think even the circular walls are beautiful) after there have been some rains!

I want to second the request for regular pictures taken from the same location.  Humans respond well to "before" and "after" pictures.  Taking the picture on the same calendar day every year, or like you said previously, every 6 months.

I'm on it!

One problem: I'm not there right now. It's rainy season right now and all roads to our place are flooded. This is normal for this time of year, so I camp out in the capital and do other stuff. Like gardening. Some people still manage to drive there in this season. It can take anywhere from 24 hours to four days to get there--200 miles. You go for a bit, get stuck. Everybody gets out and pushes. Drive a little more, repeat. That's not my cup of tea, so I sit tight in the capital until late October when the "roads" are normally drive-able... and it only takes 7 hours to go 200 miles.  

No worries though. My colleague has assured me that he is taking pictures for me. It should be very lush right now. Between July and October we get 32 inches of rain, so it should be pretty. Right now in August is the height of it. It can rain everyday for a week or more. Try picturing that compared to the photos I've posted above!

So come October I should have some pics to post...Thanks for following!

😄 its really interesting to see another climate, if you could get some permaculture focused photos of the flooded and muddy areas it could be super interesting to study if you even finish up with the village and want to try working elsewhere. I can feel the swampy insights in my bones just thinking about it 😆😆😆

james buttler wrote:

I like your tool that picks the fruit I am wanting to setup a large commercial farm though and I am trying to figure out how I would manage a farm if it was to be run as a permaculture farm. Hand picking 100 trees myself would be one hell of a chore for little return considering the sale price of apples.

I want to go large-scale as well. I'm thinking that I could buy and then rent it out, manage land for somebody else by renting it to people, raise livestock via Allan Savory and develop a large herd , or buy/ rent land then hire managers and teachers to manage the people and animals... that's about all I got for now I have a few others I half remember but that would take a while to put on paper

Stone and rocket mass heaters are the bomb in your climate