Gray Henon

18,550

After a very long dry spell, and burning ban, we finally got enough rain to burn.  Everyone else was at work, so I did it solo.  Chose the smaller of the two piles, hoping it would be manageable. The burn was quite an undertaking as there was a bunch of bamboo and brush that needed to be added to the fire as it burned. I got around 95% on, but towards the end, had trouble keeping the pile covered and was losing coals, so I decided to quench it with just a bit of brush left.  Spread it today, solo as well.  Very doable with a break around halfway through the pile.  Still have the big pile to go when we get some more rain and I have some help available.

5/11/26

One chicken per member of the house hold can nearly be fed with kitchen/butcher scraps  if you are processing foods that you have grown.  I also give mine a bucket of well rotted wood chips per day to scratch through and get bugs from.  I keep the chickens in a tractor in my orchard, so the wood chips and manure become compost for the trees. I still buy some feed to supplement, but it has been very little the past few months since we butchered our pig, the usual recipient of kitchen scraps.

What climate are you in?  Drier climates harbor fewer parasites than wet humid ones.  We’ve gone long periods without chemical worming, but never have been able to get completely away from them.  We rotationally graze and feed brush/trees.  Never tried a copper bolus, but, from what I recall, they are said to help.

Been using chips for years to build dark, rich soil.  Overall a great resource.  Downsides I have noticed are that the resulting soft soil is a vole paradise, also makes it easier for trees to blow down.  I still mulch the veg garden heavily, but trees just get a very light/broad application now.

If you don’t have a “kindling cracker” (wedge with a sharp edge up that can be mounted on a log), get one.  Reduces wood down to smaller sizes in a hurry.  Much safer than a maul or axe for the last split or two. We split logs down to 5-6 inches with a maul then any further with the cracker.  Lots of versions online, but if you are handy with a welder, easy enough to make.  I made 3 of them for us to process biochar material.  Also made a few for gifts.

I vote “yes” for a bamboo forum.

In general, yes, trees retain soil moisture.  One of the driving reasons I planted trees in my pasture was water retention.  However, a few tree species are known for robbing other plants of water.  Willows, eucalyptus, and poplar are a few.  

calbo collier wrote:So Gray, it appears the film left us with an uncertain message.  The last speaker definitely said that if the energy from the pyrolysis is captured, then it is a viable enhancer - but most farm/independent creators are NOT capturing the energy from pyrolysis - what is your take?  I know you're probably the number one biochar person I read on this site. Ta.

It certainly saddens me to watch what is probably a winter’s worth of home heating go up in smoke with every batch of biochar I make.  I have ideas for what is basically a mini retort woodstove to utilize the waste heat, but the volume of biochar produced would be low compared to my piles and add to my daily chore list.  

I have seen videos of small town scale biochar/biomass energy plants in Japan, but can’t find much info on them.

I would image that it would not be that difficult to add augers similar to the Tigercat carbonizer in the video to existing biomass energy plants, they probably already have them for ash.  There just has to be a good market for the biochar as they would be sacrificing some energy production.  Biomass plants may also burn things such as tires or railroad ties, which would obviously contaminate the biochar.

More detail on the trees w/biochar trial that showed no improvement would be interesting.  I think a lot of biochar trials are probably on the short side.