Wil Odin

Keep in mind that people have started to find out that human sewage compost has not been treated for forever-chemicals. This is a thirdhand story, but I was recently told about a family who found out that a lot of their kids health problems was because they’re now organic farm had been a conventional farm that used human sewage Fertilizer in the 80s, But since they didn’t know what a forever chemical was those hadn’t been removed and the soil had incredibly high concentrations of forever chems.

Maybe if you were just using your own families sewage it’s not as big of a deal, but if you are bringing any in you are probably getting mega high concentrations of forever chemicals unless you happen to be in an area where forever chemical remediation has been implemented (Which is probably no place in America).

I live in the Midwest, so lots of clay and our weather runs the full gamut. My post setting was a bit of an experiment (see end), I tried to put half or more of the full post length in the ground (so 3-4 feet, been a few years). I put an inch or two of pea gravel in the bottom of the whole and filled the rest of the hole with regular crushed limestone gravel (think that’s 3/4” grade?) and it down with every 3 to 4 inches of fill (really wish I d thought of adding water to increase compression).

The idea with the pea gravel at the bottom with larger gravel on top would create the opposite effect of a perched water table and hopefully make the water flow down below the post end.

The finally bit of experimentation was that I did sho sugi ban wood treatment rather than chemical. We will see how it goes, the part below grade I made very crispy and I made sure saturate the entire structure with oil. The above grade part is doing pretty well 3-4 years on, though the sun has and weather have stripped the carbon off. I am wondering if I should do a deeper burn next time to get the char to stay better, but in lieu of that I just go back over it with a torch every now and then. It’s a pretty short fence so it’s no issue.

I use exclusively kitchen scraps, with the exception of Bay leaves. No Reimer reason whatsoever other than the fact that I’ve started keeping an eye on my ratio of chicken bones to vegetables. (Realize that a lot of my stocks have been closer to veggie stock lately lol)

Anytime I make a meal I save the leftover peels and other scraps from onions, garlic, carrots, mushrooms, etc. I generally buy whole chickens and cut them up instead of buying boneless so I usually have a decent amount chicken bones. I fill up 12 1/2 pressure cooker and then fill it with water and set it for two hours. I could probably use less stock materials, but honestly, I have an issue with my freezer getting too full.

Look into Paw Paws.  One of the few fruit trees I know of that thrives in heavy canopy forests.

Any word on this project?  Interested to see how it went.

I am doing something similar in MO.  There is this random 300 acre park in Kansas City that is strangely wild for being right next to downtown, but is overgrown with invasive species.  I have cleared invasives from about 3 acres (only 1% lolz, but better than nothing), have started putting down native seed mixes to bring back the forb population, and started thinning out the tree canopy.

Beyond any pointers you have on felling in dense forest settings (I am trying to leave lots of standing dead wood where it isn't a walking path hazard but that still leaves quite a few I have to take down), I was also curious what you did with those springs you mentioned in the initial post.  There are several springs in this park and I think it would be a good next step to do something with those.

Awesome vid and response, thanks a ton!  I actually tried posting an update to my thread, but looks like it didn't go through.

I did a bit more research and finally determined that my method created pine pitch rather than pine tar; basically I burned off all the "tar piss" (lol) to make a much thicker substance that when cool is like glass.  I don't think it will be an issue that I burned off all of the tar piss considering that stuff is all highly combustible/flammable so I don't think it would have left over much of anything.

I am going to make another batch but add a valve, I have a lever lock lid on mine but I am not sure if I will flip it over like in this video. I am a bit concerned of leakage, was that caulk they used in the vid?

I am going to heat up existing pitch and add oil to a portion of it to make it more workable.  Would definitly love to get more input on this as well.  Thanks for pitching in! : p

Hey all, first post.  I hoping someone can tell me what I am doing wrong.  I have made a decent amount of pine tar, but its coming out like glass.  I have to break it out of the bottom of the barrel with tools to harvest.

I am guessing its my setup causing this, (will ask on that at the end) but the more pertinent question is whether its ok for me to add a liquid to make it so I can use the pine tar without heating it up (looking for goopy consistency).  If so, any suggestion on if I should do water or oil, if oil what type, and the ratio.  Keep in mind I am wanting to use this for a number of different applications, so I will only add turpentine when prepping a small batch for use on a tool handle.  I've got an entire camp coffee pot full so I got quite a bit so it'd be nice to be able to just scoop out some when I need it rather than heating up the whole pot.

Last question is about my setup.  I have a 20 or 30 gallon steel barrel that I seal with mud/clay, but there is no drainage pipe so I assume that the reason my pine tar is rock solid is because I have cooked all the liquid out (can't remember the name of the watery stuff that comes out with pine tar atm).  Assuming thats my issue, what is the best way to add drain?  My thought was a bulwark fitting with high heat silicone washers and copper piping capped off with valve.

Cristian Lavaque wrote:Related: Dew ponds



http://www.rexresearch.com/dewpond/dewpond.htm

Neolithic Dew Ponds and Cattleways by Arthur Hubbard & George Hubbard
http://archive.org/details/neolithicdewponds00hubb

http://google.com/search?q=dew+pond&num=100&tbm=isch

How did they keep these from becoming mosquito havens?