derek kal

Hi all,

The house I bought has a really tiny water pump house/shed. its probably 3'x3'x3' and has a shallow well/convertible pump, pressure tank and the very start of the heat trace system. Walls are about 5 inches of fibreglass insulation and the roof is 3 inches of rigid Foam insulation. the floor is also dug down roughly 1 foot but is only covered with a vapour barrier

In zone 3B, northern Ontario, any idea of how much i need to heat the well house? would a 100W bulb work? it has a 1500W space heater inside which seems like extreme overkill to me.

Hey all!
I am looking for a free computer program, app, or website that will allow me to map out my homestead virtually. Im looking for it to have a satellite image as a base and then the ability to make shaded areas of different colours to represent the pigs, chickens, garden etc. Ideally it will also show the size of those sections by acre or sqf. Im sure there are complex systems but i only need it for a few acres around my little homestead.

Also any good quality satellite image sites that will allow me to track what my property looks like over the seasons and my development?

Thanks in advance!

I am also hoping all you wonderful people can help me with my permaculture start. My property is 10 acres with about 1 acre of cleared land which includes the house, garage, driveway, septic field, well, and some outbuildings. I would like to take this 1 acre and make it a lot more productive. I have no interest in mowing the acre of land all summer. My hope is to add the garden space in the middle of the driveway, a firepit area, and a hottub patio but this all amount to only a small section of the land.

I have dozens of deer who call the property their home and I love to see them, but they will cause major issues when starting to build up my food forest/permaculture property. I don't really want to fence in the whole space because that means I have to add gates on the driveway and would take away from the general appeal. I also want to see the deer as they are gorgeous and often give birth near by. Has anyone found a nice medium between wildlife like deer and your garden space?

Along the same lines is bears. We don't have grizzlies but do have black bears which will come every so often. Because of this, I want to keep my fruit trees away from the general garden so that the bear doesn't destroy the fence and whole garden on its way to the fruit. This, however, defeats the benefits of guilds within a garden setting.

I feel like this was a long rant but I hope it gives a bit of insight and hope someone has been in a similar situation and had a partial solution!

These suggestions have been a great help so far! Permies people are the best!

My plan and next steps are going to be tilling the top few inches of soil and then covering it with leaves for the winter. In the spring I plan to rake the leaves and allow the ground to thaw out then cover with sticks and branches, then cardboard, leaves, mulch and compost/soil. I hope to get a mid season crop in next year as long as things go well!

John Indaburgh wrote:I think that's for folks in high numbered USDA zones. If you want to order root stocks or scions for grafting, or bare toot trees. you'd better order in the winter or there's not much of anything left.

Thanks for the reply! The nursery had a few 10+ foot Pear trees that I did pick up for a great deal. I just now need to figure out if I get the into the ground ASAP or place them in a garage under a tarp for the winter. Not quite sure how to manage it!

Hello,

Im in zone 3B and the nursery close to me has a number of Apple and Pear trees at a huge discount. I often read that planting fruit trees in Fall is totally fine, but I want to double check that it works for cold climates like mine.
Thanks!

Not sure if this is the right spot but I have had a theory for a while that I cant seem to find a ton of information about.
I have an 8 person hottub (roughly 600 gallons) and live in northern Ontario zone 3b. It gets down to -40  a few times a year so winter is cold but often very sunny. I have often thought that solar thermal water heaters would likely work for keeping the hottub at manageable temperatures. I not talking about heating it up from tap temperature as that is extreme. More just thinking the daily fluctuations.

The biggest issue is how to get the heat from the thermal panels to the hottub. I dont want to do an open circuit as I fear that any trapped water could freeze causing a big issue.

I could do a closed loop with some sort of heat exchange and glycol but not sure how to work that. With a closed loop, I worry about the sun heating the glycol too much and causing pressure issues. The other issue would be when the sun is not out, a closed loop would actually cool the hottub.

I'm thinking a simple pump with a temperature sensor will be what turns it on and off.

Any suggestions?

John C Daley wrote:Thats a very big question!
I have some;
- do you have a lot of time
- Do you have the $1000
- Are you in a hurry?
- What do you hope to grow?

Yes a big question indeed!

- I have enough spare time likely. Probably 10-20 hours per week to get it started.
Time in regards to seasons is different. We only have about 3 weeks til the first frost but maybe 6 weeks until the snow stays on the ground.

- I prefer not to spend the $1000 as I already need to buy all the fencing for another $1-2000.

-i would prefer to get a good start on it now and be planting this in the spring and early summer.

-i plan on growing regular veggies. Pretty much your standard stuff. Fruit trees will be in another location as a hope to keep bears from destroying the fenced garden.

Hope that helps!

Hello,

I am developing a new garden space and am not sure how to start it. The space will be roughly 30x40 or similar depending on best layout. Right now the area has decent looking soil, a thick mat of grass and bedrock anywhere from 1 foot to 4 feet underground. Ideally, I want to have it migrate to a no dig system in the near future bit at this point I am not sure how to get there.

Should I tear up the existing grass with a rototiller and plant in the original soil? Grass grows really thick so I think the soil should be decent.

Should I just lay cardboard down and add leaves, compost, soil and straw down and plan in that? Doing this seems like it will cost me around $1000 for the compost, straw, and soil.

Should I do something different? I have lots of sticks leaves etc so can make hugelmounds as the center to my garden beds if it's the best call. I also have lots of rotten trees for wood chips and organic material.

Any ideas are great!!!
I'm growing in zone 3b.

Hey all,

I have a 10 acre plot of land in zone 3b (Northwestern Ontario, Canada) 9 acres of my land is treed mostly with thick stands of relatively thin pine trees. As its part of the Canadian shield, there is lots of exposed bedrock and loose stones throughout. the stands are made up of almost 100% pine trees that range between 2" and 8" thick and about 30 feet max. Except for the spots where nature has taken a few trees down or the old path goes through, all the ground is bare.

I want to make the space feel brighter and encourage ground growth and new tree species but not sure the best way to go about that. Should I just start selectively thinning pines?
Or is it more the ground itself? there are lots of fallen trees, pine needles, leaves and other debris. Do I just need to give it a good rake and spark some new growth?
A mix of both?

The ultimate goal would be either enough ground coverage for chickens, goats, or sheep but eventually planting some shade-loving crops.

I have attached a few pictures.
Thanks!