Scottie Chapman

Hello all,

A friend of mine is a partner in a 1,300 acre property in CA, outside of Yosemite. It is a high risk fire area and they are constantly clearing dead trees and brush. A lot of it has to be burned in the winter because it is too large for chipping. While a huge bonfire is fun and solved the problem of getting rid of what becomes dry season tinder, it seems like a waste. Does anyone know of any large-scale hugelkultur examples? .

To me it seems doable. The land is already quite contoured naturally, and has creeks and ponds and lots of different environments. They have heavy equipment on the property.

Lydia Feltman wrote:I read once long ago that bleach will not actually kill mold. It only whitens the stain and may leave a residue that the mold can grow on (as does soap) Hydrogen peroxide will kill mold, but you may need to get something stronger than regular 3 %. I have been using 35% greatly diluted to 6% for many things, but I just discovered that on Amazon there are many brands of 12% H2O2. This would be a lot safer and easier to use than 35%. You might be able to find it in a hardware or home goods store.  The bottle should tell you how to dilute it , if necessary, for what ever use you need. Of course you have to keep the area dry. You can also buy de-humidifier buckets.

I just want to set the record straight about bleach, white vinegar, and hydrogen peroxide. All of them contain water! Household bleach is 6% sodium hypochlorite in water. White vinegar is about 5% acetic acid, and water. Household hydrogen peroxide is 3% hydrogen peroxide, and water. Even if you use a higher concentration of hydrogen peroxide, the reaction yields water and oxygen.

I agree that making an inhospitable pH might be the key to effectiveness. Bleach has a pH of 11-13 (very alkaline). White vinegar is about 2.5 (very acidic). Household peroxide is a weak acid with a pH of 6, but can be as low as 3 for industrial peroxide.

The thing to remember about mold is that spores are everywhere, not just where you see the mold. You can reduce them with treatments, but as long as you have the moisture problem, it will return. I agree with the dehumidifier idea and the practice of opening a window.

I also use heavy welding gloves for blackberries, though only on my left hand (pruners in my right hand). They are inexpensive, have a thick gauntlet, and come in S.M and L. You want to get the thick, split hide ones, not the soft ones used for MIG or TIG welding. I also often grab the canes in the throat of loppers and pull them out. I spent 11 years tending a 5 acre property where battling blackberries  and poison oak was at least 60% of my job and that is what worked best for me.

I would encourage anyone and everyone to resist buying anything from Temu. Cheap comes with a steep cost to the environment.

I got turned on to "visible mending" a little over a year ago, and I wish I would have gotten into it years ago. It's a creative way to prolong the longevity of clothing (possibly indefinitely) while adding beauty and character at the same time. If you're not familiar with it, check out Kate Sekules book, "Mend!", or just Google "visible mending".

So far, I have mended moth holes in 3 merino sweaters, patched holes in 4 pairs of pants (2 were for friends), and appliqued patches over two shirt that had gotten stains on them.

The other good thing about visible mending is you can use leftover yarn from knitting projects (or neighbors' leftovers), or unravel and re-use yarn from sweaters and socks that are beyond mending.

My latest acquisition is a large loom, and I intend to make rugs, runners, placemats, etc, from cotton items that have become too degraded or damaged to mend.

I also enjoy the process of hand stitching. It's a slow but rewarding process, and a nice way to wind down at the end of the day, and a great project for the slower winter months. But most importantly, a mended item is one less article of clothing going to landfill, and it lessens the demand for new items, which usually carry a high environmental tax.

I'm all for adding bugs to the diet. I have eaten grasshoppers and mealworms. Thinking of raising my own mealworms at some point.

My brother lives on the east coast where Green Tomato Hornworms are a nuisance to tomato plants. He picks them, fries them, and makes tacos out of them. I haven't tried them yet, but he says they taste just like green tomatoes. What a great way to make use of a pest!

I used a Fels Naptha/ Borax/ washing soda recipe for over a year before reading EWG's evaluation of Fels Naptha. It didn't get a very good grade, unfortunately. I'm starting on a homestead on an island where the water table is too high for septic tanks, so all washing will be used for grey water.

I have used soap nuts, and I thought they did a good job. Would love to try horse chestnuts and grow my own soap!

Wow...this is the first time I've been able to successfully reply to a post, so I like it! Thank you!!

Flora Eerschay wrote:Watercress is one of the plants I really wanted to grow in a tiny setup, because it's small and healthy. But I wasted a lot of seeds before it finally started growing. Now I think it's much easier than I thought... it just needs water, not soil, but not completely still water like in a bowl.

So I used a stretched swab of gauze to put seeds in it, and attached it to the edge of the aquarium with paper clips.



It uses a 6w LED lamp, and the watercress "bed" was right under it. Some sprouts went under the glass and they were just fine.



Growing watercress and Pablo, the male guppy. Guppies are omnivorous but they prefer to eat algae, so they don't really bite at the roots.

When the plants got bigger, I moved them to aquarium with baby guppies, in which water level is slightly lower.



Tiny guppy is 13 days old today!

One plant fell out of the gauze and into some floating plants - moss, duckweed, water fern, and maybe something else.



It's fine there too, so I think they can just grow like that.

Recently I saw watercress in a regular pot, for sale along with some herbs, but mine just died in soil... so I'm happy that it grows well in the water.

I have a similar tool, but the blade is a bit longer and narrower. It is my new go-to for removing grass/weeds for new planting spots.