Eino Kenttä

I came across some of last year's fireweed stalks the other day, and felt compelled to peel the bark off a couple of them and make a short length of reverse-wrapped string, just for fun. I've done this before, but don't remember any of it turning out quite this good. Those fibers were strong! When trimming off the little ends of fibers that poked out from the finished string, my nails weren't enough for the job, I had to use my teeth on some of them. The string tolerates quite a bit of tension, even though it's not thick, without showing any signs of breaking. I imagine it might be used as strings for some kind of musical instrument, it makes quite a nice sound when plucked under tension.

This is great info! I'm trying a variation on this with almonds. I just sorted out the intact-looking kernels from a supermarket bag of (organic) almonds and soaked them. The first batch I left in the fridge for a bit before removing the coating on the seed (since I read they need cold stratification), but it's only after removing it that they started putting out roots. The next batch, I removed the coating first, and then stuck them in the fridge for a bit just in case. They haven't rooted yet, but are looking good. I'm thinking they might not need the cold if the coating is removed? I might try one batch without any stratification at all. I'd guess that peaches and almonds should work the same, being very closely related.

Ooh, good find! As for the type of wood, I think most wood can be bent like that if cut thin and then steamed... Here is the Swedish Wikipedia page for the technique. There is an English version (Heat bending of wood) but the pictures aren't as good...

Hmm... Wonder if the "too little, too late" flowering has to do with variety, or with how much energy is stored away in the crowns? I have only harvested hop cones for beer once, but that was in coastal Norway, just south of the arctic circle, and I guess the climate there would be similar to yours in summer, but with longer colder winters. Maybe this year your plants will start flowering earlier, since they stocked up on energy last year?

As for whether to pick off the later shoots to encourage the earlier, I don't really know anything, but my gut feeling is that hops are so powerful and tenacious that it wouldn't really matter. They don't need to prioritize where to put the energy, they just put all of it everywhere! If you like the shoots as vegetables, I don't really think that harvesting a few would set the plant back much. On the other hand, if you leave all the shoots this year, you'll get a maximum amount of leaf surface area, and so a maximum amount of photosynthetic potential. Assuming the plants don't grow dense enough that the shoots shade each other too much, of course...

Most of the hops that can be found wild or feral in my part of the world are female clones once used for beer brewing. Male plants are quite rare. I have actually planted a couple of males in our garden though, along with some females, hoping for them to set seed. From what I've read, the seeds contain plenty of fat. I haven't found anything conclusive on whether they are edible for humans, but even if it turns out they aren't, I think the birds would appreciate them!

Okay, now that's interesting! I knew the Rosaceae have notoriously weak crossing barriers, but hadn't considered that would mean there's a possibility of fruit set even in the incompatible crosses... Cool!

Wow, that's beautiful! I just might have to try these again. Our climate is a bit too harsh for them I think, and I planted the seedlings out when they were far too young, so the winter killed them...

You could turn the problem into a solution and use your dog as an inoculation agent
Just soak the char in something she likes, feed it to her, and warm compost the dog turds...

Hi Mark, welcome to Permies!

I'm no expert, but one way to make a slope stable is to build a wall from unmortared rocks, where each rock slopes down into the soil. The rocks will want to slide inwards, but are stopped by the soil. The soil will, in turn, be held in place by the rocks. The absence of mortar means that the rocks can move a bit without the whole thing cracking and crumbling. See below for a trashy five-minute Paint drawing of the building technique, and a picture of the foundations of our future cabin which was built like this and has survived a couple of winters, as well as being walked on a lot, without any issues.

For a non-plastic moisture barrier, birch bark is the traditional one. It has been used for more or less exactly what you describe, as a barrier between the foundations and bottom logs in log houses etc, as well as for a lot of other things.

As for your other question, do you actually need to attach the wooden floor to the concrete slab at all? Your floor will be between the cob walls, right? Wouldn't the cob hold the floor in place well enough on its own? You could just put your choice of moisture barrier on the slab, lay your floor beams on that, and build whatever type of floor you want on top, and then anchor it with the walls.

Oh, and welcome to Permies!