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damaclese
03-24-2009, 01:10 PM
OK guys been reading again i know dangerous. LOl i was reading in DG about biochar and how it affects soil chemistry. i wont try to explain it I'm sure theirs lots of you all that know allot more then i do .but i was particularly drawn to this topic living in Vegas are soils are vary poor and retain Little if any of the nutrients that we invest are hard earned money to apply to are gardens. after i read that article i was highly motivated to get some charcoal to apply to my garden. i was hoping to help retain some of the trace as well as firt i put on. also in soil analysis we have a lack of bio mass in are soil so all those microbes that i have been applying arnt helping as theirs nothing for them to live on ones they get in to the soil. so again biochar cam to mind. any one know any thing they would like to contribute id gratefuly except your post on this topic. heres a link to the article in DG. all let you all know if it makes any difference this growing season cant hurt right? and i have a sours here locally thats cheep and pure

Biochar: Good for your garden AND your carbon footprint! (http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1669/)

thanks
Paul

JoeReal
03-24-2009, 01:28 PM
Paul,

I am a proponent of the use of biochar. The effects are not immediate, so don't put your hopes up on instant rejuvenation of the soil. It takes time, 5 or 10 years. It is exactly the same principle as the Amazonian Dark Soil or Terra Pretta. By plowing biochar, there is a net entrapment of carbon from the atmosphere to be locked into the soil forever. Unlike other organic amendments which easily degrades and turn into carbon dioxide and water, so the carbon is recycled back. Peat moss as an example are mined and are therefore the same net carbon polluter as petroleum. Bark chips from trees are carbon neutral. Biochar is a net carbon entrapment.

But the benefits you will get would take a longer time to realize. I suggest that meanwhile, you mix biochar with compost and coconut dust or husk chips (usually sold as coco brix) and mix them to improve your soil. Coconut material is carbon neutral and renewable resource and lasts longer than peat moss and have aeration as well as wonderful water and fertilizer retention capabilities. You will get immediate results from such a combo if you do this over wider area and not mixing on the planting holes only.

I can give you various articles about biochar. One of my friends developed a gasifier where the wood is fed, and they get fuel from it, and the waste biochar is then used to improve the garden by mixing it with other soil amendments. Through time, the other amendments will disintegrate away and the biochar remains forever, giving you longer lasting beneficial effects just like the Amazonians of 5,000 years ago, whose technology work to this very day!

Regards,

Joe

damaclese
03-24-2009, 04:45 PM
Jo thanks for that quik answer to my post I'm convinced more then ever that the key to successful gardening in my rocky sandy soil is to amend amend amend but i think i have to get smarter about what I'm doing and the info you gave me was such a big help could i have some of those links to the articles you mentioned in your post? i fully intend to renovate the soil in my garden and if it works well I'm going to pass this info on to others here in Vegas and the south west here after all thees years of gardening i thought i had the low down on soil but i realize that i was working with good soil before i moved here to the Mohave desert back in Missouri the earth was dark black for many many ft down and it drained well you could plant just about any thing in it and it would not only grow but it would thrive i want some of the Amazon soil YE HA! so i can have Amazonian Plants LOL!
i called HD and they don't have the coco chips so all have to get that some where els any suggestions on how I'm going to do all this with so many plants already in the ground 3/4 of my landscaping is 4 or more years mature I'm mainly filling in now so i can add to thous spots could i top dress with any success?

Michael_Andrew
03-24-2009, 05:45 PM
I looked into biochar and like the idea and I have added the remnants of my wood burner to my potting soil. It's my understanding that its not exactly charcoal. You have to burn it with a lack of oxygen and produce a charcoal that has residue with it. Its kinda of gummy. There's stuff in that gummy substance that spose to help. Of course I think that maybe charcoal wouldn't hurt either. You can make it by putting the wood (other cellulose? can be used also) in a pot with a lid and cooking it. It will put off gasses that will flame up. What you have left in the pot is the gummy biochar. The charcoal also will absorb co2 that helps with greenhouse gasses. I found the same as Joe said that it may not give a big effect the first year but subsequent years it just improves the soil and gets better.

Michael

JoeReal
03-24-2009, 06:27 PM
Paul, I hope all the links below still works...

Terra Preta possibly The Next Generation soil amendment material or potting media.

Terra Preta is also known as Amazon Black Soil. These soils are super rich in nutrients, easily stores nutrients but does not leach out easily, and has high organic matter content. These soils are formed during the start of agricultural times when the first Amazonian civilization started agriculture by slashing rainforests and then turning the biomass into charcoal instead of burning them and then incorporating it into the soil. This retains about 50% of the carbon into the soil and the method produces the least amount of nitrous oxides, particulate matter and other green house gas emissions. The carbon incorporated into the soil becomes very stable and helps in building up the fertility of the soil through the years. Thus with the carbon dioxide being trapped by plants and then itself being trapped into the soil through the years, there is a significant net entrapment of carbon compared to burning of forests during forest fires or agroforestry industries.

Scientists of today are able to duplicate production of terra preta and there is a net entrapment of carbon into the soil, thus potentially reducing the carbon dioxide trapped by plants from the atmosphere. So how does this relate to us citrus hobbyists? Perhaps we need to add real charcoal (not the briquittes from the stores!!!), powder them up and add into composting process, or even into CHC's (Coconut Husk Chips). The CHC's, real charcoal, and compost would perhaps make the most ideal potting media yet. But if you are not into potting media, at least incorporating some real charcoal into the soil should help build it up through the years. Charcoal briquittes on the other hand I will consider them as "poisonous" to the soil, simply because of the binding agents used to form them. Fortunately, I can dig up some info on how to make real charcoal from my debris of yard waste. I will then use them to try making potting media or improving my soil. I for one really hate leaching out excessive nutrients from container grown plants. Such leacheates from potted plants are big contributors to stream pollution. Charcoal helps by minimizing the leaching of these excessive fertilizers and thus help the environment and conserve our use of fertilizers. There are very active sites in the charcoal itself that helps bind some nutrients when you apply fertilizer, and then are released back when the roots gets in physical contact or intercept those sites. We need to study this more, simply adding charcoal may not be the direct way to do it, but that would be a start.

To learn more about this ancient technology which could help us a lot today, click on the various links below:

Untitled Document (http://www.css.cornell.edu/faculty/lehmann/terra_preta/TerraPretahome.htm)
Reproducing the Amazon’s black soil could bolster fertility and remove carbon from atmosphere (http://www.innovations-report.de/html/berichte/geowissenschaften/bericht-55516.html)
Soil erosion, energy scarcity, excess greenhouse gas all answered through regenerative carbon management (http://www.newfarm.org/columns/research_paul/2006/0106/charcoal.shtml)
Terra Preta Homepage, Dark earths, Red Indian black earth (http://www.geo.uni-bayreuth.de/bodenkunde/terra_preta/)

JoeReal
03-24-2009, 06:34 PM
Paul, I can't find my contact info on the coco brix supplier! And I know they have cheap price. We had a stockholder's meeting at Las Vegas last weekend, and we met a guy who happen to be there and wanted us to resell his coco-brix. They had a website, but lost his card, so cannot find the info. If by chance other members have the info, I'll post it here. You can order direct from them. Otherwise, if you can't get hold of coco materials, you can use composted redwood bark and regular compost, mix it with biochar. I sometimes hitch a trailer and haul away horse manure from my friend's estate and dump them in my garden, and it is free stuff that you can use together with biochar. First, find friends who have horse ranches, :) You may need to make sure the horse manure have properly composted, do not use fresh manure!

Lagniappe
03-24-2009, 06:50 PM
I've read only a tiny bit on this but had to burn some tree tops after having some large trees removed and decided to try it. I'm not sure if I'm going about it the right way. I had a huge stack of p-stems and covered them with the hot coals from my burning. I also covered this with ash and sawdust(wood shavings). The pile has been reduced significantly. I added some of the greener ones to the top for now.
http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=16276&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=16276&ppuser=766)

Randy4ut
03-24-2009, 08:16 PM
Saw a show the other night talking about the Amazon soils and how they are now excavating and seeing just how much charcoal was added into the soil compared to nearby areas where no charcoal was added. It was amazing!!! Here is another link that gives some good info on Terre Preta that even I could understand... Neat topic!!!

BioEnergy Lists: Terra Preta (Biochar) | Information on the intentional use of Biochar (charcoal) to improve soils. (http://terrapreta.bioenergylists.org/)

lorax
03-24-2009, 08:58 PM
It's common practise here to make biochar from the chaff of particularly nutrient-hungry crops (like cane) and then plow it back into the fields before the next planting. There are canefields in Ecuador that have been in continuous production for more than a century using this method, and soil tests show that the nutrient balance is still good.

Lagniappe
03-24-2009, 09:31 PM
Now it's raining :(
Perhaps the proccess was complete.

damaclese
03-24-2009, 10:31 PM
Paul, I can't find my contact info on the coco brix supplier! And I know they have cheap price. We had a stockholder's meeting at Las Vegas last weekend, and we met a guy who happen to be there and wanted us to resell his coco-brix. They had a website, but lost his card, so cannot find the info. If by chance other members have the info, I'll post it here. You can order direct from them. Otherwise, if you can't get hold of coco materials, you can use composted redwood bark and regular compost, mix it with biochar. I sometimes hitch a trailer and haul away horse manure from my friend's estate and dump them in my garden, and it is free stuff that you can use together with biochar. First, find friends who have horse ranches, :) You may need to make sure the horse manure have properly composted, do not use fresh manure! Jo I'm not saiyng thers no manuer in Vegas but thers not much most of the ranches here are gone thanks to are LV city counsol

CookieCows
03-24-2009, 10:55 PM
I spent part of my childhood in Colusa Ca. a town surrounded by rice paddies and I remember they used to burn the fields every year. I wonder if that was partly why they did it?

Harvey, I bet you know about that!

Deb

harveyc
03-24-2009, 11:21 PM
Hi Deb,

The burning of rice fields has/was been done to control a fungus that causes disease in rice. From what I've read in various other groups and sites in the past, I believe the oxygen needs to be cut off from the burning material to form the charcoal and those rice fields are completely open to the air (and much of the carbon goes up into the air, thus the air quality concerns/restrictions).

Joe and I discussed different designs of barrels, etc. to make biochar a couple of years ago and some day I may get around to converting an old 500 gallon fuel tank (completely empty, of course) into a biochar oven. Maybe before i die! LOL

Harvey

JoeReal
03-24-2009, 11:29 PM
I spent part of my childhood in Colusa Ca. a town surrounded by rice paddies and I remember they used to burn the fields every year. I wonder if that was partly why they did it?

Harvey, I bet you know about that!

Deb

Hi Deb,

I used to work with Rice Research and have many research publications in that field. I used to work with International Rice Research Institute and UC Davis Agronomy Department. I developed several phenology models and Expert Systems on rice farming. During my graduate research work, I have always driven to Chico, Colusa, Biggs, Richvale for a few years, almost everyday from Davis.

The efficient method of burning rice straw quickly and cleanly is the most preferred method, leaving very few amount of biochar that can be plowed back into the soil. The main reason why farmers burn the rice straw is to reduce repeat incidence of some fungal and bacterial diseases. If they plow the straw back, then the diseases will come back with a vengeance the next year. So the farmers set fires on the rice straw to burn them efficiently, as in no residues or charcoal left behind, in minimum labor cost. I no longer work with rice research and have been working as programmer for better pay. But during those days, there were laws designed to reduce the amount of annual burning due to "pollution" from rice smoke, accidents due to smoke crossing over busy freeways causing accidents, and so we scrambled to find alternatives. Some of the alternatives to burning is to shred the straw and plow under after letting them stand to feed the overwintering fowls, another is to gather the straws for making ethanol, or paper, or other uses, including feeding to cows. Unfortunately, turning the straw into biochar cannot be easily done in the rice fields, it was not economical for the farmers. I don't know what current alternatives to burning they are using now, and has been away for many years. But burning the rice straw as is, do not produce significant amount of biochar. I hope they'll find better methods to do it, to kill the overstaying diseases by producing biochar and plowing the biochar back, in a most economical way.

Joe

harveyc
03-25-2009, 12:12 AM
Though not a significant use in quantity, those snake-looking erosion control rolls you see along contruction sites are typically made from rice straw. That's a nice use for something that might otherwise get burned. They do still use it for ethanol production, I believe, and co-generation. We don't see nearly the amount of burning we used to, mostly because of air quality restrictions.

The only time I've burned in my fields was when I burned wheat straw in preparation for laser land-leveling where we needed a free clear of debris. Otherwise, I prefer it to go back into the soil for tilth and nutrition.

A friend who I partner with in some of my farming has a fairly good size project with a state water quality district where he will plant rice shortly on ground owned by the state. Fortunately for him, all of the funds for the project are already paid out by the state to some local district which disburses money to him while this broke state has shut down other contracts. Anyways, I help him on various tasks and will be interested to see with how they handle the straw. Rice has not been farmed right in my vicinity in the past though another farm has grown it for a few years just about 8 miles east of me as part of a wildlife project. There, they just flood the fields and let the waterfowl feed on it, a win-win situation.

Harvey

damaclese
03-26-2009, 02:33 PM
so Jo how do you feel about humic acid being a good and readily Incorporated sours of carbon? its been recommended to me. and i was told theres no waiting time for the carbon to become mixed in to the bio cycle as the Co is in a state that bactirea can use already

JoeReal
03-26-2009, 04:14 PM
so Jo how do you feel about humic acid being a good and readily Incorporated sours of carbon? its been recommended to me. and i was told theres no waiting time for the carbon to become mixed in to the bio cycle as the Co is in a state that bactirea can use already

Humic acid has many excellent properties that can improve the soil and improve soil nutrient uptake. The carbon in the humic acid will get immobilized (favorite term used by microbiologists when microorganisms consume nutrients and perhaps incorporated into their cell structures), but then ultimately released back into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide. So it is carbon neutral.

JoeReal
03-26-2009, 04:22 PM
Though not a significant use in quantity, those snake-looking erosion control rolls you see along contruction sites are typically made from rice straw.

That's one great use for it Harvey!

Some of those snake-looking or soil erosion nets are made from coconut fibers which lasts longer. Called coconet, it is of the winners of ecological alternative contest sponsored by Cambridge University in the UK

Bunot Co. | Cambridge University Entrepreneurs (http://www.cue.org.uk/companies/Bunot)

Coconet is a soil erosion control net made from waste coconut husks. With the Philippines' rich coconut resources, the company aims to become the world's leading producers of coconet with a highly improved production capacity starting with the growing demand of the Chinese market. This enterprise is environmentally friendly and will benefit the coconut farmers in the poor rural areas of the Philippines by generating revenue in the rural economy and providing new livelihood opportunities.

I often see coconet covering the newly constructed bare ramps of an overpass or other CalTrans work.

harveyc
03-26-2009, 05:43 PM
Joe, I don't know if you can tell the difference in appearance between coconet and the stuff made from rice. I did not know what the stuff along the freeways was made of but when I went to the big warehouse (I'd guess 100,000SFF) of Sacramento Bag Co. (now located in Woodland) last year, I saw pallets of the coils and saw that it was labeled as made from rice straw. Since it's a local material, I'd hope that CalTrans chose it for their products.

JoeReal
03-26-2009, 05:56 PM
Joe, I don't know if you can tell the difference in appearance between coconet and the stuff made from rice. I did not know what the stuff along the freeways was made of but when I went to the big warehouse (I'd guess 100,000SFF) of Sacramento Bag Co. (now located in Woodland) last year, I saw pallets of the coils and saw that it was labeled as made from rice straw. Since it's a local material, I'd hope that CalTrans chose it for their products.

Harvey, in some cases it make sense to use the rice straw ropes, but in other more abusive situations, coconut materials are a lot better, especially for longer term erosion control. I can usually tell the difference by inspecting the bundles carefully. In the nearby construction area, I saw most of them straw bundles but was surprised at one section that is always wet and flooded and suspected it to be from coconut husk fibers. But I know for sure they were not from rice straw because of the finer fibers. There were more straws around the base of elevated construction mounds than do coconuts, but those guide ropes leading into the sewage drain are different than rice straw materials.

JoeReal
03-26-2009, 05:59 PM
Now I remember how I confirmed it, the coconut stuff will usually have coco coir dust falling off if you press and twist the rope. Coco coir dust are like very tiny round speck of brown sawdust.

damaclese
03-27-2009, 08:32 AM
Jo After looking around to see if i could find coco chips i'v concluded that they are to exspesiv for me so I'm just going to use fine wood ships that are partly composted its pretty cheep around here funny how a town with almost 2mil people has almost no good sources of agricultural supplies when i was calling around i actually got laughed at and was asked by one guy at a local nursery why would i want coco chips! he said he'd never heard of them can you believe that! ones again i feel like I'm living in the one place on earth that has taking the concept of dumbing down to a how new level

ps iv been talking about the biochar to different people and almost no one has heard of it before its sorta like when i was talking about carbon foot prints 5 years ago i had to explain that one too do you ever get the feeling that some how you are out there! and that people think you are weird of just nuts i get thees blank looks i just want to slap them don't people read ever! so when i say i live in a desert i mean that literally and intellectually

One Vary Frustrated Gardener
Paul

Lagniappe
03-27-2009, 11:17 AM
Pauly, I can relate to what your saying.
My friends think I'm nuts for some of the gardening methods I employ. I asked my cousin for some gutters that he was throwing out and he agreed since they were extra bits. When I told him that I was using them for hydroponic channels he said "you always have some crazy thing going" (only his version was not so tame).
I also bought 10 gallons of molasses from one of, if not the largest, syrup manufacturers in La. to spray my property with. When she was working up my ticket, the lady asked "what are you going to do with this? mix with feed? ", I told her it was to feed the soil organisms.....bacteria mostly. She replied," I think I would want to kill all the bacteria, not feed them."

It's not their fault though. Unless one is actively researching this type of thing or communicating in a forum such as this, they may never hear of such practices. Think about it, would you know about as many growing techniques if not for the internet ?
I too am guilty of ignorance in these matters. Just a few short years ago, my wife asked why I didn't use compost tea. I told her that it sounded stupid to me...why extract nutrients from compost and apply them when it's so much easier to put the compost on the beds :P :P :P
I finally decided there must be more to it and began to google like a mad man. My whole world was changed in a matter of weeks. I had no idea that the soil food web was so complex and that plants could benefit from anything other than fertilizers or manures. I had no idea that microbes had such an important role in soil or that soil was anything more than a growing medium.
But it's the same for me and,I'm sure, for many of us....there are very few people around that I can talk to about these things because they have never heard of them or have dismissed them (as I did with tea, originally) as being unnecessary or non-effective.

Can you belive that my char pile is still smoking after several days of heavy rain ?

damaclese
03-27-2009, 11:54 AM
well Lag now that iv hijack this thread and since its my thread i feel i can all say this I'm old enough to remember long before the net and iv always been a reader highly interested in the world/universe around me and i didn't mean to imply any sort of intellectual superiority i think my point is that thees kinds of things really don't fall that far out side of the current social discussions of are day their all related to global warming ( stewardship of plant earth) in one way or another i think what i was saying about Vegas (being my point of referents) is that here not much matters besides making money and drinking your brains down to a slow dull state existence this towns only a hundred years old Born out of a kind of mythic wester culture that permeates it/us here to this day what brilliant young mind would be drawn to a place like this not many I'm sure but I'm here and not so say that I'm brilliant i had to come here for reasons out side of my control
but I'm not going to change the way i view the world in order to fit in with the low mentality and lack of imagination that is Vegas (that was in no way pointed to you are any ones comments in this thread I'm just getting on my sope box and heaving my probably unwanted opinion out in to the world to see what comes back to me)

some times i think i mite be a tad bit bitter LOL

Lagniappe
03-27-2009, 12:06 PM
Perhaps you got the wrong impression from my post....I'm not very well spoken nowadays. My point was that I talk to a lot of people and very few know what I'm talking about in regards to gardening. I even learn new things on a daily basis. Things I never dreamed of. Things such as hybrid soil / hydroponic systems....who would've dreamed?
It's also very tough to find the equipment and supplies I need. I never dreamed a bulkhead, water soluble ferts suitable for hydroponics, calcium nitrate, bulk worm castings, worms, ......... would be so hard to find.
People just have never heard of the things I'm doing and it's very frustrating.

My dad and a freind were here yesterday ,clearing brush, and commented on my smoldering pile. I tried telling them about char and they thought I was nuts. Both told me to stir it up so it would burn down faster......these are the things I'm talking about.

damaclese
03-27-2009, 12:27 PM
after rereading your post i did have one other thing to say: is a persons fault if they are ignorant I say no its not but! is it there fault if they see no value in bettering them selves intellectually spiritually or physically and to this i say unequivocal yes it is their fault

an Albie it slightly ridiculous example would be:

In the beginning of WW2 the German people (I'm of German descent)where vary economically and politically repressed people having been treated vary poorly by the rest of Europe threw the reparations that were leveled on them after the First World War this being said they turned there backs on what Hitler was doing even thou they knew that ultimately that thees things were morally reprehensible so you see that is a case were people were presented with information but turned away from the opportunity to better them selves by acting on what they new
so were they ignorant of the facts in hind site we now that a good many new not all but allot but simply chose not to learn and grow throw there situation by acting so i see this as an example of people that refused to know! and refused to learn! and 3 million Jew Gipsy's Gays and many other ethnic people payed there lives for the German peoples opportunity to stay ignorant
In summation this kind of thing is dangerous but we here in the USA always think it cant happing that way again we are to savvy we are so smart
then why is are world falling apart at the seams because we don't want to learn any more! and ultimately isn't that the pentacle of Arrogance!
so you see there is a relationship between the guy at the nursery that doesn't know what coco chips are and why its important to learn and grow as much as possible all the days of your life no mater what your situation is

damaclese
03-27-2009, 12:59 PM
Lag i posted that last part before you posted yours so when i cam back there was yours
No i defiantly got your point its vary hard to know every thing thats out there in the world i hear you on that and i commend you for finding a passion and going for it with all your hart thats the kind of behaver I'm talking about if every one did that look at what we could become as a people
its not important to know ever thing there is to know but what is important is knowing that we don't know every thing! but being open to the opportunity to learn when ever it comes are way.
the coco chip guy laughed at me if i was him i would have said i don't know what that is TELL ME ABOUT IT! and why because i want to know as much as i can its my passion and it is at the core of who i am and what i know to be one of the reasons I'm here on this earth along with Giving and receiving as much Love as i can

PS i think you are vary eloquent when it come to expressing your thoughts to me and other here on the org Keep doing it never feel that what you have to say isn't right i want to here ever thing you are wiling to express to me
we all have are ways of talking and thats what makes it interesting
as you well know I'm highly dyslexic and it takes extra time for me to wright
but i keep on doing it and so should

Lagniappe
03-27-2009, 01:02 PM
I really don't understand what's happened here, but I'll go along for whatever reason.
Most of the people I referred to have no need to know such things or to seek out new methods (or forgotten methods) of growing. Some don't even have a lawn. My point was that I agree with you about it being difficult to find things or to share points of veiw on some things.
In regards to ignorance though, if one has no use for the information, finding it would be of no use. I'm not sure as to how this evolved to such a discussion.
I know very few people who can mount a .50 BMG to a turret, calibrate it , and ready it to fire. It's not that they're not wanting to better themselves, there's just no need for this knowledge to have ever been an issue in their lives.

Lagniappe
03-27-2009, 01:04 PM
Okay, I posted that after you posted about not posting after I posted......
We need to get more in sync here :D

damaclese
03-27-2009, 01:15 PM
I'm laughing that has happing to me several times in the past just one of the drawbacks of people all posting in close time intervals as they say **** Happens LOL

so back to the main topic you are making your own Biochar i take it
thats so cool
I cant we have sticked burning restrictions but i did find a sours of pure
charcoal that is sold for barbecuing it has no binders I've used it to cook many times its 3$ for 20lb and i think I'm going to use that along with the semi degraded wood chips and now that you mentioned the molasses i mite throw in some of that to ya ha! my garden will not know what this new soil is for LOL

JoeReal
03-27-2009, 01:49 PM
When I have the time and money, I'm planning to build a solar-powered biochar making machine. I've got some rudimentary plans on how its done. One of my thesis projects in college (BS Agric. Engineering), was to build a very cheap high precision solar water heater. It gives boiling hot water which helps sterilize from microorganism contamination and other parasites without burning wood. I can modify the design for making biochar.

My plan really is to turn grass clippings, fallen leaves, cuttings and trimmings from pruning, all into biochar. Today's design of charcoal often require solid wood and the grass clippings and other garden residues just turn into ashes. But the garden clippings and piles of leaves are the most abundant from my yard, and often they overflow my tiny compost bin so off to the streets they go. It is truly a waste.

I believe a solar powered biochar making machine is able to handle such grass clippings and leaves. One thing nice about the grass clippings is that it is already in powder form if they are turned into biochar.

damaclese
03-27-2009, 01:54 PM
good idea Jo is there any way you could post the drawings?

JoeReal
03-27-2009, 02:04 PM
good idea Jo is there any way you could post the drawings?

I'm not good with AutoCAD drawings. So not for a while. But I can give you the basic idea. You would be making your own parabolic reflectors to focus on a barrel. It is the heat of the sun that will cook, without oxygen, the contents of the barrel. You will have to capture the gasses that comes out of the barrel, run it through a condenser to give you an excellent plant-derived insecticide and fungicide or biofuel, depending on the various stages of condensates (lighter ones comes first, then heavier ones). What remains is the biochar inside the barrel, and at the same time, you produce excellent natural insecticide and fungicide, and biofuel (which can be refined further for fueling your car). In this setup, nothing is wasted. More complex, more expensive, but very environmentally friendly.

If I can find scanners and my old drawings, will post it here, but that could take some time.

Michael_Andrew
03-27-2009, 03:57 PM
YouTube - Official Biochar Tutorial Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEGmP6dhW5c)

lorax
03-27-2009, 04:13 PM
I'm not good with AutoCAD drawings. So not for a while. But I can give you the basic idea. You would be making your own parabolic reflectors to focus on a barrel. It is the heat of the sun that will cook, without oxygen, the contents of the barrel. You will have to capture the gasses that comes out of the barrel, run it through a condenser to give you an excellent plant-derived insecticide and fungicide or biofuel, depending on the various stages of condensates (lighter ones comes first, then heavier ones). What remains is the biochar inside the barrel, and at the same time, you produce excellent natural insecticide and fungicide, and biofuel (which can be refined further for fueling your car). In this setup, nothing is wasted. More complex, more expensive, but very environmentally friendly.

If I can find scanners and my old drawings, will post it here, but that could take some time.


JOE. Email them to me, I can convert them to high-quality JPGs no problem. Better yet, email them to me and I can feature the DIY biochar maker in the next issue of Bananas Quarterly.

momoese
03-27-2009, 04:40 PM
YouTube - Official Biochar Tutorial Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEGmP6dhW5c)

Seems easier to buy a few bags of hardwood charcoal from the market and crush it up. Why spend all that the time and waste all that wood to make it yourself?

JoeReal
03-27-2009, 05:05 PM
JOE. Email them to me, I can convert them to high-quality JPGs no problem. Better yet, email them to me and I can feature the DIY biochar maker in the next issue of Bananas Quarterly.

Lorax, wish I could email my scratch papers. My first problem is finding them, then scanning my pencil sketches. And I don't have a scanner at the moment. Will find it someday and I will send to you.

JoeReal
03-27-2009, 05:09 PM
Seems easier to buy a few bags of hardwood charcoal from the market and crush it up. Why spend all that the time and waste all that wood to make it yourself?

That would be my shortcut for now. There is horicultural grade charcoal for sale at our local Home Depot, but couldn't find it anymore. The BBQ charcoal briquites needs to be tried out as they seemed cheaper than the hort grade charcoal, but was hesitant due to the binders and other petroleum additives in it, but can't really dismiss it unless it's been tried. Anyone tried it? I know the hort grade charcoal are good for orchids.

My main problem are the grass trimmings from mowing, the leaves during the fall, and the wood waste from pruning. These are not good for making charcoal, and requires bigger energy to convert to biochar, unless you go solar.

momoese
03-27-2009, 05:16 PM
It's my understanding that its not exactly charcoal. You have to burn it with a lack of oxygen and produce a charcoal that has residue with it. Its kinda of gummy. There's stuff in that gummy substance that spose to help.

Michael

Maybe this is why you have to make your own? Joe?

lorax
03-27-2009, 05:21 PM
Lorax, wish I could email my scratch papers. My first problem is finding them, then scanning my pencil sketches. And I don't have a scanner at the moment. Will find it someday and I will send to you.

You may not have a scanner, but you do have a digital camera! You can email your sketches after all. Shoot, email them to me and I'll turn them into AutoCAD drawings!

Richard
03-27-2009, 06:21 PM
When I checked last fall, horticultural charcoal was $12 per cubic yard from Hanson Aggregates (will call price).

JoeReal
03-27-2009, 06:45 PM
You may not have a scanner, but you do have a digital camera! You can email your sketches after all. Shoot, email them to me and I'll turn them into AutoCAD drawings!

Will try to do that, just have to find my sketches. Thanks!

Michael_Andrew
03-27-2009, 06:51 PM
Don't use the briquettes. Too many chemicals in it (starch, borax, paraffin). You can use the lump charcoal but not mesquite (for reasons I don't remember). Again I don't think its exactly biochar but I still think it would be beneficial. Our local Andersons has bags of charcoal in the garden section (its actually on closeout right now).

Pyrolysis is the process of burning with the lack of oxygen:


Pyrolysis (http://www.cpeo.org/techtree/ttdescript/pyrols.htm)

Here is an interesting video of the benefits:

YouTube - Biochar - agrichar - Terra Preta (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzmpWR6JUZQ)

JoeReal
03-27-2009, 07:05 PM
Don't use the briquettes. Too many chemicals in it (starch, borax, paraffin). You can use the lump charcoal but not mesquite (for reasons I don't remember). Again I don't think its exactly biochar but I still think it would be beneficial. Our local Andersons has bags of charcoal in the garden section (its actually on closeout right now).

Pyrolysis is the process of burning with the lack of oxygen:


Pyrolysis (http://www.cpeo.org/techtree/ttdescript/pyrols.htm)

Here is an interesting video of the benefits:

YouTube - Biochar - agrichar - Terra Preta (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzmpWR6JUZQ)


About the briquittes, I have seen the documentary on how they're done. Suffice it to say that at least a scientific trial is needed to see if they are harmful or not tot he plants and under what conditions.

Another term for pyrolysis is gasification, and thus the gasifier is doing pyrolysis. You can control the products of pyrolysis by controlling the amount of oxygen and water going into the pyrolytic chamber. There are many useful products from pyrolysis depending upon how you control the air and water going into the chamber. Supplying water for example, can produce alcohol (the toxic kind), and supplying oxygen somwhere downwind of the chamber, can turn that alcohol into acetic acid which can be very effective herbicide. Limiting the oxygen will give you producer gas which becomes building blocks for liquid fuel. There are many variations and models of gasifiers. A friend of mine has developed one that creates direct fuel to power water pumps or electric generators in the farm, by slightly altering the carburetor of a standard Biggs & Stratton engine. Was asking him to supply me biochar.

JoeReal
03-27-2009, 07:20 PM
Also, I have a friend in Texas A & M University who developed a very nice gasifier that supplies hydrogen fuel from breakdown of biomass. One interesting thing is that the hydrogen goes into another project.

There is this very new technology of converting wood waste into alcohol without the use of fermentation. The technique is to first separate the agricultural waste into cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin. The Cellulose and Hemicellulose are fed into aerobic chamber that has forest microorganisms which coverts it directly into acetic acid without releasing carbon dioxide. The lignin is then fed into the gasifier of my friend to produce hydrogen gas. The hydrogen gas and the acetic acid are reformed to produce alcohol, all without releasing carbon dioxide. This method is revolutionary in that there is no alcoholic fermentation involved and thus no carbon dioxide released. This results in production of more alcohol per unit biomass. Thanks to the wonders of thermo chemistry and biochemistry! But then again, we will have to wait for the bottom line analysis, which I think they are nearing to production costs of less than half than the current methods (usually involving alcoholic fermentation) of alcohol from biomass waste.

And the most wonderful this is that they have oodles of biochar that is produced from this process which can be plowed back into the soil. Too bad, I can't have those biochar. There is another project that is interested in their biochar which they are plowing back into the soil to recreate Amazon Terra Preta. I really love this kind of innovative approach to reusing waste and plowing back carbon into the soil.

momoese
03-27-2009, 07:51 PM
Oh noes, they said global warming and climate change in the same video ;)



Here is an interesting video of the benefits:

YouTube - Biochar - agrichar - Terra Preta (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzmpWR6JUZQ)

Richard
03-27-2009, 10:15 PM
Don't use the briquettes. Too many chemicals in it (starch, borax, paraffin). You can use the lump charcoal but not mesquite (for reasons I don't remember).

Why not buy humic acid? It's a great source of organic carbon, a whole lot cheaper, easier to apply, and penetrates right away. A $3 bottle is usually plenty for a small suburban back yard.

JoeReal
03-27-2009, 10:37 PM
Why not buy humic acid? It's a great source of organic carbon, a whole lot cheaper, easier to apply, and penetrates right away. A $3 bottle is usually plenty for a small suburban back yard.

They are two different products and different purposes. Biochar improves the soil by improving aeration, nutrient and water use efficiency. Biochar also increases the effectivity of humic acid so that you wouldn't need to use a lot of it. Humic acid doesn't last very long and degrades, releasing carbon into the atmosphere. Biochar lasts forever when incorporated into the soil. Biochar when plowed into the soil entraps its carbon forever, never to be recycled back.

There is an upcoming Herbal Organic Concentrate that has humic acid and other nutrients being marketed in the Philippines and it costs $1/bottle and is a lot much better than just humic acid alone because it has more chelated nutrients.

Richard
03-28-2009, 12:17 AM
There is an upcoming Herbal Organic Concentrate that has humic acid and other nutrients being marketed in the Philippines and it costs $1/bottle and is a lot much better than just humic acid alone because it has more chelated nutrients.

I think this is the one derived from rutile sand deposits? When it breaks down it leaves elemental carbon in the soil. Humic acid is a natural chelating agent, so the manufacturer has taken the opportunity to fortify it with micronutrients. It is also available in the U.S. The typical application rate is 2 quarts per acre.

damaclese
03-28-2009, 09:51 AM
thanks for all the good info every one i had no idea when i started this thread that it would bring out such a productive conversation beats the hell out of chatting endlessly about spider mites (no offense to any one that likes chatting about mites) LOL

o and i can get charcoal from the grocery store that is 100% char theres no binders in it when you open the bag it looks just like the cinders you get in a camp fire that has not burned completely it says on the side of the bag "no binder" the brand is Cowboy Coal it also states on the bag that is 100% natural and contains no toxic additives

Bob
03-28-2009, 11:14 AM
When this thread started I didn't really have an interest and now it's the newest thing I'm into in gardening. Thanks Pauly.

momoese
03-28-2009, 11:29 AM
thanks for all the good info every one i had no idea when i started this thread that it would bring out such a productive conversation beats the hell out of chatting endlessly about spider mites (no offense to any one that likes chatting about mites) LOL

o and i can get charcoal from the grocery store that is 100% char theres no binders in it when you open the bag it looks just like the cinders you get in a camp fire that has not burned completely it says on the side of the bag "no binder" the brand is Cowboy Coal it also states on the bag that is 100% natural and contains no toxic additives


We have that brand and a few others available locally. This is actually what I use to BBQ. When lit with a chimney starter it smells great!

Chironex
03-28-2009, 02:40 PM
Great job Pauly, I use charcoal in many of my containers for TC, so it only makes sense to use it in containers and as a soil additive. Hospitals use it to absorb toxins that people swallow, drug O/D's, etc. The stuff I buy for TC is also recommended as a daily dietary supplement to help rid the body of several bad substances.

damaclese
03-28-2009, 08:08 PM
Hmm i thought at least one person would say somthing about the Spider Mite coment LOL

Lagniappe
03-28-2009, 08:16 PM
Hey Pauly, would you cook with this basil?
Click on the pic, then click again to zoom!
http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=16324&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=16324&ppuser=766)

damaclese
03-28-2009, 09:00 PM
ooww yuck!

damaclese
03-30-2009, 07:39 AM
on but slightly off the subject i went out to lows yesterday and they had some of the charcoal i was looking for so i got a bunch of it along with Cocoa chips a really good off brand of cow manure and some of my favorite compost along with a few other plants that i needed to finish my French stile planting bed that forms the approach to my front door and to work i went i mixed up all the stuff plus i added sea weed extract to it

well 8hr later i had planted all the lungstrum as well as a couple of the rose trees and then i added a layer of it to the enitgher bed working it in around the plants obversely i cant till as theres many mature plants already living happily in this bed but I'm sure it will help nun the less

it was hard work but i feel i did something for my plants that can only make them happier and will suck up some of the Carbon in the atmosphere in and around Vegas it was so cool how good the soil looked after i did that for those of you that don't know what passes for soil here in Vegas is just about only sand and lots of rocks so any time i add to that it helps dramatically
I'm hoping that the new plants do well its a bit late in the year to be planting with the approaching heat of summer coming I did put up some shade cloth to protect the roses that i planted from the direct affects of the sun

mskitty38583
03-30-2009, 08:03 AM
Hey Pauly, would you cook with this basil?
Click on the pic, then click again to zoom!
http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=16324&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=16324&ppuser=766)

not till after all the buggies were gone. lol. oh well whats a little protine that makes you "wiggle and giggle and tickles inside you".....yummy, tasty tasty

damaclese
03-31-2009, 02:43 PM
just a quick update on the biochar garden alls good in this realm all the new plants i put in sunday are doing grate nun of the normal shock i tend to get becaus of the hot sun i atribut this to the high levals of organics i put in i know its to soon to see any afects from the biochar i alsow thing the kelp micros realy are helping one of my orchid buddys swars this stuff can keep a plant from cossing over if you spray it on the folge in its last 20seconds of life LOLi dose seem to bring younger plants out of shock and lastly the cocoa chips i uesd as top dreesing have the most wanderful aroma of chocolat and i have to say that after spreading manure the chocolat sent is a nice change of pace i highly recomend them if only for the smell and they do a dam passabal job of keeping the mosture in
thats all for now
Paul

CookieCows
04-01-2009, 01:37 PM
I found the Cowboy coal at Walmart after practically sitting on the floor of Lowes and Walmart reading the bags of several brands. I had forgotten what brand to look for so was just searching for something that didn't have binders. Next step is to go crush it up and spread it!

:goteam:

saltydad
04-01-2009, 05:11 PM
At the garden center I used to manage, I was told by customers that they had a problem with mold in the cocoa chips after a while. Of course, this probably doesn't pertain to Nevada gardens. :ha:

damaclese
04-02-2009, 07:05 AM
i hope not! i put them around my roses and Lord knows that roses and mold do not get along yiks!

damaclese
04-02-2009, 07:17 AM
I found the Cowboy coal at Walmart after practically sitting on the floor of Lowes and Walmart reading the bags of several brands. I had forgotten what brand to look for so was just searching for something that didn't have binders. Next step is to go crush it up and spread it!

:goteam:

good luck wih the crushing part. i tried that in a plastic bucket and that was hard on my hands. i used a 2x4. i found it easiest to just pour it out on to the concrete and pound it out that way. be carefully breathing that black dust is vary harmful to you lungs. it wasn't in the end a vary efisiont way of doing it lots of dust blew away. it was a windy day. I'm sure all find a better way if you do let me know. i Keep thinking that surely theres a machine to do this right. LOL you know something like the charcoal crusher by Brigs and straton. LOL or the Biochar maker by Ronco. lol we should ask Ronco to make us one!

Bob
04-02-2009, 08:07 AM
Throw it in to a burlap or other heavy sack and run over it with your car a few times.

Michael_Andrew
04-02-2009, 09:02 AM
Gardening with Biochar FAQ / FrontPage (http://biochar.pbwiki.com/)

Biochar enthusiasts generally agree that raw biochar needs to be processed further prior to being added to the garden. Composting, or soaking with compost tea, is commonly used to charge the pore volume with beneficial organisms and nutrients. Soaking in a nutrient rich solution (examples are urine or fish emulsion) prior to composting is accepted practice.

sirmoebly
04-02-2009, 02:36 PM
Very interesting, I'm going to give this a try on my clayish soil. Thanks for the tip.....(anythings gotta help)

damaclese
04-02-2009, 04:00 PM
Gardening with Biochar FAQ / FrontPage (http://biochar.pbwiki.com/)

Biochar enthusiasts generally agree that raw biochar needs to be processed further prior to being added to the garden. Composting, or soaking with compost tea, is commonly used to charge the pore volume with beneficial organisms and nutrients. Soaking in a nutrient rich solution (examples are urine or fish emulsion) prior to composting is accepted practice.

I sprayed it with seaweed extract

Chironex
04-02-2009, 08:02 PM
Throw it in to a burlap or other heavy sack and run over it with your car a few times.

Genius! So simple but I wouldn't have thought of that.

damaclese
04-04-2009, 05:22 PM
Genius! So simple but I wouldn't have thought of that.

its alwas the ones with the high IQ that never think of things LOL

damaclese
04-05-2009, 10:46 AM
why cant some one come up with a product thats all incompasing why do we all have to keep buying this ingredient and that ingredient for are gardens when and enterprising person could take all the nutrients along with the biochar microsomal minerals compost and put it in to one product it would be cheaper just from the standpoint of reducing transactions alone less shipping fewer chemical factories we have to start thinking about thees kinds of things in a more inclusive single solution as i like to say simple is better
maybe we all need to form a cop. with the intention of making products that not only salve are worlds pollution problems but that makes it simple and convent for people and that would solve my problem of knowing were to buy and what amounts of things to apply this concept make sense to me isn't it aways better to have things more controlled from the stand point of production and distribution? i know this all sounds off the subject but really its not. it's all about growing in a safer way with a more environmentaly friendly strategy

Michael_Andrew
04-05-2009, 11:24 AM
I'm in Pauly! I'll pm you my address so you'll know where to send the checks when we start making money. It is a great idea though. Someone or group buy the ingredients and put them together and sell the product. Premier that sells pro mix I was at ther web site and they are now making mixes with mycorise and others with boicide and many other mixes for specific purposes. I'm sure if biochar is as good as it looks they will have a mix with it also.

Anyway, I made several batches of biochar this weekend. Just took a metal coffee can and filled it with sawdust. Put foil over the top placed in the woodburner and made a small fire. Its cool how the gasses burn off. Since it was sawdust it made this very nice workable char. Its different than just charcoal in that its a little gooey and smells really bad. I never noticed charcoal having that bad a smell. This stuff will vomit a dog off a gut wagon. I'll try to get some pics of it posted but the camera eats batteries and I'm all out.

Michael

JoeReal
04-05-2009, 03:17 PM
We can supply some of the ingredients like the coconut fibers. We are in talk with many coconut farmers in the Philippines. We told them how to prepare their coconut materials for making chips and coco brix. It would be a while before we can distribute it here via retail, cheaper than the existing ones that are imported from Sri Lanka. We are willing to talk with various interested people making to make their own brand of garden amendments or potting mixes and we supply the coconut fiber or coconut husk chips component, and the bulk orders are faster to get and delivered.

Anyway, one of the problems of Coconut materials is the sodium, and Sri Lankan suppliers are touting their coconut fibers as the one with the lowest Sodium. Sodium is highly soluble and can be easily washed, but we will do some cation exchange trick like immersing the fibers in a solution of K-Mag then rinsing it off. Then we dry and pack them for bulk shipping. The advantage of the K-Mag treatment is that it is organic, and displaces almost all of the sodium with potassium and magnesium, elements that are needed that will help plants, especially bananas.

Just in case in doing your own mixes and decide to use coconut fiber components along with your biochar, I can go ahead and move our coconut project ahead of schedule. Just PM me if you are interested. We don't do retail at this time.

Regards,

Joe

saltydad
04-05-2009, 06:14 PM
I sprayed it with seaweed extract

Darn. I had a very amusing picture in my mind's eye.:ha:

damaclese
04-06-2009, 06:37 AM
well another Sunday another biochar project under my belt iv now done the garden on the left side of my front door approach its looking nice did the compost cocoa chips cow manure (sorry Richard it was all i could get) micros from powdered Kelp and course the biochar turned it all in about 5 times my backs killing me lol Planted a about 5 linsturms its to late in the year to plant any more rose trees as they would not have time to set roots before the 110 deg weather i hope its not to feminine looking to have all those rose trees but their just beautiful here and out of all the things that you can grow here roses do so well do to the dry air i almost never get mildew and theres no problems with the grafts freezing as it hardly ever goes below 32 i was reading more about the biochar and i know now its going to take some time to really help i also read that adding more each your for several years is a good idea helps to keep the soil actively renewing particularly with the yearly inputs of organic materials so since i had some trouble braking up allot of char i don't feel so bad about not getting the right amounts in all just keep adding small amounts each year i was Reading in a bio symposium that this is the way they are teaching out in the Fields any way its vary important that we don't all go making biochar just to add to are gardens it should only be a left over byproduct of other activities remember you are burning to make this stuff and thats allot of co out in to atmosphere i think it would be best if we all let some one that has a bio char reactor do it for us as they will be using the by products to make electrical power or other things and hopefully be controlled by the EPA with the proper flow scrubbers on the combustion sources or what ever i don't know all that much about the commerce side of biochar what good dose it do if a hundred million people all start burning there garden waste out back to make biochar that makes no sense to me

damaclese
04-09-2009, 09:19 PM
I'm in Pauly! I'll pm you my address so you'll know where to send the checks when we start making money. It is a great idea though. Someone or group buy the ingredients and put them together and sell the product. Premier that sells pro mix I was at ther web site and they are now making mixes with mycorise and others with boicide and many other mixes for specific purposes. I'm sure if biochar is as good as it looks they will have a mix with it also.

Anyway, I made several batches of biochar this weekend. Just took a metal coffee can and filled it with sawdust. Put foil over the top placed in the woodburner and made a small fire. Its cool how the gasses burn off. Since it was sawdust it made this very nice workable char. Its different than just charcoal in that its a little gooey and smells really bad. I never noticed charcoal having that bad a smell. This stuff will vomit a dog off a gut wagon. I'll try to get some pics of it posted but the camera eats batteries and I'm all out.

Michael

I was talking with a Friend yesterday and i wanted to revisit this idea of making a signal product if its truly going to be Eco friendly it has to be made locally and with ingredients that can be either scavenged off of other processes or made on site again trucking things in defeats the point of saving resources and not generating harmfully byproducts
also making Biochar in your back yard: if you don't have a vary high Tieck biochar furness then you are releasing lots of carbon in to the atmosphere it can be done safely by using mirrors to reflect soler heat on to the biochamber so you don't have an out side combustion souse JoReal pointed that out nicely in a previously stated comment in this vary thread

Michael_Andrew
04-09-2009, 11:09 PM
Paulo I really don't have any numbers to back this up but maybe someone here will have some answers. The biochar I made came from sawdust. If I didn't make it into biochar it was headed to the compost pile. Even decomposing wood fibre makes greenhouse gases. I'm not sure if more is made through Pyrolysis. Given it is given off at a faster rate. Its my understanding burning wood with oxygen present gives off co2 (carbon dioxide) with low oxygen present it gives off co (Carbon Monoxide). Carbon monoxide is short lived in the atmosphere. I'm not sure which one is worse for the enviroment. But when you make the biochar it does flare off gases. Some things to consider is that the use of fertilizer is a big contributer to greenhouse gases. Also, this surprised me but the gas that is the biggest contributer to greenhouse effect is water vapor.

Maybe you can see if there is a water processing plant locally where you can get the stuff left over from the process. I never used it but hear some give it away free and it is a good amendment.

Michael

damaclese
04-10-2009, 07:41 AM
Paulo I really don't have any numbers to back this up but maybe someone here will have some answers. The biochar I made came from sawdust. If I didn't make it into biochar it was headed to the compost pile. Even decomposing wood fibre makes greenhouse gases. I'm not sure if more is made through Pyrolysis. Given it is given off at a faster rate. Its my understanding burning wood with oxygen present gives off co2 (carbon dioxide) with low oxygen present it gives off co (Carbon Monoxide). Carbon monoxide is short lived in the atmosphere. I'm not sure which one is worse for the enviroment. But when you make the biochar it does flare off gases. Some things to consider is that the use of fertilizer is a big contributer to greenhouse gases. Also, this surprised me but the gas that is the biggest contributer to greenhouse effect is water vapor.

Maybe you can see if there is a water processing plant locally where you can get the stuff left over from the process. I never used it but hear some give it away free and it is a good amendment.

Michael

thats good stuff to know thank you for your input Clark county water district dos use the left overs bio mass from there water purification plants i never used it all look in to it one of the reasons i haven't is because i was told that theirs a left over polymer in the firt and i wasn't curtain what that did or if it was truly inert i sure don't want to add any thing harmfull after spending tons to amend the soil in my yard the bio project is quite costly for me i don't have access to allot of free farm wast and such.

Chironex
04-10-2009, 02:32 PM
Get what stuff? Sawdust or biochar, I am lost here.

Michael_Andrew
04-10-2009, 02:42 PM
Biosolids! Scot. From the water treatment plants.

Chironex
04-10-2009, 02:42 PM
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, ty!

Michael_Andrew
04-10-2009, 02:49 PM
Biosolids California project:

Biosolids Home: CIWMB Organic Materials Management (http://www.ciwmb.ca.gov/Organics/Biosolids/)

Chironex
04-10-2009, 02:51 PM
Thanks I will check it out.

damaclese
04-10-2009, 03:24 PM
Get what stuff? Sawdust or biochar, I am lost here.

If I'm fallowing your question right. the stuff i was taking about are the left over waste that come from the Clark county water treatment facilities. they dry it out and offer it as fertilizer. however i know it contains a polymer that they use as a floccullent to ade in settling out of wast in the water. they say its harmless but I'm not sure its truly inert.

Chironex
04-10-2009, 03:28 PM
Oh, are you talking Milorganite here?

Michael_Andrew
04-10-2009, 04:08 PM
MIL-waukee-ORGAnic-NITrogEn
CLAR-k-ORGAnic-NITrogEn

So I guess he's talkin Clarorganite

Chironex
04-10-2009, 05:19 PM
MIL-waukee-ORGAnic-NITrogEn
CLAR-k-ORGAnic-NITrogEn

So I guess he's talkin Clarorganite

LasVorganite - has a better ring to it.:ha::02::0517:

Richard
04-10-2009, 05:30 PM
LasVorganite - has a better ring to it.:ha::02::0517:

Wait, can't we sell this as the riches left in Vegas?

Michael_Andrew
04-10-2009, 06:27 PM
But you could only sell it locally! What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas!

hatfam
04-10-2009, 06:57 PM
good luck wih the crushing part. i tried that in a plastic bucket and that was hard on my hands. i used a 2x4. i found it easiest to just pour it out on to the concrete and pound it out that way. be carefully breathing that black dust is vary harmful to you lungs. it wasn't in the end a vary efisiont way of doing it lots of dust blew away. it was a windy day. I'm sure all find a better way if you do let me know. i Keep thinking that surely theres a machine to do this right. LOL you know something like the charcoal crusher by Brigs and straton. LOL or the Biochar maker by Ronco. lol we should ask Ronco to make us one!

What about a wood chipper

Chironex
04-10-2009, 07:48 PM
What about a wood chipper

No way, can you just imagine the dust - Yikes!!!! You would look like a coal miner after a double shift. Or you would look like Al Jolson singing "Mamie"! :0520:

I like Bob's idea with the burlap bag and the car.

Michael_Andrew
04-10-2009, 09:40 PM
Actually I think the wood chipper is an excellent idea! Run the wood thru the chipper then process it into biochar.

Chironex
04-10-2009, 10:36 PM
But you could only sell it locally! What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas!

This post is more sinister than meets the eye. hahaha

damaclese
04-17-2009, 07:27 AM
I've been looking for a source for Biochar that is made in an environmentally sound way. I've located several. Waiting to here back on pricing. Any one interested MSG me and all pass the Co names and pricing to you.

the best one is from a co. called charGrow there biochar comes pre inoculated with Microsomals. Is pre crushed to the correct size. this is the one I'm thinking of getting just depends on there pricing. It sounds exspesiv but all just have to Waite and see.

Beats the heck out of Crushing the stuff up which is a pain and times consuming along with some what dangerous to your health

CookieCows
04-18-2009, 08:27 AM
I've been looking for a source for Biochar that is made in an environmentally sound way. I've located several. Waiting to here back on pricing. Any one interested MSG me and all pass the Co names and pricing to you.

the best one is from a co. called charGrow there biochar comes pre inoculated with Microsomals. Is pre crushed to the correct size. this is the one I'm thinking of getting just depends on there pricing. It sounds exspesiv but all just have to Waite and see.

Beats the heck out of Crushing the stuff up which is a pain and times consuming along with some what dangerous to your health

I'd be interested in knowing the cost etc. on this and with the cost of it in mind.... am I correct in that you only mix biochar into your beds once? I haven't started smashing my bag up yet and still have to buy whatever it is I need to soak it in also. It would be really great to be able to buy it already done.

damaclese
04-19-2009, 08:10 PM
I'd be interested in knowing the cost etc. on this and with the cost of it in mind.... am I correct in that you only mix biochar into your beds once? I haven't started smashing my bag up yet and still have to buy whatever it is I need to soak it in also. It would be really great to be able to buy it already done.

Yes only ones if you get the right amount in the first place iv been told that 1 qft per 1 qyd it the ratio to go with but that is quite alot so if you cant do that much i think any is better then nothing

lorax
04-19-2009, 08:37 PM
LasVorganite - has a better ring to it.:ha::02::0517:

For some reason I read that as "Las-VOGON-ite" and had to think about where you'd get enough excess Vogons to make fertilizer.

adrift
04-20-2009, 06:35 PM
LasVorganite - has a better ring to it.:ha::02::0517:

Sounds like an alien species in a Heinlein book. :drum:

adrift
04-20-2009, 06:38 PM
For some reason I read that as "Las-VOGON-ite" and had to think about where you'd get enough excess Vogons to make fertilizer.

I guess if I had read a little further I would have seen that I'm not the only twisted one around here. This round's on me Lorax. :nanadrink:

damaclese
04-21-2009, 07:03 AM
well not one Co that i wrote to has responded to any of my e-mails so i guess I'm going to have to make my own Biochar so I'm looking for some plans for a soler powered bio furnace all post them here if i can find a free one

CookieCows
05-01-2009, 03:39 PM
I'm ready to crush up my bag and soak it. Can I just mix it in a wheel barrow with the water we bring up from the stock pond that is high in nitrates? Is there anything else I need? After mixing that up can we just rotatill that into the bed or does it need to sit for awhile? We've already rotatilled in a bunch of composted manure/dirt/hay.

BTW Pauly I looked at your roses in the photo gallery.... beautiful!!

Deb

damaclese
05-02-2009, 08:53 AM
I'm ready to crush up my bag and soak it. Can I just mix it in a wheel barrow with the water we bring up from the stock pond that is high in nitrates? Is there anything else I need? After mixing that up can we just rotatill that into the bed or does it need to sit for awhile? We've already rotatilled in a bunch of composted manure/dirt/hay.

BTW Pauly I looked at your roses in the photo gallery.... beautiful!!

Deb

hey Deb good to see are thread is still going strong!
you can soke it for 24hr is best but even a few hr will work poind water is good althou not as highly concintrated with the leveals that the pure microzomeals would have rember it will take a year or two to realy see a big difrince alsow know that you will have to add boi mass ever year in order to keep the afets strong so save that conpost and add it often! o i forgot add some powderd sea kelp you wont bealve how shock resistant and dark green your plants will be if you do i know this for a fact as i was doing my garden down the path i did one sid then ran out of the kelp when i got to the other side but whent ahed and did it any way the side with the kelp is already out growing the side with out it and i dont have to water it as oftin in the heat of the day

CookieCows
05-02-2009, 09:31 AM
Thank you!!

damaclese
05-07-2009, 08:34 AM
you all are probably going to know this but i found a good firt that has high concentrations of microsomals it Kellogg brand i just put some down for my late may early June feeding I'm sure its going to work grate you just have to make sure you dig it in as microsomals hate light also finished the east side Ventricosum garden added tones of bio char and lots of organics i mite have gotten a bit carried away with the compost but what can i say I'm a sucker for the stuff iv run out of kelp and am having a hard time finding cheaper stuff my last batch was practically 25cents a gram! i cant do that again any one know of a good source pleas post your progres i want to hear who all is doing this and we can share practical tips on how to make it easer after all its back braking work

Lagniappe
05-22-2009, 12:22 PM
My char cooked very slowly for a few weeks inder a few inches of dirt.
YouTube - char 010 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUBMh9xb2g0)
YouTube - char 009 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ro7IWw_hWII)
My video stopped and I didn't knowhow to splice it, so there's two parts. This was a wedge of wood taken out to fell a tree.

damaclese
06-03-2009, 09:50 AM
well its early summer here in the Nevada Desert things are heating up we are moving precipitously close to 100 deg frh the bio char gardens look better then the non char ones and are so far requiring less water but its had to say as allot of the char gardens are new and to get plants threw their fist summer requires water ever day the adding of the Kellogg's firt has been a meager help to the plants in particular the giant Atlantic pumpkins are growth adduced LOL if you ever want to see a plant that grows as fast as a banana try the Atlantic pumpkins you will need at least a 1000squ ft for them of your not doing the char then i suggest you do there will be no regrets trust me

Lagniappe
07-12-2009, 10:57 PM
I threw part of a watermelon onto the char pile and had vines sprout all over. They love it! I can't even see the pile now, just melon vines.
The deer are creeping up and snipping them though.

damaclese
07-13-2009, 11:14 AM
darn those deer i was right about the bio char its amazing stuff

Lagniappe
07-13-2009, 05:49 PM
I never knew watermelons grew so fast! We've always broadcasted the seeds in burned clear cuts and checked on them when it was time to harvest.
Here are the deer tracks:
http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=19258&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=19258&ppuser=766)
A hand sized fruit that was thumb size 48 hours ago:
http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=19257&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=19257&ppuser=766)
A little bit of the char pile is visable here:
http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=19255&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=19255&ppuser=766)
Damage caused by the bastage deer:
http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=19254&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=19254&ppuser=766)
A full veiw of the char-pile:
http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=19256&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=19256&ppuser=766)

amazondk
08-03-2009, 06:01 AM
Hello,

I was reading through this material which interests me a lot. Terra Preta is commonly found around the area where I live, which is Central Amazonia. In fact the village where I have a country place has the area in the middle of town made of the stuff. The area is used as an open square and to place soccer. But, it is mostly Terra Preta. I wish my land was.

Here is a picture of some exposed soil.

dk

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a282/amazondk/Palm%20Talk/Terrapreta-1.jpg

Richard
08-03-2009, 09:48 AM
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_preta:

Terra preta soils are of pre-Columbian nature and were created by humans between 450 BC and AD 950.[5][6] The soil's depth can reach 2 metres (6 feet). Thousands of years after its creation it has been reported to regenerate itself at the rate of 1 centimetre per year[7] by the local farmers and caboclos in Brazil's Amazonian basin, and they seek it out for use and for sale as valuable compost.

Terra preta is characterized by the presence of low-temperature charcoal in high concentrations; of high quantities of pottery sherds; of organic matter such as plant residues, animal feces, fish and animal bones and other material; and of nutrients such as nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), calcium (Ca), zinc (Zn), manganese (Mn). It also shows high levels of microorganic activities and other specific characteristics within its particular ecosystem. It is less prone to nutrient leaching, which is a major problem in most rainforest soils.

amazondk
08-03-2009, 05:45 PM
Richard,

As you can note from my picture there are pottery shards showing. Paricatuba the village where my country place is has been inhabited I would say at least 5,000 years. There were up to 10 million people living in the Brazilian Amazon region at time of European contact. The area of the Rio Negro where Manaus is would have been very attractive as the black water rivers have very little insect pests and the muddy white waters of the Amazon nearby have very high fish populations and rich soil of the floodplain from sediment washed down from the Andes. The name Paricatuba comes form a plant used as a drug by indians called parica, and tuba means a place by the beach. In many places of the Amazonas areas of terra preta are popular with pot producers as the plants grows very well there. A few years ago I was looking for forest land for an investor in the States and visited a guys place in the eastern part of the state, he had 17 hectares of terra preta. He used to grow bananas there, and they did very well.

dk

Lagniappe
08-08-2009, 05:48 PM
I just brought in and cut open the first of my char melons. The rind was sort of thick but the flesh is sweeter than any that I can recall eating. Two thumbs up for the char melons!
There are several fruit ready to be picked and many younger ones on the vines. We may be sick of watermelon before the frost hits......but I doubt it. :D

amazondk
08-09-2009, 01:01 PM
Terra preta is used for watermelons frequently here. That is interesting that yours would be of superior taste.

Here is another Terra Preta picture from another area. I mentioned this above which belongs to the guy who has 17 hectares of Terra Preta and used to grow bananas there. He said the place really produced bananas.

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a282/amazondk/Palm%20Talk/terrapretamauesbatista.jpg

damaclese
08-09-2009, 07:25 PM
iv desided to go back in to the exsisting Bio Gardens and add more bio char i dont think i put enough in the first pass
i am alsow going to grind it up much finer

CValentine
08-24-2009, 01:55 PM
http://i668.photobucket.com/albums/vv49/valentines12/0823091712.jpghttp://i668.photobucket.com/albums/vv49/valentines12/0823091714.jpg

Are these what I'm looking for?? :) ~Cheryl

damaclese
08-24-2009, 06:45 PM
http://i668.photobucket.com/albums/vv49/valentines12/0823091712.jpghttp://i668.photobucket.com/albums/vv49/valentines12/0823091714.jpg

Are these what I'm looking for?? :) ~Cheryl

the kings-ford yes the other one no you don't know what they mix in any thing that says its a briquette just use 100% lump char coal make sure you brake it up in to as fine a powder as you can but don't spend all day trying to crush it just hit it until its fairly fine with some smallish lumps would do good for you i hope that it works for you i have plants that are growing new leafs out in 105deg in the bio char amended gardens iv never had this before its amazing i think you are going to be vary happy don't forget to inoculate it with Microsomal Bactria it speeds the process up quite a bit and add Kelp to the inoculation too

If i get a chance all post some pictures that show the groth of the bio char plating beds take care
PaulO

CValentine
08-24-2009, 07:48 PM
Thank you Paulo & everyone! :) ~Cheryl

Bob
08-24-2009, 07:57 PM
http://i668.photobucket.com/albums/vv49/valentines12/0823091712.jpghttp://i668.photobucket.com/albums/vv49/valentines12/0823091714.jpg

Are these what I'm looking for?? :) ~Cheryl

Put it in a nylon bag and run over it a few times with the truck. ....I'll be doing this in fall.

damaclese
08-24-2009, 08:05 PM
Put it in a nylon bag and run over it a few times with the truck. ....I'll be doing this in fall.

good advice bob!
i have a bicycle what should i do LOL don't answer!

Richard
08-24-2009, 09:08 PM
Humic acid is less expensive, less laborous, and more effective.

damaclese
08-25-2009, 09:36 AM
Humic acid is less expensive, less laborious, and more effective.

yes I'm sure you are right Richard but not in the long run as char last for centuries and humic only last for a season or two right? and you certainly will not get any argument from as to the the ease of Humic acid in comparison to the char which is vary laborious anisauly but after its in and tilled you don't ever have to do it again if you applied a sufficient quantity in the first place i think its to each his own on this one

I'm pretty sold on it i have growth in the char Beds that i have not ever had are temps are in the 105 but it is cooling off at nigh i think the char holds on to the firt allowing for a more even slow release the plants look Greener have not exhibited any of the heat shock i normally see here and the roses have continued to bloom all summer were in the past particularly on the west side of my house they will stop in the months of July and August this could be do to many factors i have applied trace elements to that garden 2 times this year
i only fertilized ones at the beginning of the season when i did the beds

its kinda guess work for me i must admit iv been vary frustrated thees last couple of year with the success of my gardens and i am wiling to try any thing you have been most helpful with your advice thank you

PS and off the subject the K-mag is amazing! the leaf structures on my bananas are huge they have been putting out leafs that are bigger then the hold plant this last couple of weeks i cant thank you enough for it i wish every one would use it there would be no more threads on fertilizers lol i don't know maybe its because of the soil chemistry here perhaps it works extremely well with gypsum based soils its grate all be buying more when the time comes

Bob
08-25-2009, 03:18 PM
good advice bob!
i have a bicycle what should i do LOL don't answer!

Boy am I tempted Pauly....... I had a few good ones!

Richard
08-25-2009, 11:49 PM
yes I'm sure you are right Richard but not in the long run as char last for centuries and humic only last for a season or two right?

The carbon in Humic acid will remain in the applied soil at least as long as the carbon in biochar.

BadPun
08-26-2009, 01:42 AM
Hmmmm, I use Cowboy Lump Charcoal from Lowe's for smoking meats... I'm currently working on a bed for my AE AEs. If I do decide to add some to this bed am I better off soaking the ground up charcoal in a kelp extract solution or something else? Sounds messy :ha:
I wanna do it right (relatively speaking) since I hope to never have to dig this bed up again... well, at least not 'til next spring :woohoonaner:

damaclese
08-28-2009, 03:51 PM
Hmmmm, I use Cowboy Lump Charcoal from Lowe's for smoking meats... I'm currently working on a bed for my AE AEs. If I do decide to add some to this bed am I better off soaking the ground up charcoal in a kelp extract solution or something else? Sounds messy :ha:
I wanna do it right (relatively speaking) since I hope to never have to dig this bed up again... well, at least not 'till next spring :woohoonaner:

if your cant get bio char then yes the Charcoal is the next best solution
soak it in kelp extract and Microsomal for a day or so add a 1/4 of a tsp of some lower dose firt to Tye the microsomal over until they get in the ground add lots of compost mix and plant you are not going to see that big a difference in the first year but next will good you mite see a big boost with the Kelp and microsomal they act almost immediately

Be sure to add more kelp periodical thats just good Garden Practice and you are going to have to firt a bit just take it easy until you get the feel of your new soil chemistry its goos firther and last longer

BadPun
10-29-2009, 02:07 PM
Dunno if anyone's seen this article, but I found it quite interesting. Basically it's a summary of field testing done with Biochar in Cameroon showing that biochar effectively increases crop yield for maize by the same amount as either organic or mineral fertilizers alone. Of course adding said fertilizers to the biochar increased yield even more...
Biochar Fund - fighting hunger, deforestation, energy insecurity and climate change - Biochar works: Cameroon trial data show strong improvement in maize yield (http://biocharfund.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=54&Itemid=74)

Simply Bananas
07-25-2011, 07:46 PM
Got back from southern Costa Rica last week. We made a couple of trips to Paradise Botanical Garden: Rio Claro (Golfito), Costa Rica (http://www.paradise-garden.travelland.biz/)

The owner is a retired engineer from the banana company. His name is Robert Beatham He is older, but the first time I saw him he was wheeling out and loading 40 large lipstick palms into a pick up truck.

Anyway, more on Robert in another thread. They grow a lot of rice in Southern Costa Rica and the burned rice hulls are dumped at Robert's place the Paradise Garden.

In the picture below Robert's favorite banana, the red banana, growing from the charred rice hulls. He incorporates it into the soil for its nutrients and to give it loft.

http://www.bananas.org/gallery/watermark.php?file=44582&size=1 (http://www.bananas.org/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=44582&ppuser=226)

Nicolas Naranja
01-15-2013, 12:42 PM
I have a 10x10x2.5 firepit in my backyard and I have burned quite a bit of stuff over the past 2 years (trees, cull bananas, palm fronds, doors, pallets etc...) So I am digging it out now and putting it around my trees that are on marl.

http://i1182.photobucket.com/albums/x455/NicolasNaranja/2013-01-13163549_zps534af541.jpg

http://i1182.photobucket.com/albums/x455/NicolasNaranja/2013-01-13163606_zps7288090c.jpg

We shall see how the plants turn out. Needless to say the bananas on the marl/shellrock are't growing very well. I have three different soils in my backyard muck, sand, and marl/shellrock. It's so much different that what I dealt with on my old farm and somewhat different than what I have on the new farm.