Projects, Permaculture, Homestead, Farmstead and the likes

[Jaak]

Posted by Bill Ryan (here)
Meanwhile, I'm not chopping wood, but I am carrying water. I'm washing myself from a big soapy bucket, the toilet is flushed with water from the rain barrel, and I still have enough stored fresh water for quite a while. It's all one of those interesting this-should-never-go-wrong,-but-suppose-it-does?? experiences. They're always (a) rather a surprise, and (b) educational!

I was a squatter for 18 years and for most of the years i had no running water so i had to do the same things . Even when living with running water in the house im as conservative with it as possible.

But in a way i liked carrying water into home . Physical exercise plus a meditation, quality alone time while waiting for water to fill up the 20L bottle and then taking it to home. Learned to recycle my shower water for toilet water ,shower with dirty dishes and recycle all that for toilet ... In summer times i would leave a 20 liter jug outside in the sun for couple of hours and from that i had a warm shower in the evening that was even too hot .Probably full of microplastics if i think about it now but still. In a way i think everybody should live like this for some period of time in their youth to learn , appreciate and not to be wasteful with water or anything. Century ago this is how most people lived . Most people had no running water in their home. Billions probably still dont .
Poverty and discomfort could be great teachers ...

Now im living in a house with a running water and it bothers me that im flushing toilet with clean water while my shower water just goes down the drain ... And it rains for so many months in a year in here and none of it is recycled to use in the house.
Shameful. Re-designing and re-building the water system in this house would be costly but if i had the money i would do it .

[Bill Ryan]

Posted by Bill Ryan (here)
Meanwhile, I'm not chopping wood, but I am carrying water. I'm washing myself from a big soapy bucket, the toilet is flushed with water from the rain barrel, and I still have enough stored fresh water for quite a while. It's all one of those interesting this-should-never-go-wrong,-but-suppose-it-does?? experiences. They're always (a) rather a surprise, and (b) educational!

After 15 (long!) days of carrying water, I've at last finally fixed the problem. And I can actually have a proper shower now.

As often happens with these kinds of things, there was more than a single issue. The pipe was blocked in two places, not one. But all is now resolved. I'm wet and muddy from head to toe, and I feel like I've been working out at the gym, but I'm also completely delighted (and I dare to say, quietly rather pleased with myself ).

What I also learned, btw, is that an AI robot could NEVER have solved this. The AI critics are all 100% correct when they say that no AI can ever be a plumber.

[Baby Steps]

You can keep chickens without buying feed. The 5 plants needed are in the video

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=HBybPrgnRk0

These are

Moringa
Comfrey
Azolla (floating fern grows in 5 days)
Tree Collards
Amaranth (including seeds for winter)

[Ewan]

Japan — His Method Is Spreading Across Continents


Japan Spent 40 Years Adding Chemicals to Save Its Farms — One Man Removed Everything and Won

In 1938, a young Japanese plant scientist walked away from one of the most prestigious agricultural research careers in the country. While Japan was embracing chemical fertilizers, pesticides, mechanization, and industrial farming, Masanobu Fukuoka decided to remove everything.

Forty years later, his fields were producing rice yields equal to some of the most productive farms in Japan.

We explores the extraordinary story of Masanobu Fukuoka and Natural Farming, one of the most influential agricultural experiments ever conducted. Following a near-fatal illness, Fukuoka returned to his family's farm on Shikoku Island and began questioning every assumption of modern agriculture. He stopped plowing, stopped fertilizing, stopped spraying pesticides, stopped flooding rice paddies, and developed a system built on ecological processes rather than industrial inputs.

Using white clover cover crops, straw mulching, direct seeding, biodiversity, soil biology, and clay seed balls known as nendo dango, Fukuoka created a regenerative farming system that restored soil fertility, reduced labor, improved water efficiency, and maintained competitive rice and barley yields without synthetic chemicals.

We break down the science behind Natural Farming: soil microbiology, nitrogen fixation, cover crops, no-till agriculture, ecosystem resilience, biological pest control, and the principles that later influenced regenerative agriculture, permaculture, agroecology, and sustainable food systems worldwide.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=fLeaPhM6PoA