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  • From: "Pete Gasper, Gasper Family Farm" <farmer1@gasperfarm.com>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] A school near a terraced rice field in Vietnam
  • Date: Tue, 07 Jan 2014 20:34:26 -0600

Look into the terracing construction methods of the Inca's. Sounds similar to the things Lawrence discusses for the Asian terrases and maybe more along the lines of the solution you need.

They were creating productive terracing systems on what for all intensive purposes looks like near vertical rocky slopes.

On 01/07/2014 10:14 AM, Jay Woods wrote:
I appreciate the effort you went through to get the references. I have read
them all.

But (he wrote with a smile) they are not designed for my constraints: thin
soil, steep
slopes, little water, and 30 miles to the nearest Keystone paver. The
following gives an
idea of the lay of the land:

* http://www.inmagine.com/imb091/imb0910770-photo

Unfortunately, the rock formations are not layer cake geology either here in
Nevada in
the basin and range province. The closest I have been able to come to
techniques is:
* http://www.merip.org/mer/mer254/water-conflict-cooperation-yemen
Unfortunately, the water rights have been stripped from the land and well
drilling is not
an option. The article plainly indicates that it wasn't much of a solution
anyway.
Somehow I need to build terrace walls that are sealed against water leakage
and that
insulate enough that cold weather won't heave the walls using only readily
available
local materials which means rocks, dirt, and pinyon pine and plenty of hand
labor. As I
am used to mining, converting some of the local limestone to quicklime has
never
been a difficult task.

On Monday, January 06, 2014 08:05:01 PM Neil Bertrando wrote:
In general for construction, earthworks and other technical information
require detailed calculations, specs, design parameters, etc. I refer to
FAO, NRCS, engineering, and construction references.

you might also consider utilizing the keyline design system for layout.

Here's a list of resources. hope it helps.

Soil conservation techniques for hillside farms
http://www.nzdl.org/gsdlmod?e=d-00000-00---off-0hdl--00-0----0-10-0---0---0d
irect-10---4-------0-1l--11-en-50---20-home---00-0-1-00-0-0-11-1-0utfZz-8-00
&cl=CL1.16.9&d=HASHbdde2fe3749493c1a0de2d.1&gt=2

NRCS engineering field manual chapter 8 Terraces
http://irrigationtoolbox.com/NEH/Part650_EngineeringFieldHandbook/EFH-CH08.p
df

FAO Watershed mgmt field manual ch 9
http://www.fao.org/docrep/006/ad083e/ad083e10.htm

FAO Irrigation Water mgmt: Irrigation methods
http://www.fao.org/docrep/s8684e/s8684e03.htm

bench terrace design made simple
http://tucson.ars.ag.gov/isco/isco12/VolumeIV/BenchTerraceDesignMadeSimple.p
df

FAO Watershed mgmt field manual ch 6
http://www.fao.org/docrep/006/ad083e/ad083e07.htm

FAO Watershed mgmt field manual ch 8
http://www.fao.org/docrep/006/ad083e/AD083e09.htm

retaining wall manual for Keystone pavers
http://www.keystonewalls.com/media/Literature/ConstManual.pdf

Am Soc of Ag engineers terrace manual. not able to access but would like to
http://elibrary.asabe.org/abstract.asp?aid=41193&t=2&redir=&redirType=
On Mon, Jan 6, 2014 at 12:09 PM, Jay Woods<woodsjaya@gmail.com> wrote:
I'd like to try terracing on 5 acres of hillside here in Nevada. It is dry
country so the water table needs to be perched in each terrace. Do you
have
any sources on their construction? I remember seeing terracing used under
these conditions in the Mid-East.

On Monday, January 06, 2014 12:24:21 PM Lawrence London wrote:
On Mon, Jan 6, 2014 at 10:38 AM, Pete Gasper, Gasper Family Farm<

farmer1@gasperfarm.com> wrote:
What kind of soil is underneath those fields? Here in America we'd
consider
that too steep to plant or do much anything with besides maybe cattle
or

scrub timber. But then you can't run a combine with a 30' header
across it

and our soils of such geography tend to have stone a few inches down.
But

I
wonder if human scale agriculture could radically expend food
production

here via methods like that.

The amount of planning that goes into the design, construction and soil

preparation of those terraces is incredible. I read an article on a
group
that rebuilt some that had been damaged from erosion when the walls
collapsed. I guess construction methods vary according to materials
available on site but usually a lot of dry-laid stonework goes into the
foundation of each terrace wall. Drainage and wall reinforcement is part
of

the process. I think some Asian rice terraces date back thousands of
years.

The steep terrain was all the people had to work with, little or no flat
land. Here in the US the best farmland, prime, not marginal, should be
protected from development and made available for agricultural use only
employing natural methods and materials and permaculture.

There is no reason that prime farm soil on hilly terrain could not be
terraced and farmed productively. Depending on slope techniques using
Yeoman Keyline plows to backhoes, to skid loaders to track loaters to
track

hoes could be used. Water would be a big issue and impoundments would be
necessary. I am talking about earthworks only, without any masonry
components unless they are abundant on site and can be used in situ
along
with the soil used to build the earthworks. An in depth permaculture
systems design could be created using polyculture, livestock, fish,
crustaceans, crop diversity, post harvest methods that recycle
byproducts,

chinampas, all ideas taken from certain terraced regions in the
Phillipines

where permaculture is practiced traditionally and is the de facto
standard

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