Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["TradingPostPaul" <tradingpost@riseup.net>]

Certainly. The storage I'm planning is not for drinking, though it could of
course be filtered and purified. I've experimented with soil cement and the
general ratio is one part Portland to ten parts soil. With clay the ratio
goes higher. I've found a three-inch slab is close to concrete, and an
eight-inch wall is practically indestructible (and immovable!) and doesn't
soften or crumble in rain, far as I can tell. Haven't tried ferrocement
because soil cement seems a lot less work. A cylindrical soil cement wall
and floor four feet deep would be coated with sealer and should hold water
loss to a bare minimum. Covered air tight of course. In ground seems
simpler than above ground, unless we need gravity for water flow. It just
seems a shame to let the greenhouse and house runoff go to waste, esp where
you don't have growing space near the house and need to save garden water
for months at a time to get through dry spells. 

paul, tradingpost@riseup.net

*********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********

On 7/20/2006 at 1:32 PM art corbit wrote:

>Hi Paul,
>
>I haven't said anything yet but this rain water collection and storage has
>been mentioned a few times. I just want to caution people to be very
>careful
>with rain water storage especially under ground. Over time it can develop
>some real bad little buggers that will make you real sick.
>
>In times past these "Cisterns" as they were called were widely used and
>became one of the major sources for Typhoid and some other bad diseases.
>Just for watering the garden or the animals it is fine but not for
>drinking.
>I guess I probably need to post some plans for a simple solar still for
>pure
>drinking water just in case someone should have a need for it.
>
>Art in Arkansas
>