permaculture

[Rain Tenaqiya <raincascadia@yahoo.com>]

Dieter, why don't you write a book about your experiences and knowledge 
regarding living in the Mediterranean?  Or at least a long article for a 
permaculture magazine?  I'm going to start saving your emails.  I find your 
information extremely valuable.
 
Most of my irrigation (which I've stretched to the limit due to a variety of 
social and other factors) is applied through drip, so I don't have the 
problem of water evaporating off mulch.  I had to abandon most of my small 
annual beds, so most of what I'm talking about is trees and shrubs.  Most of 
these are still only up to three feet in diameter.  I've tried to give the 
trees about 10 gallons (40 liters) a week, but by mid July or August I can 
usually only afford about 7 gallons.  Some trees are doing better than 
others, but I have the intuitive feeling that the few trees I hand water 
three times a week seem happier.  My gut tells me that younger trees (at 
least) really need to have the entire surface of the soil near their roots 
remain moist, not just a the column of soil below a drip emitter.  I've been 
surprised at how poorly the figs, chestnuts, and almonds have fared, but I've 
been impressed by the growth of certain acacias, especially
 Acacia dealbata, despite its flammability).  My soil varies from 
serpentine-derived heavy blue clay (high in magnesium and calcium) to sandy 
clay loam with pH values from 5.5 to 6.9.  The new pond we built is slowly 
filling and I hope this will change the whole irrigation situation radically. 
 I feel the trees need two or three times the water I'm giving them (the 
University of California at Davis says I should be giving them 10-25 gallons 
a DAY rather than a week!).
 
My kitchen garden experience here is still very limited, but I plan to mulch 
the entire thing.  I can't stand using short-lived plastic drip lines at the 
density needed for this application, so I am actually thinking about using 
microsprayers or even sprinklers, even though these are less efficient and 
create other problems.  I don't want to spend half my day hand watering, 
either.  Flood irrigating furrows might be cool, if I could figure out an 
automated method.
 
As for biochar, it is hard for me to see doing it on any scale given the 
involved preparation.  I can't imagine the people who created Terra Preta 
went through all this trouble, though the tropical context makes a big 
difference in how the charcoal would interact with the soil.
 
All my life has been spent in maritime climates, even in California, until 
now, so it is taking me some time to adjust.  A lot of the recommendations I 
hear from people are inappropriate to this climate.  For example, cover crops 
here never do as well as the wild plants that are already here.  We have 
several species of native and exotic clovers, plus two species of vetch, that 
virtually cover the ground.  Wild oats probably grow as well as any other 
grass.  Most of the cover crops need more rain than we get, or require soil 
cover, so are only appropriate for small, cultivated areas like the kitchen 
garden.



>From bwaldrop@cox.net  Fri Dec  4 13:57:53 2009
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Dieter,

What do you mean by "dirt mulch"?

Bob Waldrop, Oklahoma City
www.energyconservationinfo.org



Dieter Brand wrote:
> Rain,
> tilling and manure for Dryland Faming with a Dirt Mulch.  The dirt mulch 
> is extremely efficient in cutting soil evaporation to zero.