Why No Clay? Manure? Sand? Forest Mould?!

greasemonkeymann · Oct 16, 2014

Rrog said:
Hi Everyone! What a great thread! I'm a big fan of biochar. You can soak in any high-N material. You can consider soaking in a microbial tea of some sort to pre-innoculate microbes, but that's not what I do, since microbes will reproduce and start living in the biochar right away. No need to pre-innoculate for microbes. Fresh biochar will hold N like crazy, but release it later.

It's a great aeration amendment and holds water also.

this is a great thread!
So do you use an alfalfa tea? Some use urine or high nitrogen guano?
What about a lite nitrogen manure like rabbit?
I'm kinda liking the idea of alfalfa, EWC, and some rabbit poo

Rrog · Oct 16, 2014

Those are all excellent N sources. I'd make a slurry so it's wet. Let the char soak a few hours.

Or you could do as St0w's wife insists- pee right into a bag of Cowboy Charcoal. Why do you think they call it cowboy charcoal?

st0wandgrow · Oct 16, 2014

I wish we could all take a field trip to Rrogs new place. Some cool shit happening there! :-)

cannakis · Oct 16, 2014

st0wandgrow said:
Rrog is making his own. He's using a 35 gallon steel drum inside of a 50 gal. I'll shoot him a text and see if he can pop in here and school us.....

Haha awesome! I would love that! I want to make my own charcoal too... I remember seeing something like you stack it three feet high and wide and like I don't start a fire on the sides or middle I don't remember exactly, but then throw some sod, mud or something over the pile... And you have to watch it because a small flare up and especially using Pine the wwhole pile will be lost and go to ash.

Rrog · Oct 16, 2014

Next year we'll have a drum circle or something. At least cook a bunch of BBQ

cannakis · Oct 16, 2014

Haha I had no idea this exploded and rrog is already responded.! Haha I will have to get to reading.

Rrog · Oct 16, 2014

This is the double barrel retort I used as a starting point for this newer design

cannakis · Oct 16, 2014

Rrog said:
Next year we'll have a drum circle or something. At least cook a bunch of BBQ

Haha I don't know what this is in response to yet but I Am down! I have gotten addicted to True smoked pork with real Apple Cider Vinegar and just salt! Mmmhhmm damn it has changed my life forever! A Whole Real pig over charcoal All day! And I used to Hate BBQ.

greasemonkeymann · Oct 16, 2014

Rrog said:
Those are all excellent N sources. I'd make a slurry so it's wet. Let the char soak a few hours.

Or you could do as St0w's wife insists- pee right into a bag of Cowboy Charcoal. Why do you think they call it cowboy charcoal?

hahaha, that's good stuff, just right into the bag, eh?
I think we (RIU) may need to add a biochar sticky, a vermicompost sticky as well as a SST sticky.
this is some good shit

cannakis · Oct 16, 2014

st0wandgrow said:
You can buy a bag of natural charred wood (like Cowboy brand) and use that. Break it up in to 1/2" ish chunks and soak it in a high N teal for 24 hours like an alfalfa tea to charge it. Otherwise it will rob your soil of all Nitrogen

edit. @Rrog is a good guy to talk to about this

why does it rob nitrpgen? sorry if this already answered going through thread now.

greasemonkeymann · Oct 16, 2014

oh

cannakis said:
Haha I don't know what this is in response to yet but I Am down! I have gotten addicted to True smoked pork with real Apple Cider Vinegar and just salt! Mmmhhmm damn it has changed my life forever! A Whole Real pig over charcoal All day! And I used to Hate BBQ.

ohhh man, I make a damn tasty pulled pork, get a 4 lb shoulder, some apple cider vinegar, some pineapple juice(a natural tenderizer), some pineapple rings, and an orange for zest. mix the zest, the vinegar, the juice and marinade the shoulder, and before bbqing get some toothpicks to hang the pineapple rings all over the shoulder. This recipe also kicks mucho culo on half hams too.

greasemonkeymann · Oct 16, 2014

cannakis said:
why does it rob nitrpgen? sorry if this already answered going through thread now.

works like a sponge, the same attribute that makes it helpful in CEC and beneficials.
dosent really rob it, exactly, just soaks it up and releases it slowly

cannakis · Oct 16, 2014

greasemonkeymann said:
i'

im gonna go strain some of my EWC and make a molasses tea, get a bag of the charcoal, and go to town... I have some extra pots that are empty, course i'd like to re-do ALL my pots but that's a bitch... especially the 40 gallon air pots.... makes my back hurt just thinking about it.
I really like the idea though, and the more I research it, it seems for a no-till setup it'd be almost crucial, my thinking anyways

haha i hear ya! free exercise is how i look at it. fuck paying to work out. get paid to workout.

cannakis · Oct 16, 2014

greasemonkeymann said:
works like a sponge, the same attribute that makes it helpful in CEC and beneficials

ahh i got ya thanks! so it will soak up the soil n! duh d d.. that's why you soak it in n!

greasemonkeymann · Oct 16, 2014

cannakis said:
haha i hear ya! free exercise is how i look at it. fuck paying to work out. get paid to workout.

that's exactly why I do 12 pushups during every emissions test I do, I have to crawl under the car to verify the catalyst anyways, so why not?

Rrog · Oct 16, 2014

Fresh biochar will have a + charge and be one of the few items that holds Anions like N. As the biochar ages in the soil (1-2 years, as I recall) the charge changes and it becomes a more traditional Cation binder

cannakis · Oct 16, 2014

greasemonkeymann said:
oh

ohhh man, I make a damn tasty pulled pork, get a 4 lb shoulder, some apple cider vinegar, some pineapple juice(a natural tenderizer), some pineapple rings, and an orange for zest. mix the zest, the vinegar, the juice and marinade the shoulder, and before bbqing get some toothpicks to hang the pineapple rings all over the shoulder. This recipe also kicks mucho culo on half hams too.

Nice! Does sound good, but I Am much more of one for the simple things! Like chicken pastry needs to be literally Just chicken, water, salt, lots of salt, and pastry. For me just a good ole pig, charcoal/wood, salt lots of it, and pure unpasteurized apple cider vinegar. The flavors you get from that alone is insane! As Pliny wrote over 2,000 years ago, no other food provides over 50 different flavors!

cannakis · Oct 16, 2014

greasemonkeymann said:
this I KNOW I read, people say the best time is about three harvests in.
Almost like my own soil mix, my second and third runs were the best tasting and best producing

Hmm interesting.!

cannakis · Oct 16, 2014

Pattahabi said:
Another article

P-

you are always so full of information! haha! North Carolina is mentioned in this articles!

cannakis · Oct 16, 2014

Rrog said:
I'll be working on this a lot closer, since I'm looking to tweak this biochar maker (retort) design so that anyone could just follow the measurements, build a retort, and get the results. I have high temp probes to set in the actual burning chambers to monitor temps. The trick is to modify the ventilation so it burns at a certain temp. Once I have that ventilation dialed in, this could be reproduced cheap and more people can make the char in volume for cheap / free.

The trick is for biochar, we'd like a lower temp pyrolysis. More neural pH and may be better AEC (Anion Exchange Capacity)

awesome!!! dial it in! let us know!!!

Why No Clay? Manure? Sand? Forest Mould?!

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