[Terrapreta] Larry's comments

[Richard Haard]

when I posted the flicker links to our charcoal making session I  
should have sent a slightly different link that has comments on each  
picture.
Anyone who would like to look at these they are here in my charcoal  
photoset

http://www.flickr.com/photos/rchaard/sets/72157594444994347/


Incidently we have decided to leave the pile cook until next weekend  
it is steaming and smoking happily away today and we are thinking it  
will do no harm to let it sit and cool slowly.

Here is what Larry had to say about our project.

Bill-------We have been caught... between two worlds. Between a very  
old process and modern conveniences... between two personalities, one  
firmly rooted in American agriculture while the other is exploring  
the edge of ecology via observation. We have thoroughly enjoyed this  
interplay (occasionally in public) for at least twenty years. Mainly,  
we have found value in aspects of the other's perspective. We learn  
together.

Rich and I have put this project together with the gracious will of  
Todd Jones and our own curiosity. Up to this point Rich bought the  
cord of dry hardwood and Todd lent the field and the tractor... this  
effort has been done on a financial shoestring and the materials on  
hand.

To answer your question on what we used to start the fire and why it  
was started before it was covered is more of a process than a  
specific item used. A process involving our personalities.

The pallet boards were placed under the firewood to provide good air  
flow for the fire and I wanted to have a solid body of heat to  
capture before minimizing the air flow with layers of materials that  
would act as barriers to the collapsing mass of burnables. These  
barriers functioned to support the roof so that there was less  
opportunity for a hotspot (outside air access) to develop and, to a  
certain degree, provide volatile organic material to a cooling fire.

Fire logs were used to start the fire, reasonably dry wood and access  
to air (a raised stack of wood) caused the fire to get out of control  
while we layered above the hardwood. It was the front end loader (a  
tractor with four-wheel drive) that really brought the fire under  
control by dumping field soil on top of the final layer of cardboard.

I was attempting to have the burn act  more like a cooking pit than  
pyrolized charcoal.

The example we used to model after is how did the Amazonian fires  
create Terra Preta not how to make charcoal. I believe that 8,000  
years ago that the partially cook residue in camp fires, which  
included charcoal, led to the observation that plants grow better in  
old fire pits than in areas that were not fired.

Encasing wood in a steel chamber, heating that chamber to produce  
charcoal may not produce immediate benefits for growing plants. Yes,  
there is an immediate benefit for the sequestering of carbon but the  
value of Terra Preta includes both values---increased food production  
and the capture of atmospheric carbon via photosynthesis (wood).

What I have described here is a process to prioritized my activities  
towards increased food production and finding the techniques that an  
individual gardener or small farmer could replicate.

I hope this gives you a better understanding of Rich's description  
and of the pictures that he took. If you have any other questions  
about what we did or what our next step is, please ask.

  Thanks for the question. May we live in abundance-------Larry