[Terrapreta] Pottery Shards

[Kevin Chisholm]

Dear Barry

Barry at Biochar wrote:
> Hi All
>  
> My personal thinking is they used the large pots to mix up the biochar 
> into bacterial brew's before adding it to the soil or compost pits.

Very interesting thought! As a Biodynamics Practitioner, would you know 
if people were using  "bacterial brews" in Agriculture that long ago? If 
so, what would you speculate they were using for possible ingredients?
> It might be one of the reasons why they would have had so many pots 
> out in the food growing areas? The pots could have also been used to 
> hold the fresh char which was bashed into finer amounts then soaked. 
> It's just an idea.

I wonder if any Archaeologists ever re-assembled some of these shards, 
to get an idea of the nature of the vessels or containers that were in 
general use at the time? There is something very strange about the huge 
amount of pottery shards found within their living area... there was a 
major mound in a Bolivian TP area that was in the order of 30 feet tall. 
Perhaps it was simply a way of disposing of broken pottery.... dump the 
shards on the fields, and spread them around so that you could still 
grow in teh area. That would be easier than building another mound, and 
losing good land. On teh other hand, they could dump the shards on teh 
sides of tehir canals to reduce or eliminate erosion.
>  
> I'm also wondering if the pottery shards were added to keep the soil 
> in place during the Amazon wet season, I'm sure they didn't want their 
> new top soil washed away.

A cover of grass or vegetation would be much more effective, to absorb 
the impact energy of heavy rains.
>  
> One question on Terra Petra, Was the original light coloured Amazon 
> top soil found to be mixed through the black Terra Petra?

Good question! Hopefully someone can answer it for you.

Best wishes,

Kevin
>  
> Regards
>  
> Barry Batchelor
>
>     ----- Original Message -----
>     *From:* Sean K. Barry <mailto:sean.barry at juno.com>
>     *To:* lou gold <mailto:lou.gold at gmail.com> ; Kevin Chisholm
>     <mailto:kchisholm at ca.inter.net>
>     *Cc:* Terrapreta preta <mailto:terrapreta at bioenergylists.org>
>     *Sent:* Wednesday, December 12, 2007 1:27 AM
>     *Subject:* Re: [Terrapreta] Pottery Shards and CEC
>
>     Hi Kevin,
>      
>     I don't believe that charcoal amendments to soil alone can
>     increase CEC, but I am not positive.  I think the increase in CEC
>     in charcoal amended soils is attributed to the ability of the
>     charcoal to foster improved growth of the microorganism
>     populations in the soil, which increases the organic matter
>     content of the soil, which then increases the CEC.
>