Sepp Holzer on ponds and "the monk"

This thread is to discuss the "ponds and the monk" section of the Sepp Holzer's Permaculture article.

Sepp does not like to draw pictures. In twelve days of training, Sepp never did a powerpoint, although he did have somebody else show some of his pictures from previous projects.

The way he conveys nearly all information is through telling stories and interpretive dance. By "interpretive dance" I mean that he speaks a lot through his hands. Maybe that was just because most of us in the audience didn't speak german - but I see him doing it in the german video too.

"The Monk" is something he frequently talks about. Through interpretive dance. He places his right elbow in his left hand and makes his right forearm perfectly vertical. After a second, he moves his right fist left and right a few inches.

I've seen him do this about 40 times now.

All ponds have a high flow over flow that is used sporatically, but the monk is there for 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. It is a pipe that goes through the dam at a low point. Inside the pond there is an elbow that will connect this pipe with a pipe that goes to the surface. The top of the second pipe will then determine the water level of the pond.

These two pipes and the elbow are "The Monk". The key is, that the elbow is a tight fit, but can still slide a little. So if you move the monk side to side, you can adjust the depth of the pond.

When we were at Mowich farm, Sepp was quick to point at a culvert and holler "catastrophe!" (a word that must be the same in german and english). He then tells a story about how there will be a great rain storm at 2am and the culvert plugs, the water rises, runs over the dam and the dam is destroyed. As part of the story he holds his hands together and places them next to his head to show the pond owner asleep at 2am.

Later that day, I asked if the monk would ever plug: "NEVER!" The interpretive dance had the body language of waving me off because I'm a stupid child (with good humor). He then talked about how they use the monk in some interesting ways to "vacuum" up algae, elodea and even silt. They would go so far as to attach poly pipe to the end of the monk and then buzz around the pond sucking up all sorts of things. And what's fun is to put an even longer pipe on the downhill side and then you get super duper suction power.

Later I asked Josef, who tends to be a bit more humble: he says that it is true, you can have all sorts of leaves and other debris in the pond and monks just don't seem to plug up.

So, I'm thinking about this ... and I think I can see it ... because 1/16 or 1/8 of an inch of water goes over the edge of the monk and into the monk. Then debris, which is gonna have some in the water and some out, won't be able to make that tiny, sharp, downard turn. Debris would just sit around outside the monk. The culvert could do the same trick if it were lower in the dam and had an upwards elbow. Big sticks and logs ... the only stuff that could plug the 18 inch culvert we were looking at ... would not be able to get over the edge of the same culvert standing on end.

I have lots and lots more to say about all of this, but for now I need to post what I've written so far and make some pictures to better explain myself ....

So here is my rendition of a pond with a standard culvert.

And here is my rendition of the same pond with the culvert modified so that it will, in theory, not plug. I can just hear Sepp getting all upset over my use of the word "theory", because to him, it is absolute fact.

Now I've zoomed in on the stick coming up on the culvert ...

And I've tried to modify the picture a little to show the stick much closer to the culvert. The stick will stop at the outside edge of culvert and go no further.

Maybe I missed it in skimming, but what size pipe was Sepp using for the "Monk?"

Quittrack wrote:
Maybe I missed it in skimming, but what size pipe was Sepp using for the "Monk?"

I think it depends a lot on the size of flow he expects. But I get the impression that most of his monk's are about 2 inches in diameter. I think some are as small as an inch.

There is more and more and more to add here. It will probably take me a month to get it all out. But here is a tidbit that I thought was really interesting:

Sepp has 72 ponds at his place and he has probably built hundreds of ponds outside of his property.

He has been fiddling with the very top edge of the monk ....

This might be a good time to point out that in a couple of his videos you can see the monk in action. And in at least one shot is a close-up, complete with sound and the monk is making this "thip-thip-thip-thip" sound. Sepp thinks that getting the monk to make that sound is the best thing ever.

So, he's fiddling with the top edge just a tiny bit - like a millimeter worth of fiddling. He's trying to encourage the water to go down the monk as a spiral. But if he can get the "thip-thip-thip" that's even better.

He talks about getting a lot of oxygen in the water. And he talks about catching fish out of the pond where the water comes out of a monk from a higher pond and dribbles into this pond. So he will catch fish from the end of the pond where the water dribbles in and from the other end. The fish from the end with with water coming in have more life and energy than any other fish on his property. I've heard him tell this story three times, where the fish is so full of life it even leaps out of the pan (no innards and no head). repeatedly. He ends up cooking the fish by holding it in the pan.

Sepp has a certain sort of spiritual connection with his land. And it seems that this whole life force thing involving the spiraling water in the monk is a really big part of it. And the "thip-thip-thip" is even better.

I kinda wonder if it is nothing more than the water has a maximum of dissolved oxygen at that point, and that is what makes the fish so lively. My impression is that Sepp thinks there is more to it.

Well, the man is obviously very charismatic, and quite eccentric... What he believes is probably up for speculation due to language barriers, but he does seem to reside in a little different reality than the rest of us.

Most of the best minds live in a world all their own, and seem to not only think outside the box, but don't even know of the existence of the box. In a lot of cases, that's referred to as Autism. I have two sons who have it. And everything is black and white with them, no in between. (which i thought of when Paul was saying how everything that he didn't come up with was a "catastrophe."

He's brilliant, that much is certain. He's just a little out there. he's a rebel.

paul wheaton wrote:

I kinda wonder if it is nothing more than the water has a maximum of dissolved oxygen at that point, and that is what makes the fish so lively. My impression is that Sepp thinks there is more to it.

you always catch the best fish at the bottom of the dam! I think your right about the dissolved oxygen. but I am not real spiritually minded and try not to assign more meaning to things than is neccesary. sometimes something just is what it is. great idea to keep it from clogging.

Not sure if this is the thread, but I just watched the video about sealing ponds with saturation & vibration.

Sepp Holzer talks a little bit about the Brazil nut effect in that video, but doesn't speak of it by name. He talks about rocks and sand working their way up to the surface as things are shaken. More importantly, though, clay and silt will work their way down, for precisely the same reason; if there are too many coarse particles, the coarsest layer can be skimmed off and more assorted soil put in its place.

I wanted to provide links to more info on the mechanisms involved...especially for anyone who is having trouble following Mr. Holzer's reasoning, or wants more theory behind their efforts to adopt his methods:

Brazil Nut Effect
Soil Liquefaction

Notice in the picture at the bottom of the second article, how the largest particle (the sewer system) has worked its way upward, forcefully enough to tear up the pavement. The caption mentions buoyancy, which certainly played a role, but I doubt that is the whole story.

One little thing about the life energy:

The monk slurps down much of the surface of the pond, including probably a lot of algae and insects. Fish living in that effluent would probably not only get more oxygen, but better food. Not only more calories, but likely also more omega-3 fatty acids, which allow animals to keep moving even with a cold body temperature.

Joel Hollingsworth wrote:
Not sure if this is the thread, but I just watched the video about sealing ponds with saturation & vibration.

Sepp Holzer talks a little bit about the Brazil nut effect in that video, but doesn't speak of it by name. He talks about rocks and sand working their way up to the surface as things are shaken. More importantly, though, clay and silt will work their way down, for precisely the same reason; if there are too many coarse particles, the coarsest layer can be skimmed off and more assorted soil put in its place.

I wanted to provide links to more info on the mechanisms involved...especially for anyone who is having trouble following Mr. Holzer's reasoning, or wants more theory behind their efforts to adopt his methods:

Brazil Nut Effect
Soil Liquefaction

Notice in the picture at the bottom of the second article, how the largest particle (the sewer system) has worked its way upward, forcefully enough to tear up the pavement. The caption mentions buoyancy, which certainly played a role, but I doubt that is the whole story.

Where is that video Joel? I would really like to watch it. All I have picked up so far is that he likes to use pigs to stomp the ground... they seem to compact it and bring about waterproofing somehow. I would love to use no liner.. so expensive. Problem is my rocks absorb water so would have to blast them away to seal effectively.

Interesting links. Never knew of that before.....brazil nut effect.

Chelle

He might be referring to this video I took:

http://www.youtube.com/paulwheaton12#p/u/18/3vHXa3y8B7M

Yes, I think that's the one.

Cyara wrote:All I have picked up so far is that he likes to use pigs to stomp the ground... they seem to compact it and bring about waterproofing somehow.

In the video, he seems to suggest that they are only tall enough to make themselves a wallow, and he wanted to work on a larger scale, so he had to train the backhoe operator to imitate the pigs. But he certainly did learn the technique from them, after much wonder and contemplation.

Cyara wrote:Problem is my rocks absorb water so would have to blast them away to seal effectively.

When you do a shake test near your intended pond site, is there any proportion of clay/fine silt? The video talks about having to scoop up the rocks that have risen to the top, and add soil, sometimes repeatedly...but blasting probably isn't required. Is the weather such where you live that keeping them wet as they freeze and thaw might be worthwhile, to increase the proportion of finer stuff?

new podcast talking about Sepp's ponds and stuff

http://www.richsoil.com/permaculture/305-podcast-035-sepp-holzer-film-discussion-2/

And another podcast (036) discussing ponds and the monk Q & A style at the pub: http://www.permies.com/permaculture-forums/1360_0/permaculture/sepp-holzer-on-ponds-and-quotthe-monkquot

Paul and Kelda continue reviewing Sepp Holzer's Permaculture (the book), chapter 1 part 5 in this podcast: podcast

They talk a lot about the monk and the energy of Sepp's water.

Here's a few photos I took of the monk in Tamera, Portugal.

With thanks to Tamir Yaari, one of the speakers at the Water Symposium and a member of the Water Landscape Design-Tamera ecology team, for not only being a model in the photos and showing how the monk moves, but also for later helping a certain fat, pain-wracked female to cross the stepping stones on our tour of the gardens without falling head-long into the stream. I still feel guilty about him getting his feet so wet...