shawn dunseith

The climate of the area is humid sub tropical with a dry season and a wet season. With average temperatures of 80-90F  in the wet season and 40-50f in the dry season.

I have family members who are currently living in Africa and they have been talking to me about a school /orphanage there that does really good work helping teach the most vulnerable children and adults valuable skills and the locals grow a great deal of their own food.

I'm wanting to send some books on permaculture and food production to donate.

What would be some of the best books to send?

So far, I'm thinking "Sepp Holzer Desert or Paradise" is going to be at the top of the list.  

Are there any books on Zai holes?

Wow! Thank you everyone for all the great advice!

The house was demolished and all debris was removed from the site. The house was built long after the use of lead paint had already stopped so this shouldn't be an issue but will likely get the heavy metals and agricultural soil test done anyhow. You can't ever have too much information.

I'm currently contacting all the local tree trimmers and letting them know they can dump all the wood chips they have here 24/7 so hopefully over time I'll get quite a bit and am also on the search for old rotten or just unwanted hay and straw bales that local farmers want to get rid of.

Plan on mulching as much as possible and inoculating it with good fungi and also cover cropping with the various plants which have been suggested.

Will try to take plenty of pics for future updates.

Looking to repair a newly bare piece of land. It's about an acre of fairly sloped land in rural north Missouri consisting of mostly compacted clay from where a house was just removed.

The land will remain bare (no buildings) for a few years and (might be) brush hogged once or twice a year.

What would be the best cover crops to plant to repair the compaction and begin building quality soil?

I have been kicking around the idea of building a sort of kiln like box made from possibly fire brick and clay or some other better type of high temp tolerant material and insulated with a thick layer of dirt. It would be built in a way which would allow air to be drawn through it and heated to a very high temperature with a large Fresnel lens as the top of the box. The air would then be pumped through a large mass inside a tiny house and then on into the house itself.  The air flow could be generated by a small exhaust fan at the end of the pipe inside the home.  does anyone have any thoughts on whether this might work, how efficiently it might work, best possible building materials, ect...   any thoughts are welcome

This quote is on his playing cards

Sepp

Paul

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What if I removed the permies tag? because if you google sepp holzer , permies is #5 on the list, so it would be an indirect route. just a thought