The Sovereign Homestead Podcast – Détails, épisodes et analyse

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Building Your Sovereign Homestead

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Floating Wetland Gardens In Pantry Ponds For Resilience, Function and Yield Stacking ~Epi-079

Saison 2 · Épisode 79

lundi 29 avril 2024 • Durée 01:01:34

Floating wetlands are a "new" old technology that is well worth looking into if you are doing aquaculture at just about any scale - from small backyard tanks a few hundred gallons in size, on up to multi-acre ponds and lakes.

Floating wetlands take the essential functions provided by wetlands and concentrated them into a smaller and more mobile footprint. Wetlands are the kidneys of the landscape, and floating wetlands amplify many of those beneficial functions, such as:

Integrated wetland (edge) functionality into an open water body = excess nutrient removal and water clarification
Increased biomass production = more habitat and more food for livestock, wildlife and humans
More "optimized edge" without reducing storage volumes in ponds
Shade - decreases water temps, reduces algal growth potential by reducing light in the water column
Shelter - fish shelter underneath and amongst the hanging roots
- some systems even have protected fish spawning beds hung underneath the island
Shoreline protection / floating breakwaters - if wave erosion is a thing in your pond, consider a chain of floating islands to reduce wave action and protect vulnerable edges while also creating a highly-valuable living filter element
Habitat Creation - floating islands contain so much edge in such a small space, they inevitably create habitat for many forms of life - from the micro (biofilms) to the macro (water fowl and fish) and everything in between.
Waste water treatment - floating rafts with nutrient-accumulating vegetation are utilized to clarify and treat sewage effluent

Floating gardens are great for the homesteader as well. They are self-watering (obvious, but worth mentioning), benefit from increased sunlight availability to crops (light reflected off the water's surface to crop plants on the island), pest protection (no burrowing or terrestrial garden pests are going to make it to your floating garden - unless you've got Navy SEAL gophers!). They make excellent floating hutches for water fowl. Some folks have experimented with adding solar lights, fans and wheedwhackers to create nocturnal fish feeders by attracting insects and knocking them into the water for the fish to eat.

There are many ways to make floating islands - from DIY to pre-made - this would make an amazing summer time home-school project - construction, design, aquatic ecology, observation, nature time...talk about stacking functions!

Show Resources

YouTube Playlist: Living Systems - Food Production - Floating Gardens
Pre-made / Custom BioHaven Floating Islands
Epi-59: Sovereign Food Systems - Pantry Ponds
Epi-61: Up-Leveling Calorie Production Per Square Foot With Azolla
Epi-64: Using Duckweed To Grow More Calories Per Square Foot
Epi-62: 5 Tenets Of Carnivore Homesteading

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WHAT I DO: Resilient Human Habitats Where People And Ecology Thrive Together

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Adaptive vs. Prescriptive Management For Homesteads And Lifestyle Design ~Epi-070

lundi 12 février 2024 • Durée 39:42

Adaptive Management: Observation-driven management for constantly increasing resilience and ecosystem function by employing planned, purposeful disruption.

Prescriptive Management: Labeling your observations so that you can look up a prescription that fits that label. This is a much more myopic way of managing a landscape, as you're automatically confining yourself to pre-existing solutions for truly unique problems or challenges.

Adaptation is Nature's way. Nature is always changing - things may rhyme but they are never exactly the same. Therefore our management needs to change with this constantly changing landscape.

3 Rules of Adapative Management

Compounding: every decision creates a cascade of compounding effects, these effects are never neutral, they are either positive or negative with regards to ecosystem function and whether or not they move you closer to your Quality of Life goals or further from them.
Diversity: Greater species diversity is always better, and creates positive compounding effects.
Disruption: Introduce planned, purposeful disruption in order to vary the stimulus that the landscape receives to continue making gains in ecosystem function, homestead efficiency and resilience, and enterprise profitability.

Never assume you've got it in the bag! ALWAYS base your actions on observation - adapt to the feedback that Nature is always providing, instead of prescribing from a narrow field of pre-existing solutions.

Show Resourcesb

https://understandingag.com/resources/fact-sheets/
Adapative Grazing Webinar - 3 Part Series w/ Allen Williams: https://pastureproject.org/webinar-archive/adaptive-grazing-101-webinar-series-with-dr-allen-williams/
About Dr. Allen Williams: https://soilhealthacademy.org/team/dr-allen-williams/
VIDEO: What Is Adaptive Grazing?

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Why We Use Functions-First Design To Create Holistic Ecosystems ~Epi-069

Saison 2 · Épisode 69

lundi 5 février 2024 • Durée 47:36

When we design holistic ecosystems, we start with mapping out desired and required functions THEN search for, select and/or design elements/systems that provide those functions in a way that aligns with the site-specific context.

This is contrasted with how most people "design" systems - they see an ad or read an article and like the thing or the method/technique they see, and then say "I want thing A" or "I'm going to do technique B" on my land.

And then systems start being built around these sexy, cool things that are out of alignment with the context of time and place.

Today I hope I can convince you that starting your homestead design (or re-design) by first assessing your desired and required functions - and thus creating a map of functions and functional outcomes that you require to support your chosen Quality of Life - that you can then much more quickly and effectively design or select the appropriate elements to populate your design.

This is functions-first design, and I encourage everyone to at least give function mapping a try when designing their homesteads.

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Off-Grid Soil Fertility For Sovereign Food Systems ~Epi-068

Saison 2 · Épisode 68

lundi 29 janvier 2024 • Durée 58:56

If you are serious about food sovereignty, you're serious about building soil.

In this episode I detail 4 methods for creating your own soil fertility inputs from what you are already growing, can source on your property or very close to home, or are already in the course of putting food on your table. They are:

Vermicomposting ------------------> good biology
Compost Tea Brewing --------------> amplify biology
Biochar ----------------------------> retain biology
Plant-based Liquid Fertilizer --------> feed biology

It is in the SYNERGY between these methods that the real exponential gains are to be found. I chose vermicomposting as a way to create good biology in the first place as it is relatively simple to get started with and will yield returns of worm castins within a growing season or less.

Next, utilize aerobic compost tea brewing to expand the amount of beneficial biology you have created from the worm castings. Once you have a tea you can spray it and cover large areas of plant bodies or soil surface with beneficial biology and nutrients. This is WAY more efficient than spot application of compost.

Next, use your aerobic compost tea inoculated with worm castings to inoculate charcoal and turn it into biochar! Biochar is a millennia+ soil amendment - it will outlive you and the next 20+ generations in the soil - and it will provide a home for beneficial biology and retain nutrients for the entire time it persists. This is as close to an infinite improvement as we can get in our human form.

And finally, to charge up naked charcoal and give all the beneficial biology something to eat, we make anaerobically fermented weed tea (though animal products can be used too) to create a mineral and nutrient rich solution. Use your compost tea brewing set up to hyper-aerate this solution to kill all of the anaerobic organisms, leaving a nutrient soup, and then introduce naked charcoal and beneficial micro-organisms (vermicompost) to create a nutrient-rich, hydrated, beneficial microbe hotel that will provide increasing benefit to your growing systems year after year without you having to do it year after year.

This is about getting off the treadmill of annual inputs. Don't give your money to the big fertilizer companies when you can make a way better, site-specific product on your own for very cheap that doesn't have a long-term downside like typicaly salt-based fertilizers and centralized, commodity soil amendments.

Food sovereignty can be acheived when our food systems build soil by default. That is what this synergy can do for you.

Resources

DIY Soil Fertility - Part 1: Vermicomposting
DIY Soil Fertility - Part 3: Compost Tea Brewing
DIY Soil Fertility - Part 6: Charcoal & Biochar
DIY Soil Fertility - Part 8: Fermented Liquid Nutrient Fertilizers - write up coming soon!

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Biosolids: America's Dirty Secret ~Epi-067

Saison 2 · Épisode 67

dimanche 21 janvier 2024 • Durée 01:12:10

Today is an expose about one of America's dirty secrets - we're talking about the nation wide biosolids program.

Supposedly its a great way to beneficially cycle a "renewable resource" to help fertilize crop fields, protect water sheds and keep people healthy.

In reality, its anything but - and we know from first hand knowledge because we lived with it right across the street from us for months.

For any would-be homesteader looking to re-locate to the country, be aware of the potential for biosolids in your watershed and potentially right across the fence (as in our case).

This is a huge problem, one that has resulted from a society and civil infrastructure built around the assumptions of a perpetual and never-ending supply of cheap energy. Now those chickens are coming home to roost, and its on us to fix it. First things first we have to learn just how extensive the problem of dealing with our own shit is so we can wrap our heads around what will be required to retrofit existing systems to make them work for a lower energy future.

Show Resources

Actual EPA Laws & Regs: https://www.epa.gov/biosolids/biosolids-laws-and-regulations
- Plain English version (its 175 pages long - don't get too excited): https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2018-12/documents/plain-english-guide-part503-biosolids-rule.pdf
EPA Propaganda Page for National Biosolids Initiative: https://www.epa.gov/biosolids
PFAS Guide Doc: https://www.epa.gov/system/files/documents/2023-07/Joint-Principles-Preventing-Managing-PFAS.pdf
The EPAs sheet on PFAS: https://www.epa.gov/pfas/pfas-explained
EWG PFAS Factsheet: https://static.ewg.org/ewg-tip-sheets/EWG-AvoidingPFCs.pdf
https://thesovereignhomestead.com/soil-fertility-for-homesteads-vermicompost/
Home Bio Gas Toilet - turn your sewage and food waste into methane gas for cooking and valuable and SAFE fertilizer for your garden: https://www.homebiogas.com/

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Making Landfall - Your First 60 Days On The Land ~Epi-066

Saison 2 · Épisode 66

lundi 15 janvier 2024 • Durée 52:28

Today's show is all about the things you have to do to get yourself onto your land quickly without shooting yourself in the foot withe improperly located or oriented structures and roads.

Vehicle access is basically an absolute necessity in today's world. By their very nature, roads are a break from the inherent landform, and thus ALL ROADS CAPTURE AND MOVE WATER. This is just part of what a road does.

If you put in a road, or are inheriting a road without understanding that fact, you will pay for it later - all it takes is one good storm.

So today, in this first installment of the Making Landfall series, we're zero-ing in on Water > Access > Structures - the three primary design layers that have to get sorted out quickly when you move onto a new landscape. Where am I going to live? How am I going to get to it? How will this affect and be affected by water moving through the landscape?

This show is about the essential things you need to do to get it right and not create a Type 1 Error that will hamper your efforts to create your sovereign homestead as long as it exists.

Show Resources

Vehicle Access For Regenerative Landscapes - First Principles ~ the basic principles that guide planning and implementing vehicle access that has a regenerative effect on your site hydrology and ecosystem function.
Vehicle Access For Regenerative Landscapes - Essential Terminology & Guiding Questions For Watershed Assessment ~ all the things you need to know and consider when assessing your landscape to plan efficient, low-maintenance, high-function vehicle access.
Water Drainage Elements Index - blog post index of lesser-known cross drains and drainage elements more suited to regenerative water management.
Don't install 'not my problem tubes' unless you absolutely have to! Yeah, I'm talking about culverts here - I rarely see these done well, especially with regards to what happens with the water after it leaves the culvert. Perhaps try a rolling dip instead!

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A Strong WHY Can Bear Almost Any HOW ~ Epi-065

Saison 2 · Épisode 65

dimanche 7 janvier 2024 • Durée 30:27

New Year's Evolution. This show is about doing the most important work first - your own internal visioning - an rooting that vision in your heart to create a WHY strong enough to bear any HOW. If you haven't done it yet, give yourself the gift of creating your Minimum Holistic Goal. It is the ONE THING that will make everything else that comes after easier, more fun and more effective.

Creating a legacy worth inheriting starts in you.

Let your life be a love letter to future generations and leave beauty in your wake. That's how we create a world worth inheriting.

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Using Duckweed To Grow More Calories Per Square Foot ~ Epi-064

Saison 2 · Épisode 64

vendredi 29 décembre 2023 • Durée 42:04

Duckweed is an amazingly productive floating aquatic plant that is highly palatable to a wide variety of small and large livestock (ruminants, pigs, poultry, fish etc). Duckweed is a tremendous ally for those of us looking to create independence from centralized commodity food systems. You may not want to eat duckweed (though you can) but what you eat is very likely to benefit from having duckweed in its diet (and your wallet will thank you for it!).

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The 7th Generation Principle - Designing For Continuity Across Generations ~ Epi-063

Saison 2 · Épisode 63

vendredi 22 décembre 2023 • Durée 01:18:15

In this episode I am sharing what I have come to call the 7th Generation Principle - a principle guide post of sorts that I've been refining for nearly 10 years now to help guide my design work (for my own life and for others) in the direction of inter-generational regeneration.

Basically, it seems like throughout human history we've actually lived in a truly sustainable fasion - i.e. regeneratively. Some of those examples even persisted for quite some time, but now we are left with very few intact cultures that can successfully transmit the cultural values of regeneration through time from one generation to the next. Even those that still exist are struggling to keep it up.

This principles is my attempt at refining design imperatives such that we prepare fertile soil for the values of regeneration to once again take root in the hearts and minds of the up and coming generations, and for them to have the tools to successfully transmit those values to their descendants.

We'll break down all the context and various pieces of it in the podcast, but here it is in full:

A 7th generation system creates socially and economically fulfilling lives for its inhabitants, whose daily activity patterns regenerate natural ecosystems and increase living capital year over year, such that the economic and social value of natural ecosystems is always increasing, and the value-ing of those systems is transmitted intact across generations.

In this episode I'll walk through the questions that led to me writing this principle this way, and the ways to apply it in your own lifestyle design using the Regenerative Triple Bottom Line - Economic, Social and Ecological to create guiding criteria and questions to assess if you're on target or not.

Show Resources

BLOG POST: The 7th Generation Principle - Designing Regenerative Systems For Continuity Across Generations
VIDEO: The Living Root Bridges Of Meghalaya (4 min)
VIDEO: India - The Living Bridges - ARTE.tv documentary (24 min)

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