Restoring erroded land

Discussion in 'Designing, building, making and powering your life' started by Dobly, Aug 2, 2008.

  1. Dobly

    Dobly Junior Member

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    Hi all.

    We own a block of land just north of Grafton NSW. On this 5 acre block about 1 acre had been cleared before we bought it. And boy what a clearing job they did on it.

    After a flat area about the big enough for a medium sized house, the cleared land slopes down to the SW. It slopes a little at the north end of the block and lots at the south. I could provide measurements but that is not the requried here.

    What I am getting at is they totally bulldozed this part of the block to be a smooth curved hill side up to the plateau at the top where 'whoever did this to the land' planned to put the house. Needless to say that over the years since they 'developed' this block annual rain as washed all of the soil from the slopes. All that remains now is sand covered with rocks. This is 'sandstone' country..

    Now that weown the land, I want to develop the hill side with my ever growing Permaculture principles and skills.. I'm thinking swales that slow the flow of water down the slope. Then I'm thinking tons of organic matter left on the site to rot and become something good to get my gardens started. It is this that is my question.

    First up, does this sound like a plan? Would large amounts of organic mattter do the trick if left long enough and did not get washed way (thanks to well designed swales water harvesting)?

    Seconds, for the mulch itself I plan to create from the massive amount of overgrown bush that is now in the 'fire break' between our block and the next. This firebreak was only cleared a few years ago so there is LOTS of young trees, bushes and grass there that we must clear thanks to council regulations (and bush fire safety).

    My plan to get this cleared and collect up all that stuff and have it mulched and use it on our site.

    Does all this sound like a good plan? I am still new this stuff and I want to get the regeneration of the soil underway sooner rather than later.

    Let me know if you want to see photos of the block (if that makes a difference)
     
  2. ecodharmamark

    ecodharmamark Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    G'day Dobly :)

    I'm picturing your place in my mind; looks like a nasty wound.

    One of the first things you may want to consider is roughing out a site plan, which will have to take into account the following:

    Access AND water - can you accommodate water harvesting/redirecting works into your road plans?

    Building envelope - is the current site cut suitable (for your intended home, shed, etc.), or do you need to look elsewhere on the block?

    Food - gardens, orchards, animals. Got areas in mind?

    At the same time you may want to look at some remediation works to halt any further erosion. Your ideas in this regard sound OK.

    Know any permie consultants in your area? If you need some extra guidance, now might be the time to get a consultant in.

    Keep in touch, and let us know how you get on.

    Cheerio, Mark.
     
  3. Dobly

    Dobly Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    Mark

    As a picture speaks 1000 words, several pictures will speak volumes..

    This first picture is a shot or our block from Google Earth. You can see that only a section of it is (will ever be) cleared.

    [​IMG]

    This next shot shows why we want to live here..

    [​IMG]

    Now down to business..

    These next 3 shots I'll not embed in the message here as I have left them a little large so you can really see what is going on.

    This first one is a stitched together panarama, taken from a position on our north boundary about in the top middle of the cleared area. Note that the house will be at the top left of this shot and the gardens roughly in the middle of the shot. At the very right of the shot you can see what is suppose to be a wide fire break. It is from there I want to get all my fresh organic mulch.

    https://www.users.on.net/~bradford/Images/Grafton/Pana1.jpg

    This next shot shows you the sort of ground cover we have at the moment. Grim, ain't it?

    https://www.users.on.net/~bradford/Images/Grafton/GroundShot.jpg

    Finally, a shot of the hillside where someday I hope to grow fruit trees. Hard to imagine looking at this..

    https://www.users.on.net/~bradford/Images/Grafton/Slope.jpg

    Now in answer to your questions..

    >>Access AND water - can you accommodate water harvesting/redirecting works into your road plans?

    Road plans? What is a road plan? We have a road to the block already. Is that the sort of road you are talking about?

    >>Building envelope - is the current site cut suitable (for your intended home, shed, etc.), or do you need to look elsewhere on the block?

    This is sorted.. The house will be at the top of the hill on the eastern side of the block.

    >>Food - gardens, orchards, animals. Got areas in mind?

    Not exactly, but I have tons of space to play (work) with..

    >>At the same time you may want to look at some remediation works to halt any further erosion. Your ideas in this regard sound OK.

    It is encouraging to see at least some stuff growing on the side of the slope. But maybe I need to get in TONS of something to bulk up the area, then put my mulch on top, then add.. Oh I don't know.. I need help here.. I am currently read BM's Designers Manual. Will I find answers to my problems in there??

    >>>Know any permie consultants in your area? If you need some extra guidance, now might be the time to get a consultant in.

    No I don't but I'll have a look around. Here is a good place to start.. "Any permaculture consultants in or near Grafton on this forum???"

    Thanks for you informative reply Mark.

    Brad
     
  4. SueinWA

    SueinWA Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    It seems that adding any kind of loose organic material that water can shift would be a waste of money at this point. I would think that your first objective should be to cut down the speed with which the water moves down that slope.

    In Mollison's books, he shows how to reverse erosion by building barriers down the erosion channel to slow the flow of water, which would allow the water to absorb and help refill the aquifer, and eventually turn the eroded area into terraces. It occurs to me that you could do the same thing, but sort of inside-out.

    If you have access to logs or large tree limbs, lay them across the slope and pin them down with rebar or something to prevent them from shifting. Or, if you have access to a log of rocks, make long, narrow wire mesh 'cages' and fill them with rocks, positioning them across the slope.

    With barriers like these, the movement of the rainwater would be slowed, esp if you put that brush material between the barriers. Any soil or organic debris that did move downward should be trapped by the barriers and brush.

    Once the movement of the water was slowed, you could add more organic materials and hopefully end up with a stairstep arrangement down the slope that could be planted.

    Just a side note on having a home at the top of a hill... a moving fire moves uphill faster and more surely than it does downhill or sideways. Be sure to take this into account when you plant your slope, and avoid planting oil-filled growth (like eucalypts) on that slope.

    Good luck with your plants!

    Sue
     
  5. Dobly

    Dobly Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    That's what I was getting at in my first post. I figured I'd need swale to control the water and allow it to be absorbed. I have heaps of logs on the block.


    That is great to hear. I am only up to page 30 in his Designer's Manual so I'll look out for that section.

    The only book I have read on Permaculture before starting Bill's tome, was Linda Woodrow Home Garden book. That book really got me interested in Permaculture as a concept and showed one way it could work. But it doesn't have info about a sandy rocky hill side like mine

    And I have LOTS of fallen trees from the butcher job they did clearing this part of the block.

    We will be at the top of the hill (master of all we survey) :)... Thanks for the tip on oil filled plants. Much to consider and I really only want to do this once, and do it right.

    Dobly
     
  6. urbanus

    urbanus Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    A complementary reference to BM's magnum opus is Ross Mars "The Basics Of Permaculture Design". This book is written in a more approachable style and I suspect provide you with practical advice you could apply immediately. This is one of only a few permie books that I decided to purchase after reading perhaps dozens available through the library. You might also like to look at the Sepp Holzer video on terraces and raised beds on youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3iGa539a4M for inspiration on what you might be able to do with some landscape intervention.
     
  7. Paul Cereghino

    Paul Cereghino Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    You soil texture will affect how much you have to work to get water to soak in. If you really have sand, just the minimal topography will be enough to get water to soak in. Play around with a sprinkler and shovel at a small scale to get a feel for how your soil behaves under different rainfall. You might not have to do much in the way of swales to get water to soak. What would a mulch strip on contour do?

    I use lots of wood chips from arborists around here.. When we get it as grindings from clearing we call it 'hog fuel'. It works well for soil conditioning and is very stable even on a 30 degree angle slope... windrows of mulch on contour will slow runoff enough for it to soak in in sandy soil. Fine soil suspended in runoff will settle out in the mulch when the water slow and develop berms over time. You might be able to get such material dumped on site already chipped from nearby development activities depending on local practices. Chips taken from green trees is nice--you get more leaves and such.

    Manure under the mulch works great, and the biological activity that comes in animal manure may be critical for you to jump start the system. Cows are particularly nice for this--nice and fresh is fine. Rock powder too to increase your nutrient base. Sand soils don't hold water or nutrients... organic matter is the trick, with a SLOW supply of nutrients and no more than you baby soil can hold--it'll just wash out otherwise.

    Woody mulch can carry smouldery fire in a long dry season. Buried wood is nice.. water soaks in deep, wood stores it -- but then you need to dig the hole! Your other trick is legumes... nitrogen fixing trees, shrubs and forbs.
     
  8. Luisa

    Luisa Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    Your comments are very interesting Paul. I am also trying to rehab degraded soil, albeit my place is gently sloping.

    I can source wood chips in some volume as my neighbour is a lawn mower with a side gig as a tree mulcher. It suits him to give me his wood chips as it saves him paying land fill costs and hence makes him competitive with similar businesses. I have got several loads off him of late, but was told it would wash away in rains. We are using it as mulch and also to prevent the start of erosion along tracks etc.

    We are also now sourcing stable manure from the racetrack (5 minutes away). They have a huge stockpile they are trying to get rid of. It is a mixture of sawdust, hay and horse droppings, steeped in horse urine.

    The process we are now using is coincidentally very much like you describe. We are using what we can get our hands on and what we can handle. So I am very pleased to read your advice. Our soon-to-be sweet potato patch is getting a layer of chips topped by a layer of stable manure. Then it will be fenced off and the plants started.

    I'm all in favour of recycling other people's wastes in soil rehabilitation.

    Luisa
     
  9. Luisa

    Luisa Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    Dobly,
    I had a look at your photos. Yeah, it does look grim. But in my experience the land comes back. Life will find a way. You can hasten the rehab and set the direction with the advice others have given.

    I'd use the logs as they are on-site already and have to go somewhere. A site plan is pretty basic - how long have you been there? I always figure 12 months because you need to know where the sun rises and sets summer and winter, where the prevailing wind comes from, etc.

    Grafton - isn't that in the same region as The Channon? And where is Regenesis? Near there somewhere. They do consultancies and also advertise that they make good compost teas in bulk.

    Work out where the house is going. Is the top of the hill really the best spot? How will everything else relate ot the house in terms of daily routine? if you're sick can you get to the chooks to feed them and lock them away at night? That sort of thing.

    Maybe plant local acacias in quantity, then coppice them after a year or two and use them as mulch. I don't know your local plants at all but looks like acacia country to me.

    Talk to your local govt Department of Natural Resources office or Parks and Wildlife people and see what they have on your block. What vegetation communities? What soils? There is extensive govt mapping of all this info.

    Luisa
     
  10. SueinWA

    SueinWA Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    The wood chips are a great idea. The problem with sandy soil is that when it's dry, anything but a light rain rolls right over the top of it. When I lived in the desert, I realized what caused much of the flooding, as the sudden heavy rains didn't soak in immediately, but rolled over the top like it was oiled paper. Now, I live with another type of sand, a gravelly glacial soil. When it's dry, it acts exactly like the desert sand: the water rolls over the top and down to the lowest point, where it eventually soaks in. Using the wood mulch can only help. If the mulch can keep the sandy soil the tiniest bit damp, it makes all the difference in the world when it does rain, as the rain doesn't have to fight the surface tension of the sand, which it does when the sand is bone dry.

    Sue
     
  11. Dobly

    Dobly Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    Despite the grim look of the land, it is all we have.. The house we build there is the one we will live the rest of our days on. Being only 46, I have some years ahead yet and I want to get it right from the start.


    I love the idea of using what is there.. Our own resources. I had not considered the logs.. How obvious.. What do you do with them? Slow up the water? Divert the water? Does anyone know a site were I can see photos of how the logs might be used?

    The site plan is pretty basic, is it? It is alien technology to this ex Sydney boy computer programmer who has only owned this country block for 8 months or so and only planted his first vege garden 6 months ago! I'm hoping Bill's book sorts me out.

    We don't live on the block yet. It is about 20 minutes from the rental we are in now. I'd love to get one of those little weather stations to sit up there and measure wind direction and speed and store it in some little memory device. (Handy for the wind turbine I want to install too. But I digress).

    The Channon is about 150km from Grafton. Regenesis I think is near Byron Bay. A little further away than The Channon.

    Getting in professional help is a nice idea, but I am a bit more hands on that that. I really want to know what to do. Really understand it and implement my own solution (with a little help from Bill, Linda and the folk on this forum).


    Makes no difference where the house is regarding tending to the chooks etc.. If the house was down the slope, I'd still have to walk up and down the slope to put them in at night. There is not enough cleared space on top for the house and the large gardens I want (need, to be self sufficient). Beside, I really want to fix the damage what was done. Make it better and more fertile and productive than it ever was. Ain't that what it's all about? :)

    Great tips Luisa and everyone.. So much to learn and consider. Very exciting stuff.
     
  12. ecodharmamark

    ecodharmamark Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    G'day Brad :)

    Woah... interesting site :D

    Nice view...

    Hmmmm...

    OK, here's goes, difficult without contours, but I'll have a crack just on the pics and your description of the slope...

    Of course, the following is just me doing a bit of (very) remote planning. For an accurate site analysis you should (in the very least) have a aerial with 5mt contours (1mt contours would be better, although I suspect with your slope, that would mean things (the contour intervals) would be a bit tight on paper), and consult with a permie who's able to 'walk the land' with you.

    Given that you already have a relatively flat area to the N/E of the site, and given that this area too is mostly (totally?) devoid of the top layer of soil and will therefore be the hardest area to 'recover', stick the house here.

    Further to the above, and in relation to my earlier comment about road access combined with runoff redirection, have your access-way (off the bitumen) entry-point at the extreme N/E corner of the property boundary. Create a cut here, head west, then south, then back east, effectively creating a loop around the house. This will redirect any runoff around the house and into your dam, which incidentally, will be central/west to the driveway. This action will combine four design responses: 1) reduce the velocity and volume of runnoff across the N/E section of the site, 2) fill your dam, 3) provide further protection from wildfire (advancing from the N/W sector?) and 4) provide an upslope water source for your (gravity-fed) irrigated orchard and intensive garden bed areas to the south...

    Just a few random images flicking through my mind...

    Try penciling them in on your aerial, and see what else you come up with.

    All of the above advice from our fellow writers is great stuff.

    Just one more tip... ever thought about doing a PDC?

    It could provide you with many of the answers you seek.

    Cheerio, and let us know how you get on.

    Mark.
     
  13. Dobly

    Dobly Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    Wow.. So much great info.. I must admit I have had some concerns that the land is beyond repair. However the posts here show me I am headed in the right direction with Permaculture.

    Agreed. So much to consider, so much reading to do. Thanks ecodharmamark for your 'draft 1' stab at a plan. I'll get it drawn and post it here. I do have a contour map that was 'faxed to us' from the previous owners. It is very poor quality but i'm sure I can get restore it in Photoshop and post it here.

    Have I ever.. Yes yes and yes. I have been thinking hard about that over the last month or so. For us it is the cost of the course, and the fact that I have to stop work for 2 weeks. (contractor: No work, no pay). It would cost me a small fortune to do the a course (when we are trying to save to build a house on our land). My wife is keen for me to do a course. So it might happen. We'll see.
     
  14. thepoolroom

    thepoolroom Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    Have you considered doing the PDC online? Permaculture Visions offers one. It's all certified and legit, and you come out of it with formal qualifications registered with the Permaculture Institute. The interesting thing is that you can take as long as you like - if the contracting dries up for a week or two you can really hit it hard, and if you're doing lots of overtime you can leave the PDC on the backburner for a while.

    Check it out here:
    https://permaculturevisions.com/Pm-desc.htm

    I don't have any affiliation with them, but have been considering the course myself.
     
  15. Dobly

    Dobly Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    I have put together a short video that shows the block. When I took this video I was standing at the northern boundary, a few meters in from the north east corner.

    In typical YouTube fashion, the video looks rubbish compared to the HD original. Still, this video, in combination with the images above, will paint a much clearer picture of what I am up against.

    You can see the video here...
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNK-yj2fNcY

    Dobly
     
  16. Paul Cereghino

    Paul Cereghino Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    I think of it like learning a language. You and the land just kind of look at each other trying to figure it out... how useful it is to have a translator there to get it started.. maybe someone who already speaks the language, just to teach you the grammar, give you a dictionary, get you started. If you want to learn land you'll spend the rest of you life doing it, getting a jump start is good.
     
  17. ecodharmamark

    ecodharmamark Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    G'day Brad

    Thanks for the YouTube; it's just as I imagined it.

    Don't forget to let us see your site plan.

    Oh, this one is a great read (and an awe-inspiring intro to permaculture):

    The Holistic Life: Sustainability Through Permaculture
    By Ian Lillington
    Published by Axiom Australia, 2007
    ISBN 1864764376, 9781864764376
    144 pages

    Cheerio, Mark.
     
  18. Luisa

    Luisa Junior Member

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    Re: Restoring erroded land

    Dobly,

    I am 45, have been here 11 years and think I will be spending the rest of my life here too. So I understand where you're coming from.

    I recently had a PC consultant come and spend some days here. I know the block from having lived here 11 years, she knows PC. So between us and some ideas already floating around, we were able to come up with a longer-term site plan. That is why I think spending $$ on a consultant might be useful. I put my $$ back into the place as reinvesting it in longer-term build up. (And I scrounge what useful other-people's-wastes that I find.)

    I have thought of doing a PDC but it seems to me, as I expect not to do this with any other property, better to spend the $$ on a qualified consultant than on the course. I am a big believer in leveraging what I can to get best results. Since you have owned your place so short a time and not living there, a consultant might be an even better investment for you. I think you would still get to do all the hands-on work yourself !!!!!! for years to come.

    You would get the benefit of (as Mark said) someone who can walk the land with you, point things out to you that you may have noticed but interpreted in one way which the permie would see differently, and jump start you in talking to and listening to your land. I look at it as accelerating the process at the start, which is where time savings matter the most.

    When I said it looks grim, I hope you did not get discouraged. There is lots of info available, the more info you can collect now in the early stages, the better informed you are and the clearer your decisions will be. Less time and $$ wasted. Go talk to people at the local offices of your State "Land" or whatever they call themselves department. If they tell you the land is this with outcrops of that, it at least gives you some direction.

    Luisa
     

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