Permaculture Swale review after 2 inches of rain

Рет қаралды 179,337

Peter Hartman

9 жыл бұрын

Our swale got it's first rain! Check out how it went. Also we check up on the new ponds.

Пікірлер: 126

@ActionEcology 8 жыл бұрын

Nice work Peter. Thanks for posting this, be great to see how it evolves. One thing, if I was you I would ensure that there are level sill spillways installed on all your swale and dams/ponds. Sooner or later you will get enough water in there that they will become necessary. The alternative is risking an unpleasant scenario that could be (at worst) dangerous. Besides, "better to have them and not need them, than need them and not have them". ;)

@PeterHartman1 8 жыл бұрын

+S Ward (PermaConsultancy) It's funny you should say that... kzfaq.info/get/bejne/f9hxdtinvMncaJs.html I had two spillways, that were completely insufficient. one on each end, about 6 feet worth.

@ActionEcology 8 жыл бұрын

+Peter Hartman :o (shocked face).. though actually not all that shocked.. ;) hehe I commented on the other video. But hey, there's no such thing as a mistake, only a learnig opportunity! :) One point though, you should only need one spillway on the swale - so long as it's the appropriate size!

@wendymorrison5619 6 жыл бұрын

Æ : Even if your swale doesn't seal it's adding to groundwater, and makes a fine area for fruit or nut trees.

@BabyTap2010 8 жыл бұрын

Your dog is so adorable!!!

@michamohe 2 жыл бұрын

you may want to fill the swales with wood chips, you can get them free from utility companies and tree trimming companies, the wood will act like a sponge and prevent the water from just evaporating and will encourage earth worm and other critters to break up the clay a little

@iHeartFerenc 8 жыл бұрын

I'd also watch a video just of your dog swimming in the pond. He looks so happy swimming around!

@PeterHartman1 8 жыл бұрын

He definitely is. If it is hot out he is in the pond.

@xTBCGx 3 жыл бұрын

Lmao, that little swimmer. Thanks for showing the progress. I don't see enough good swale videos on KZfaq.

@rabbitfarmhobby7161 8 жыл бұрын

Awesome work on the swales. I soon will be embarking on such project. ATB

@Suburbanstoneage 4 жыл бұрын

Thank you for showing this to us, it is helpful to see it in action. I am considering doing swell very staying in the desert, and I'm looking for examples that were successful. P. S. I love your Terrier, how adorable!

@lewisdean22 3 жыл бұрын

Good video, I was your 1000 like, ❤️ from 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

@dandingo168 9 жыл бұрын

Thanks for sharing Peter I like seeing swales working, it will look great in a couple of years should look good when the ground covers all grow and cover the swale berms. If you put mulch in the clay swales would that help change the soil structure ?

@PeterHartman1 9 жыл бұрын

Daniel Boulton , Anything I do that get's life moving in and on that clay will help the water start to move through it better.

@planetbob4709 7 жыл бұрын

As I was watching your vid it seems to me you never packed the clay inside the ponds, it looks loose. If you pack the clay as hard as you can in the pond depression it will will hold water better. The trick is to compress the clay in the pond so that it becomes less permeable and more capable of holding water.

@perwetano 2 жыл бұрын

Congratulations 🙌 "this is the way" 🤲🌱

@KaleidoscopeJunkie 9 жыл бұрын

Great build ! ! Montmorillonite / Bentonite Clay (Koi Clay) will help seal it. It also aids biological filtration and provide trace minerals to support any life in the water. Worm castings worked into the surface are awesome organic matter for your new trees.

@downbntout 5 жыл бұрын

Silt will make your pond hold water a bit better every year.

@erbauungstutztaufgnade1875 2 жыл бұрын

Thank you 💙🙏🏼

@BigKatz 9 жыл бұрын

Your pond walls are very steep. It'll fill, as it gleys up, especially with ducks or pigs, but it'd help to have a lesser grade and some shallows. More shallows the better really, and they help clear up the water. Nice swales

@greenthesuburbs7233 9 жыл бұрын

Did I hear you say you dug all this by hand? Wow! Nice project - love the grafting idea with the established pear trees. I might do that with an ornamental plum on my property

@PeterHartman1 9 жыл бұрын

Nope, we dug the swale with a backhoe and leveled it by hand. Permaculture Swale Installation Time Lapse: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/bqyYldKjmbW6oHk.html

@greenthesuburbs7233 9 жыл бұрын

Still impressed

@chashamby9943 3 жыл бұрын

@@PeterHartman1 xss z- X

@1caramarie 5 жыл бұрын

Deep enough for the little doggie, is good enough. Just ask him. Nice video, too bad I have very sandy soil. Once the clay gets really packed through the years, that should improve. I do get a nice amount of rain throughout the year, and plenty of snow this far north so my food forest is doing fine. No peaches, sad.

@BenJamin-zw2pv 9 жыл бұрын

Hey Peter nice Swales. From memory (I may be wrong) the best place to plant trees is on the back of the Swale. It tends to get a bit dry right on the mound. Nice looking land you have there, best of luck.

@PeterHartman1 9 жыл бұрын

Ben Jamin You are right. We ordered way more trees than we need do to bulk discount pricing. We planted trees behind and on top of the swale just because we had such a surplus of trees.

@ActionEcology 8 жыл бұрын

+Ben Jamin - Hi Ben, actually planting into the swales is better as it will stabilise them and it's a great initial growing medium for them (uncompacted soil). As Bill Mollison and Geoff Lawton say, swales are actually a tree-growing system. ;)

@samtraji1 8 жыл бұрын

you should make that ponds a bit more waterproof. with a 15 cm layer of spinach you need a lot of it. then you throw mud over it and compress it. i have read that somewhere, that a few dudes in the 80s here in europe where up to this so no need for artificial plastic. you need only spinach seeds and a bit of land.

@PeterHartman1 8 жыл бұрын

I have heard Geoff Lawton talking about this technique. You can also do it with any other green organic matter.

@samtraji1 8 жыл бұрын

everything high in proteine, yes i was writing about it but decided to delete it to keep it short. :D now tell me destiiny does not exist...

@TrickleCreekFarm 6 жыл бұрын

Or get some pigs in there...

@MimaBeverleyPsychotherapy 8 жыл бұрын

Great video. I hope you mulch that berm soon!:)

@PeterHartman1 8 жыл бұрын

Watch some of the other videos. There is very little bare soil now.

@RickWonderNatureDude 9 жыл бұрын

Nice place you have to work... looking forward to big changes

@PeterHartman1 9 жыл бұрын

Rick Wonder NatureDude Thanks for the comment. I will try to keep you up to date.

@willwarro4054 2 жыл бұрын

YOU MISSED THAT ANCIENT INDIAN BURIAL GRAVE YOU EXCAVATED. LOVED THE SKULLS.

@AmerijamAcres 9 жыл бұрын

You need ducks. Duck poop will seal up a pond along with eggs and many other good things but they are especially good for sealing up a leaky pond.

@PeterHartman1 9 жыл бұрын

Amerijam Acres We have some ducks. I will get a video up of them soon.

@Jefferdaughter 9 жыл бұрын

Amerijam Acres Good idea. Not just the duck droppings, but also the way they work the bottom of the pond with their bills helps seal it, at least that is my understanding. Hogs or even pigs (young hogs) can also help seal a pond.

@AmerijamAcres 9 жыл бұрын

I'll be using ducks. Not a fan of pigs. Geoff Lawton recommends ducks. He says they are the best way to seal a leaky pond.

@markroeder2491 9 жыл бұрын

Amerijam Acres Oh Yeah. Well Sepp Holzer likes pigs...LOL. Pigs would be nice to start with for the compaction and build up. but I think ducks would do just fine. I'm sure they smell better too!

@AmerijamAcres 9 жыл бұрын

I'm sure pigs work as well. I'm not planning on adding pigs to my system. I don't eat pigs so no reason to use them.

@larryconover3925 2 жыл бұрын

I have 4:1 down slope from my house. DG soil. get fast runoff buy only 10" per year. how do you determine how HIGH you build up on the downside of the swale. do you intend to keep planting directly into the downside berm to help stabilize it?? Thanks

@doogyhouser8339 9 жыл бұрын

Hey Peter, I'm curious why you decided to go with a rock mulch on that jujube? Nice work on that swale!

@PeterHartman1 9 жыл бұрын

Those are just wood chips. They are just sun bleached.

@NatureShiftNow 8 жыл бұрын

+peter Hartman What zone are you in? Great work.

@PeterHartman1 8 жыл бұрын

I am in 6b.

@NatureShiftNow 8 жыл бұрын

Cool, thank you. I am in the process of getting land to do the same. Keep up the good work :)

@starsprout 8 жыл бұрын

Hey Peter , thanks for the video, i've heard that If you keep pigs in the pond for a year the soil will become waterproof so you can keep way more water. Let me know if you try it...

@PeterHartman1 8 жыл бұрын

I have heard that too. Unfortunately I just don't have time for any more animals right now.

@almightyyak675 5 жыл бұрын

Cover that clay & add plants! You planted trees in clay at the swale? I'm curious to see how this all turns out. Keep it up!

@watermelonlalala 3 жыл бұрын

I believe I heard a vlogger say the other day that swales were meant for planting trees on. Never heard that before.

@mindsethawaii558 2 жыл бұрын

Fence some ducks into the area and they will compact the pond so it doesn’t leak. Pigs do the same thing.

@1234woodwardo 4 жыл бұрын

I'm just curious why you're doing this in the first place? I've just mostly seem this in dryer climates. Looks like the land is grass covered and flat enough it would soak up all the rainwater anyways ?

@PeterHartman1 4 жыл бұрын

We definitely loose a lot of water in runoff. My rough calculations say that this system holds about 15-20k gallons. We can easily fill this up in a normal large rain event. All of that would run off with out the swale in place. In no particular order, the reasons this swale exists: Water retention Biomass accumulation Driveway protection, We would have lost the driveway a dozen times had the swale not been there There are plenty of other reasons, but those are the big ones.

@mannyvillafana128 2 жыл бұрын

Can you show us how it looks now...

@KarasCyborg 8 жыл бұрын

you need to fill it with organic material to keep the mosquitoes from multiplying.

@PeterHartman1 8 жыл бұрын

No issues there. It is filled with frogs if there is water in it for more than a day.

@Magicallstore 5 жыл бұрын

@@PeterHartman1 natural food chain system

@ryanstreckfuss9590 6 жыл бұрын

These don't look like level swales to me. Is it just the video? Are they on contour? Any plans on pitching the entrance sides of these channels?

@juliovc5630 3 жыл бұрын

Have you tought about putting a pipe from your houseroof to the swale system?

@PeterHartman1 3 жыл бұрын

It all flows there as it is.

@johnscarboroughregenerativ7240 4 жыл бұрын

By Spreading hay on the clay Areas it will help the micro organisms and the earthworms to start breaking the carbon down and bring the carbon down into the clay causing your soil to become much more absorbent To moisture I would unroll it during the dormant season and then let your ryegrass slowly grow up through it

@johnscarboroughregenerativ7240 4 жыл бұрын

kzfaq.info/get/bejne/o7B5icuBrLi6mIU.html

@1andonlynathan 9 жыл бұрын

i noticed you said you had quite a bit of clay on your land could you not line some of the ponds with it help make the more water tight

@PeterHartman1 9 жыл бұрын

The upper pond is completely clay lined and compacted. The lower pond was just a poor attempt on my part. My machine was to big for the size of pond I was building so it is only partially lined.

@ActionEcology 8 жыл бұрын

+Peter Hartman : Yeah I was thinking it would have been great to take that abundance of top soil from below to add to the swale mounds higher up and swap it for the clay to better line the bottom pond - but, probably not that helpful at this point!! ;) hehe

@joebobjenkins7837 6 жыл бұрын

Peter Hartman glad to hear I'm not the only one. I see tons of clay lined ponds on KZfaq and think to myself how do you keep the water from draining through? No matter how much I stamp down it drains about as fast as yours is.

@joebobjenkins7837 6 жыл бұрын

Word o warning from my experience. You really want to plant some rye, clover, or mulch them swales.

@PeterHartman1 6 жыл бұрын

JoeBob Jenkins they are fully covered. The project is 4 years old at this point.

@Goghahahahahaeej 4 жыл бұрын

How is everything workinh out now?

@jodiethuy4122 3 жыл бұрын

Where are you located? And which growing zone is it? I’m trying to grow a food forest in my area

@PeterHartman1 3 жыл бұрын

6b in the Ozarks

@jodiethuy4122 3 жыл бұрын

Wow that’s cold! I’m at zone 8-9

@mjlouis20 9 жыл бұрын

Any plans to mulch your swale?

@PeterHartman1 9 жыл бұрын

mjlouis20 I will probably mulch any new plantings, but for the most part I will rely on cover crop.

@TheGohbomba 8 жыл бұрын

That is fossil , and it is your treasure make sure you keep it , how old is the stone

@PeterHartman1 8 жыл бұрын

+GOH BOMBA Haha I probably won't try to move it again. It is a monster. As for the age I have no idea. I will take guesses though.

@megaarbok3290 3 жыл бұрын

Great observations, trial and error that’s at it is

@arbonac 6 жыл бұрын

I do believe that you were supposed to cover the top of the swale with decomposing material i.e. stray, wood chips, or whatever decomposing material that is eisiest to apply.

@PeterHartman1 6 жыл бұрын

arbonac we had enough rain that the seed germinated fine without it but that would definitely be beneficial in a dryer environment.

@fantasyreflection 8 жыл бұрын

Swales create wonderful places for mosquitoes to multiply. Building swales where there's good rainfall makes no sense to me. I can see them being beneficial in areas of low rainfall. It seems the low land in this video would be the best area for plantings with the good soil.

@PeterHartman1 8 жыл бұрын

I have yet to see any mosquitoes in the swale. The life cycle of a mosquito is 1-2 weeks from my understanding. The swale drains completely in a few days so there is no time for the eggs/ larva to complete the cycle. If we have a stretch of several rains and the swale has water in it for a longer period of time the frogs also start moving in. I will make a video on this topic next spring or summer.

@fantasyreflection 8 жыл бұрын

I tho't hatchings took 3 days. I had to dump the kid's play pool that often as the females would be hovering over it and thousands of little wigglers could be seen at the surface.

@PeterHartman1 8 жыл бұрын

+Noahs Ark that sounds about right. They are in that stage for about a week. So if the things dry up during that time they will never fly.

@shmina1 8 жыл бұрын

+Noahs Ark Swales are actually very important for areas with heavy rainfall. Heavy rainfall means topsoil erosion. Swales slow down the water that would otherwise pick up speed and sediment as they flow off of the property.

@fantasyreflection 8 жыл бұрын

Disturbing the soil causes erosion. If the swale is full where does the run-off go? Out the ends causing the disturbed soil to start washing away.

@hoopingrabbit3177 3 жыл бұрын

Your doggo sorta looks like a raccoon 🖤

@Johnsen2012 6 жыл бұрын

Mulch!?

@houseboatin 8 жыл бұрын

cant hear you over the wind.

@deanc2006 9 жыл бұрын

are your Walmart plants gmo a lot of the big box stores are now selling gmo plants lowes home depot and the list goes on.

@PeterHartman1 9 жыл бұрын

deanc2006 Other than that tree none of my plants are from walmart. Are they really genetically modifying trees? I would love to see a source on that.

@deanc2006 9 жыл бұрын

Peter Hartman hear is one place i found i need more info but I guess the old saying buyer be ware is still true www.cornucopia.org/2013/08/genetically-engineered-trees/

@PeterHartman1 9 жыл бұрын

deanc2006 Very disturbing. Thanks for the link.

@TrickleCreekFarm 6 жыл бұрын

A warning I received from a local gardener many years ago is to be aware that nearly all those trees from the box stores have trunk imbedded insects that you HAVE to identify by tiny holes and treat. That’s the main reason so many of them don’t grow past the first couple of years. That was about a decade ago...

@KDurankk 6 жыл бұрын

👍🙏👊😁👊❤👣📈👏

@obsoletepowercorrupts 3 жыл бұрын

So many comments about the dog resembling a raccoon.

@anthonyburke5656 2 жыл бұрын

If you want to waterproof the pond, pen a cow or two in it and feed them for a week, let them trample their dung into the ground and next rain it will plug leaks

@CorwynGC 7 жыл бұрын

Walls on the swales look way too steep.

@PeterHartman1 7 жыл бұрын

CorwynGC They seem to be doing pretty good.

@CorwynGC 7 жыл бұрын

You will never get full vegetative growth on them, and so they will lose topsoil to the water flowing through. All surfaces should be at less than the angle of repose, and fully covered with plants.

@PeterHartman1 7 жыл бұрын

CorwynGC Take a look at the update I posted last week. there is no erosion and there is enough growth that you cannot tell there is a swale there.

@CorwynGC 7 жыл бұрын

Peter Hartman You have growth on the vertical surface? Or is there just enough growth from elsewhere to hide the issue? Any water which isn't clear is carrying your topsoil. You can see it on your video.

@PeterHartman1 7 жыл бұрын

kzfaq.info/get/bejne/r9qGq5SCrKyRd2w.html There has been no erosion since the blowout. When water goes over the sill it is clear.