PermaDesign

Slow it, Flow it, Grow it

*It's not part of a plan for legalizing recreational marijuana,* says veteran journalist, Mark Oswald, of the Albuquerque Journal in this excellent piece featuring Melissa McDonald. My wife has many great quotes, but my favorite pops up at the end. When it comes to stormwater, she says, *Slow it, flow it, grow it.*

03/03/2017 | (0) Comments

SLIDE 30: Splitting the Flow

by Nate Downey

Here’s a close-up view of the flow splitter. On the sides of the slide, you can see where the greywater pops out into the mulched basin. The pink/purple circular “boxes” prevent varmints from getting into the pipe. Note that we drill small holes in theses cylinders to allow the grey water to escape and to prevent animals from getting in.

03/02/2017 | (0) Comments

Santa Fe Resource Page

by Nate Downey

One of the best resource pages for our great city is santafe.com. It has a great calendar of events that is packed full of things to do every day. There is also an extensive list of links for everything from dining to recreation. Whether you are looking for something to do, or want to point some out of town guests in the right direction, this site is the place to go.

03/01/2017 | (0) Comments

Ampersand Indoor Seed Propagation

by Nate Downey

As springtime nears, get a head start on the growing season with some indoor seed propagation. Our friends at Ampersand will be hosting a hands-on indoor seed propagation event March 18th from 10:00 a.m. – 3:00 p.m. Visit the event homepage for more information.

03/01/2017 | (0) Comments

SLIDE 29: The Branching Pattern

by Nate Downey

Here’s a good look at how the branching system works. This picture is from a different project than the main example in my APLD lecture, but it provides a good close-up drawing (by George Lawrence, Harvest the Rain’s ever-wonderful illustrator) of the “double elbow” or “flow splitter” designed by Art Ludwig. Without this plumbing part that Art invented, it would be very difficult to send grewywater in more than one direction. That is, we could not use branching, and we could not be very productive with our greywater were it not for this plumbing part.

03/01/2017 | (0) Comments

SLIDE 28: Wick Preparation

by Nate Downey

In addition to the greywater system that we designed and installed, the trenches in this picture were also used for a scoria-wick system as well as an subsurface gopher prevention fence for the veggie garden (shown in an upcoming slide or two).

02/28/2017 | (0) Comments

SLIDE 27: Overflow Point

by Nate Downey

The overflow of the old tank went to the leech field at the right of this slide, and in case there ever is any problem with their new system, we maintained the current septic as an overflow point.

02/27/2017 | (0) Comments

SLIDE 26: Site Before

by Nate Downey

Here is a before picture of the site. Note that the access point to the ”greywater” tank was prominent and not attractive. We were able to replace that lid as well as the underground tank with lots of pretty and productive plants.

02/26/2017 | (1) Comments

SLIDE 25: Final Destination

by Nate Downey

In this case, the client already had part of a greywater system plumbed, but it pointed toward the center of this slide into a septic tank. The idea was that the client would remove the water from the tank via a sump pump and a hose. The problem is that greywater turns to blackwater if it is allowed to sit in a tank for more than 24 hours. This technically made the previous system illegal. We came in, rerouted the greywater pipe to pop out in mulched basins as per the State of New Mexico’s regulations. (See the New Mexico Environment Department’s website, my book Harvest the Rain, other parts of this blog, and my Permaculture in Practice Archives for more info about NM’s greywater [aka graywater, grey water, and gray water] law).

02/25/2017 | (0) Comments