Well, mud and logs. And a bit of straw bale. Most of the materials came off the land where it is built. A house the sequesters tons of carbon. Zero paint, glue or cement. The heat from the summer heats

This is a special creation by Peter van den Berg, and enhanced by Kirk "Donkey" Mobert. It was further enhanced by the permaculture bootcamp here at wheaton labs. Kirk insists that we cannot

There are multiple floor experiments going on up at the Allerton Abbey wofati at the moment, and Jen is here to explain what's going on with the current state of the floors. We have a cob floor section

Two different experiments with a gin pole. We needed to lift heavy logs higher than the tractor bucket would go. Wasn't it Plato who said "Necessity is the mother of all invention"? I do believe

A fence made of waste wood (this wood is typically burned in an effort to reduce wildfires). It's a bit like making fence out bamboo, but in an area where these conifer poles are considered a nuisance.

In this case, it is a pole structure. And the number one thing to do is to keep the post dry. Next, make sure that when the post is put in the ground, there is a bit of gravel in the hole so that if there

Grabbing a few potatoes for dinner. Jennifer, Bella, and Dave harvesting the volunteer polyculture potatoes from the hugelkultur berms here at Wheaton Labs. These potatoes have been growing in these

Shawn and I started writing this book about 20 months ago. About six months ago we had a kickstarter - which was one of the most funded books at kickstarter! And now the book is available as an ebook,

Covering the basics of building a drystack retaining wall. And there is a giant rock sloping the wrong way right where the drystack needs to go. You always want to start with a strong foundation, and then

Jocelyn showing you how to build a dry stack stone step! First, you want to prepare the area for your stone step by clearing out the dirt, and raking through it to collect the rocks and gravel. You'll

Jennifer’s first time lighting the rocket water heater! Featuring Josiah's narration. Both wonderful Boots in the Boot Camp here at Wheaton Labs. As you can see in the time lapse taken of the rocket stove,

Ashley is here to get her hugelkultur BB certified. She has to build a hugelkultur 7 feet tall and plant it. Not the logs going to side to side - this helps to keep the sides of the hugelkultur nice and

The folks in the permaculture bootcamp built a quick gate. This is the kind of gate to keep vehicles out. The whole gate is built from logs. There are three posts: two for holding the gate when closed,

Josiah digs a hole and pours the water in. The water runs out because this is a patch of sand. Then he packs it and pours the water in again ....

It's the time of year to put up your firewood. And as you might be bringing in yet another truckload, you might be thinking of ways that you can get more heat out of less wood. A rocket mass heater is:

Shawn and I finished the chapter of our book "Building a Better World in Your Backyard Instead of Being Angry at Bad Guys". This chapter is called "Radically Deviant Financial Strategies".

Shawn and I are writing a book - we hope to do a kickstarter in a few weeks. So here we are, reading a chapter into this youtube live thing, and then we take that and push it into our podcast stream. So

Shawn and I have spent the last nine months working on a book. We are about 80% complete. We explore the idea of mashing it into a podcast as we finish up. And, in this podcast, we cover the general idea

We're calling this the pillowcase threshing technique. The seedheads go in the pillowcase. Close the end with clothespins. Smash with gloved hands for about a minute. Do the twist for about a minute. Move

A yellow transparent apple tree was dropped off by somebody and left to where the deer could get at it. Somehow it has survived! So we are going to do things that will improve the soil and protect it from