The Truth About Biochar and How to Make it

[@The_Argent]

Charcoal is basically a giant sponge. That's what makes it so good at helping hold water, nutrients and microbes in your soil. If you throw raw charcoal in your garden, physics will seek an equilibrium and it will absorb nutrients and water, making them unavailable to your plants, at least temporarily. Also, the wood ash leftover from the burn is a great soil amendment as well. Ash is high in potassium. Great for fruiting plants like tomatoes. Old Amish farmer trick was to throw a handful of ash in a hole and transplant your young tomatoes right on top of it.

[@maryjane-vx4dd]

If you have neutral to slightly alkaline soil, you'll want to compost those ashes 1st. I believe 1 of 2 things happened. Either the soil turned to alkaline and mellowed as it broke down(wasn't tested), or the ashes sucked the nitrogen from the soil and was fully charged the next year. Garden was beautiful the next year. Do I need to inoculate my ashes?

[@PermaPasturesFarm21]

Great job son!

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Thanks Dad!

[@jaquavioustheplug]

Jack Spirko always says if it didn’t do anything else, holding 7x its weight in water makes it worth doing! Definitely would be helpful in the hot Texas summer

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

That's a good point! It can hold the water while the organic material is building up!

[@thewildlayman]

Char(coal) that has not been inoculated will suck most of the nitrogen out of your soil. Your plants may turn from green to yellow. That's why some people think "biochar" doesn't work. Theoretically it should improve soils that either don't drain (heavy clay) or drain to quickly (sand) due to it's water holding capabilities. That being said microbes are the life of the soil. Compost goes a long way in improving that, but in the long run healthy soil needs living plants and decomposing plants cycling through the system. The management of that cycle (for example MiG grazing or Syntropic Agroforestry) is where the magic really happens. It really is that simple. *Edited per correction below.

[@louisegogel7973]

Do you mean the plants may turn yellow from green? And yes, the composters are just as important as the compost… they go hand in hand together.

[@thewildlayman]

@@louisegogel7973 yes, I got that backwards. Thanks for the correction! *Original post has been edited.

[@louisegogel7973]

@@thewildlayman 😎☑️🟡🟢😉

[@QuesoCookies]

Nitrogen adsorption is one of the whole points of the biochar, as it prevents the nitrates from being leach into the atmosphere and water. There's no reason that there should be any less of it available to plants because it was more than likely adsorbed to some other molecule in the soil already before the char was added. What might be happening is that the increased habitat for nitrifying bacteria caused a depletion of the existing ammonium and/or nitrites as the new colony bloomed, so the systems of the plants that utilized those might be shocked, but ammonium and nitrite producing bacteria will grow and colonize where the nitrate producing dies off without access to nitrites until the system reaches equilibrium again.

[@fiddlebender88]

It will absorb some nitrogen, but hardly most of it. The point of biochar is to act as an amendment, because different kind of soils have different pros and cons. Biochar will act as a nice little boost to that cycle of living and decomposing organic matter. In my clay garden soil I could notice a clear increase in the amount of earthworms and bugs over a couple of years of letting the amendments do their thing. Now, if I really want to make sure my plants don't lack nitrogen I'll just plant clover around them. It has worked quite well so far.

[@deborahfox-rogan65]

That’s quite the bonfire! We lived in an unincorporated rural area and needed to call our county office to get a burn permit if the fire was 3’x3’ , and needed to have either buckets or a charged hose . This was in Washington State.

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Yeah I bet. Washington is also prone to a lot more wildfires than this part of Texas. I also time the burns for right after the rain.

[@deborahfox-rogan65]

not so much on the west /coastal side ... they just like a lot of government regulatory involvement , @@ThePermacultureConsultant

[@SilverLining650]

Thanks for the explanation of differences between charcoal and biochar. Good to know.

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

You're very welcome!

[@QuesoCookies]

It's a distinction without a meaning. "Biochar" just means "charcoal used as a soil amendment." No inoculation is necessary because it's just activated carbon and will bind with everything and provide a lot of surface area for microbes to live on whether you put them there or not. It's actually better to saturate the char in ammonium, if anything, as that actually adds nitrogen to the soil and feeds the microbes that will colonize the char on their own and much more readily if there's lots of food available.

[@danielb1877]

Thanks for showing this. Will be working through some wood chips soon... need to go get a barrel. Just had a big burn pile from old fencing that I could have placed the barrel in the middle of. Oh well--always more to burn on the homestead

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Haha perfect timing! I've been able to find some decent barrels on craigslist! Thanks Daniel!

[@kennethsword551]

Ooooo dang, Wu Tang. You just reminded me with this video that I need to make more lump wood charcoal for the Barbi pit this year. I'll do a batch of hickory. I won't cook pork ribs racks without it. With that said, good documentation of making charcoal and explaining the separation of moisture, then wood alcohol. Here is a hint for the masses. Once you understand that one by-product is alcohol, designing a capture system for the alcohol you can collect it and use it as bio-fuel. Yes, you can run combustion engines with it! As always, thanks for sharing your wisdom, SGB. God bless. Wu Tang out.

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

You're absolutely right! I would love a truck that runs on a wood gasifier! Call it the SGB P.I.M.P.Mobile 😎 Thank you Wu Tang!

[@louisegogel7973]

Could you use a metal tube insulated with fire bricks to guide the fumes into a jar underground where the fumes can cool down and collect?

[@kennethsword551]

@@louisegogel7973 all of the gasifiers I have seen call for stainless steel pipe for strength, and a vessel, like a propane tank, to store the gases. The design of piping and finning would be like a condenser. You can find online designs and principles of the workings for further study.

[@MiscMitz]

Cool process. Thank you

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Thank you so much! It's always fun making charcoal.

[@mandiegarrett1706]

Wow, love this. Sorry, didn't see that single hole under that barrel. What size the hole and where you drill that hole? Thank you William. You are awesome.

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Yeah, I should have filmed it before filling. It was about 1/2" in the center. Thank you Maddie!

[@louisegogel7973]

@@ThePermacultureConsultantYes, I was going to say that the filming was too quick to see the hole… maybe a still shot would have worked better?

[@FloridamanForager]

fermented urine makes great inoculant for bio char. Not all urine is created equal though haha. No pharmaceuticals in mine so works great. Also I live in subtropical florida so its useful in my sandy food forest.

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Yeah, It's important to have pharmaceutical free urine. That stuff compounds pretty quickly. Can't be having any gay frogs out here 😂 Your spot would be a perfect application for biochar!

[@tcoxor52]

@@ThePermacultureConsultant Pharmaceuticals in soil, via urine, become degraded and broken down quite rapidly by soil bacteria and other microbes, as well as through pre-fermentation (EM or LAB) before applying to soils. Ultimately, studies have shown that the uptake of any pharmaceutical residues by plants is minuscule as long as diluted, fresh urine is not being directly applied to your plants. Where pharmaceuticals are an issue to biological life is when they enter directly into waterways. If anyone has a concern about them being transferred in the soil, your best bet is to pre-ferment the urine, then add it either to your biochar and allow it to age for at least a few months, preferably in an active compost pile or vermicompost setup, where the residues will be further degraded and neutralized. And, since one might already have a bunch of charcoal on hand, it could even be pre-filtered through a carbon/sand filter before applying it to compost, soil, or charcoal for an additional layer of removal of any residues. **The few exceptions I have seen mentioned to this would be not using urine from anyone on chemotherapy type drugs or actively going through radiation therapy, as these will leave radioactive isotopes in urine that will not be degraded in the same way or as quickly as most other common pharmaceuticals would. richearthinstitute.org/research-results/pharmaceutical-study/

[@heathhaas5163]

Nice! I was wondering how the green wood would do with the barrel. Great demonstration. Thank you, and God Bless!

[@lelawoodby4433]

Thank you for the explaination. I have limbs and brush from a 60ft maple that I wanted to make charcoal/biochar out of.

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

That will be awesome! It's easier if you let them dry first.

[@lincwayne3435]

Nice! We got a bunch of felled trees we need to do this with 🤠

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

I bet you do! It's a pretty easy process if you're clearing at the same time. Just keep adding the felled branches to your burn pile. Thanks Linc!

[@blessherhearthomestead]

Thanks, dude! That really helped put in terms I could understand. 👍

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Thank you so much!

[@paulkroll7616]

Thank you for all the work you are doing regenerating the soil. You can boost your char yield 700% by using a flame carbonizer instead. That huge pile of brush would have made 150+ gallons of crushed biochar, instead of 20 gallons of crushed biochar you can make in a single 55 gallon drum. Kelpie Wilson, permaculture teacher from Washington has a great video on it, "Low-tech Flame Carbonizers for Biochar Production." For a low budget flame carbonizer, I use a 36" diameter, 20inch tall salvage steel burn ring and it works well, the last one I bid was around $70 and they should last hundreds of burns.

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

I've never heard of that before. I'm going to check it out. Thank you so much!

[@amyb5339]

Thanks William! The innoculation phase is my stumbling block. The duck coop and compost piles are helping as best they can.

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Oh those are awesome ways to inoculate! Thank you!

[@amyb5339]

Miss you on the PIMPCAST. Dad needed your help this last week. His Luddite was hangin' OUT! Sound was jacked. He was heard well but there was a serious breach in production quality that (I believe) you would have handled neatly. Bless him, he's doing his best. All the good love to you and Emily and June. Stay safe working so hard. So happy you started a channel!

[@terrahillfarm]

Really impressive! If this charcoal was pulverized and inoculated with mushroom spores and manure, then left to sit out, would it be suitable for use as bio char in my garden? What diameter hole at the bottom of the barrel?😊

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

I'm not sure the fungi will inhabit the biochar but it's worth a shot. It's about a 1/2" hole in the center of the bottom.

[@terrahillfarm]

@@ThePermacultureConsultant Thanks William, a lot of work went into that video! I was stunned at the quality of that charcoal. I’ve got tons of trash wood so I’m going to try your method. I have extremely sandy soil with low organic levels so maybe you can do a video down the road on the additional steps to turn your DIY charcoal into good garden biochar. 👍

[@colleenbow777]

We are in North Idaho so wondering if biochar would help our soil. We’ve cleared a good portion of our property for food forest/orchard so we have plenty of wood to burn (plus milling a bunch for outdoor kitchen). We don’t have pigs, just chickens, so there is that.

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

It would definitely help the soil if it's inoculated. I would give it a shot!

[@superninteyninegm8282]

How big in terms of the diameter of the hole on the bottom? Thanks

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

It's about a 1/2" hole in the center.

[@nonyadamnbusiness9887]

The easiest way to do this is to simply burn the brush in you garden and put it out before it burns down to ash, then leave it laying on the ground for two rains. If you dig a shallow trench and use small diameter brush, it's a fast process.

[@koltoncrane3099]

Well carbon or charcoal needs to be inoculated sure. But even if you don’t do that it’s still fine. Some farming lectures I heard a few years ago was interesting. I forgot the data but it was like if you have 10% organic mass in the soil you can retain 10000 gallons of water per acre or something. Basically soil without compost or charcoal or no bio mass has a harder time retaining water.

[@LeatherHomestead-io8dt]

Well done!

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Thank you!

[@medge734]

That was really good quality charcoal. I have watched videos on the old renaissance way which was much more complicated and had a worst result.

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Thank you so much! The pigs will love it!

[@k0nche680]

Impressive! How big is the barrel hole (in diameters)? I didnt see...

[@rodjendrysik3444]

Thanks for walking through the process. What size hole did you put in the bottom? Looking at trying this.

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

About a 1/2" hole in the center. I used a ground rod to make the whole. Thank you!

[@rodjendrysik3444]

@ThePermacultureConsultant Thanks William!

[@Soilfoodwebwarrior]

I agree that bio char is not as effective in a context that is not a tropical ag zone. Its use in a sandy tropical soils is different than use in most ag Soils. However I like using bio char in composting and feeding to live stock as it adsorbs toxins. It will bind to heavy metals and other toxic components that can negatively effect your soil and livestock. It will help control bad smells and can be a small source of nutrition as well. Activated charcoal is used as a poison remedy in er settings for similar purposes. Love the channel

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

That's a good point about the toxins. My intent wasn't to demonize biochar, just make people realize it's not a panacea. Thank you so much! I love your @ handle!

[@purplehaze779]

Charcoal absorbs drugs and nutrients sometimes its bad

[@jerseyboi85]

As long as you don't feed too much charcoal, because it can compromise absorption of some essential minerals. Three minerals can get bound up with the charcoal in a similar manner to the toxins.

[@Sarrett.Studios]

Heard of “Tera Preta”? Soil building method that created the rainforests

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Oh yeah! They also found it in the foundations of a lot of these megalithic structures. Pretty crazy stuff.

[@RADCOMJ1]

That shot of it in full burn is bloodyvawesome😊

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Thank you so much!

[@m_bro6822]

Thanks for the video. Nice hat -Kaleb

[@maryjane-vx4dd]

Last year my hightunnel was finished. I brought in 2 commercial fump trucks of top soil. It worked great, but was heave in clay. Is there anything wrong with adding 8 cubic ft of perlite to evert 4x 45" row to loosen the soil. I'll be adding leaves,grass clippings and compost as i have it. Simply put, I couldn't dig my sweet potatoes and carrots w/o breaking them to pieces .

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

You can but it’s not a permanent fix. Adding compost and getting the soil biology booming is going to be your best bet.

[@maryjane-vx4dd]

@@ThePermacultureConsultant Thanks! I'll do both. My favorite local seed store also makes compost tea concentrate that they sell by subscription (up to 1 gal concentrated a month). It took me almost 30 years for my garden soil to be what it is. Don't have that much life left in me so I'll use the perlite as a tool also

[@LorenWard-y5o]

Can you please send me a link for your belt knife

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

It's linked in the EDC video I just did. It's the White River Caper.

[@georgemiller9533]

How about nitrogen fertilizer from my chickens?

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

That stuff is awesome! Just let it age before applying it to the garden. It's really hot and could burn some plants.

[@ladyryan902]

👍

[@Blynn-md4dx]

BAM!

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

BAM!

[@kevinaschim8475]

Biochar takes a lot effort, time and expense to make. For much less effort, compost delivers results that are pretty much just as good.

[@sonezmb3642]

I like the method. Haters won’t believe it’s really charcoal until you eat it!

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

They're more than welcome to come try 😂

[@Matt_Baer]

I’m digging the Pedos aren’t people patch

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

Thank you so much! I got it from Bear Independent.

[@jackjohnson291]

Topic suggestion: Hügelkultur

[@ThePermacultureConsultant]

If I ever rent a tractor with a grapple and front end loader, I'll make a few hugel mounds.

[@Scamhater007]

You look like a basketball player named Joakim Noah