Robolady, I would be honored to have you post it on your webpage. I'm always looking at your page for ideas! You have the best ideas!!!! So creative! Grannytoo, I use vinyl clips to attach things to the siding...although I have been known to add a screw now and then (with sealant around it) if I want soemthing to really stay. SHHHHHHHHHHH! Don't tell my wife. Hee hee. Cindee and Breakdishes, I am considering eventually moving the door to an entrance of one of my gardens...perhaps on a new rustic arbor I plan to make this summer. Want to find some cool rustic hinges. So, Cindee and Breakdishes, you could come "visit" my door when it's hung. LOL Kirk

silverkelt, Your analysis is accurate. The base is over two feet in diameter and the tops flop about the ten feet you mention. I have been moving sports along a board fence (beats barbed wire and is legal). However, I want to control the flop. I'm looking for an anchor.

Yes, you burn it until it dies down and starts forming coals and then extinguish it. But no, you don't want it to just smolder. You need it to burn well or it won't be charcoal all the way through. It helps if your burn materials are at least somewhat dried out. The charcoal I've made ended up largely broken down into small pieces. Most pieces that were still identifiable as sticks or branches would easily break and crumble in my hands. Any pieces that don't crumble didn't pyrolyze all the way and get tossed into the next burn pile. Not sure what to tell you about your neighbors and the fire department. You might check with your town or county to see if you really have a burn ban. It would be too dry and dangerous for me to burn in the summer, but I can do it over the winter and early spring. But yes, I guess you could do small batches in your barbeque grill. I think there are several reasons why you don't find "fertile firepits" at campgrounds. First, it's not just charcoal alone. There has to be organic matter added also. Second, the charcoal has to be broken up enough to be mixed through the soil. Not just big chunks sitting on the surface. Third, all the wood in the firepits I've seen eventually gets burned down to ash. All the carbon is gone by the time it's ash. Also, ash makes soil alkaline and it has such a fine texture that water leaches it out of soil very quickly, so what little fertilization it provides tends to wash away. That's why you may see "slash and char" described as a big improvement over "slash and burn" in Terra Preta articles.

I'm a lazy composter, but I make huge piles of compost and use every bit of it every year. I just pile stuff up on the ground. When I have more stuff, I just throw it onto the pile. I never turn it. I never wet it down. I just let it sit there and decompose. I throw stuff on the top of the pile all spring, summer and fall. In late winter or early spring, I rake off any stuff on the top of the pile that hasn't broken down yet, and shovel out the good stuff and add it to the garden beds. Then I rake the non-decomposed stuff back onto the now-bare ground and that's the beginning of the new pile. I have three compost piles and all are roughly 8' x 8' or 10' x 10'. Most of the time they are between 2' to 5' tall depending on how much is being added to them. Today, for example, I fed the compost pile closest to the veggie garden all the snap pea plants and broccoli plants I was removing from the garden, so it went from about 2.5' tall to about 5' tall, but it won't stay that tall long. My piles get hot and break down quickly. We don't add grass clippings to them very often, but that's because the grass clippings go directly onto the beds as mulch, where they decompose on their own over time. We do add lots of leaves to the piles in the fall, but we chop or shred them first so they'll break down more quickly. We also add 'stuff' from the chicken coop to the piles about twice a year when we clean it out. Compost can be easy or it can be complicated...it's up to you. I keep it easy. The main reason I don't turn it is because during snake season the snakes like to live in those piles and I don't like snakes. Dawn