“Back to Eden” Documentary & Timer mulching..

Have been getting stuck back into a few jobbies in the patch the past few weeks as Winter is creeping up on us.. One job that we neglected to do for a few of the beds during summer was mulching.. We normally buy sugar cane mulch & top the beds with.. This is then turned into the beds before planting out the following crop.. Was reading on line (a Simple Savings thread from memory) where someone mentioned that sugar cane mulch tend to use up nitrogen when dug through the soil as added organic matter.. This is far from desirable when trying to build up fertile soils..  It wont be turned into the beds from now on & the plan is to make up our own mulch for future use from local resources.. 
One method of mulching we have become interested in is the “Back to Eden” method that some You Tube gardeners we follow have been using.. This documentary was a great mini refresher course in the ways of mulch that have helped us to rethink our mulching ways.. 
The core theme of the film is the use of semi composted tree trimmings/wood chips as a thick mulch that can help you to garden on undesirable soil types.. Other ways wood chips/timber mulch can be of great benefit to the health of all soil types are,

• Beneficial fungus, worms & bacteria will break the chips/mulch down from underneath working the nutrients into the soil improving soil structure so no tilling is required..
• Suppresses the weeds from growing & the ones that germinate on the surface are easy to pull due to the loose nature of the mulch layer..
• Insulates the soil from the extremes of cold & heat.
• It can be used in many styles of farming/gardening.. Orchards, veggie plots, pots on a deck or veranda could all benefit from a layer of mulch..
• Fertilisers such as composted manures & garden waste can still be added as a top dress.. 
• Liquid fertilisers like seaweed, worm cast tea & fish emulsion are a great to use as not only do they add nutrients but the action of the liquid will move nutrients from the decomposing top layer into the soil below..
• The wood chips hold water & release it when the ground around it dries out..

Our mulching progress..
We have been slowly processing a ½ rotten mango from our neighbours yard in the electric mulcher with some of this mulch already being added to bed #’s 5 & 9.. There is still more to mulch & we might play around with it in a few different mulch blends yet..
 The mango tree in the chook yard & some Chinese elms have been pruned then mulched up to run a few experiments.. The aim of all is to find which will breakdown the best into a usable wood mulch.. 2 barrels were set up with a mix of the different mulch, some lawn clippings, a large bag of off spinach leaves from a store & a bag of well composted horse manure that had a few worms inhabiting it.. Some castings full of worms were then added straight from a worm farm into 1 barrel to see how the 2 compare..
On Good Friday morning we purchased a Tumbleweed Composter from Gumtree then set about mulching the rest of the elms.. The mulch was used in 3 different tests to try some other methods of composting.. A barrel was set up with a mix of dried & fresh Chinese elm mulch with about 500g of  Dynamic Lifter to add some extra nutrients to see how it will go..  The Tumbleweed was also filled with the same mix as the barrel.. The last batch of mulch was left in a pile to decompose naturally with no additives & exposed to the weather on the spot of last year’s Good Bug Mixgarden..These will all be left until mid May when a comparison of all batches will be made.. Hopefully we will get some nice nutrient rich blends to use in the patch.. We shall continue to use sugar cane trash while we build up our stores of tree mulch.. (We will swap to Lucerne hay once the S/Cane runs out)
 Since mentioning it on the Brisbane local Foodsite a fellow member (thanks Even) pointed me in the direction of Jean Pain& his Brush wood composting methods.. Jean goes a few steps further using the heat from the composting mass to heat water as well as collecting gas to run vehicles & cooking equipment.. These other bi products from the composting process  have interested me greatly but I fear Bianca will not agree with modifying the car to run on methane from compost just yet..
The clip bellow runs through our progress with the different set ups & some of the results so far..

Thanks for reading if you made it this far.. Feel free to leave suggestions if you can see where we could improve in our methods..
Have a great one…

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So tonight I finished the #2 Jeremy Blum video tutorial on Arduino Basics.

I was hoping to finish both #2 and #3 videos this weekend, but life interrupted and the best I could do was to finish the #2 video. Connecting the components for each of the exercises in the videos then writing or modifying the sketches (Arduino programs) per Jeremys instructions isnt hard, generally speaking. But it does give a small sense of satisfaction just to watch the LED blink correctly or for the LED to brighten as you press the switch. Baby steps. With a lot more
components, a lot longer and more complicated sketch, and probably longer debugging time, when I upload the make the robot walk sketch and hit the run switch, Ill have the satisfaction of seeing the robot walk across the room! Or the Halloween decoration light up and emit scary sounds. Or the garden sensors check the soil moisture to let me know if the tomatoes need to be watered.

The screws I complained about yesterday for attaching the Arduino to the wooden base -- apparently they werent missing. What was missing was my understanding that when the instructions said screws, they were referring to what I think of as bolts. So now the Arduino Uno is attached to the wooden base. With screws and nuts.

Also had a chance today to find all the components online that I need to finish ordering for the first five Arduino Basics video tutorials. Ill place the order for those tomorrow. The parts ordered last week from Adafruit and SparkFun should arrive sometime this week.

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If youre just getting started with microcontrollers and Arduino, you might want to consider a series of online classes coming up next week, June 9 - 13, 2014.

A blog post on DesignNews, titled "Quick-Learn on Arduino Basics," talks about the popular open source single-board microcontroller from Italy that has helped the maker movement expand as rapidly as it has. According to this post,

"...Next week, Design News and Digi-Key will begin a five-day overview of the Arduino in the continuing education program, Get Your Project Started with Arduino. The class will explain what Arduino is and offer website sources. The program will explain what can you do with an Arduino, offer example projects, and explore the Arduino architecture. The class will be presented by Don Wilcher, a passionate electronics technology teacher and an electrical engineer with 26 years of industrial experience. Wilcher worked on industrial robotics systems, automotive electronic modules and systems, and embedded wireless controls for small consumer
appliances..."

The description of the five days of classes can be found here. The online classes start at 2 PM, USA Eastern Time. If you cant watch at that time, I think youll be able to view the archived class later.

Other online class topics, such as the Internet of Things, offered by DesignNews are also listed on the page linked in the previous paragraph.

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This blog post is for everyone who knows or sort of knows what microcontrollers (MCU) are and wants to learn the basics of using them.

There are three essential parts to using MCUs:

1. Connecting the hardware (the electronic and mechanical parts of your MCU project).
2. Writing and / or loading the software to operate the MCU.
3. Figuring out how to use the MCU to accomplish something of interest to you.

If you live in the Humboldt region of northern California, the best way to learn the basics of using microcontrollers is to come to the regular meetings of the Humboldt Microcontrollers Group every other Thursday evening from 6 to 8 PM in The Link coworking space at 1385 8th Street, Arcata, California, USA. One of the primary goals of the Humboldt Microcontrollers Group is to help people new to MCUs learn how to use them.

Regardless of where you live, below are several suggestions about resources for learning the basics of using microcontrollers. To really learn about MCUs with any of the methods listed below, you will need to buy or borrow electronic components, and youll need to write the software (or firmware) programs for the MCUs.

1. Use online video tutorials.
2. Use learn Arduino or learn microcontrollers books (do web search to identify those types of basic tutorial books).
3. Use online text tutorials.
4. Build MCU projects, either from kits or from scratch.
5. Buy electronic and mechanical components, use books or websites to figure out how to hook the components together, and use MCU info websites and MCU online forums to help with issues you cant figure out by yourself.
6. If your area has a makers group, library or other organization that puts on basics of microcontrollers or basics of Arduino classes or workshops, participate in those activities.

If you come to the Humboldt Microcontrollers Group biweekly Thursday evening meetings, learning the MCU basics will consist of:

1. Buying the basic hardware parts (a future blog post, and a Humboldt Microcontrollers Group wiki page, will discuss what parts are needed for learning about MCUs with the Humboldt Microcontrollers Group).
2. Watching the appropriate video tutorials for learning MCU basics (a future blog post, and a Humboldt Microcontrollers Group wiki page, will discuss what videos to watch).
3. Doing the MCU exercises in the videos (connecting and programming the MCUs) before each biweekly Thursday meeting.
4. At each biweekly Thursday meeting, discussing any problems or questions you had when doing the exercises for that meeting.
5. At the Thursday meeting, also discussing any other MCU questions you have and getting help from others at the meeting to answer, or figure out how to answer, your questions.
6. After you learn the basics of MCUs, participating in the non-beginners activities of the Thursday meetings, picking a project that involves using an MCU, buying and connecting the hardware for that project, writing the MCU code and working on the project at Thursday meetings.

So now you know how to learn the basics of using microcontrollers...

If you live in Arcata, Eureka, McKinleyville, Fortuna, Trinidad, Blue Lake, Ferndale or any of the other fine parts of the Humboldt region, please consider coming to the Humboldt Microcontrollers Group activities to learn the basics of using microcontrollers. Check the Humboldt Makers Group website or the Humboldt Makers Group Facebook page to find out the date of the next meeting.

Hope to see you soon at a Thursday night meeting!

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So tonight I had a chance to work on the exercises in the Jeremy Blum Arduino Basics video tutorial #2 again.

I had started on the #2 video about a week back, but last week needed to return the borrowed Arduino components to the friend from whom I had borrowed them. The official Arduino Starter Kit I had ordered from Amazon showed up on Thursday. So I now had the parts I needed to resume learning about the basics of microcontrollers.

Finally, tonight I had the time to open up the kit and pick up sort of where I left off with the first exercise in Blum video #2. Before I started the video back up, though, I tried to put together the the laser-cut wooden base for the Arduino and breadboard. Annoyingly, the Italian Arduino folks seem to have either neglected to include the screws for attaching the Arduino to the wooden base, or they forgot to specify the size for those screws when they wrote the book that comes with the kit. The book says to fasten the Arduino to the base with three screws, but thats all it says. I guess thats part of the DIY aspect of the kit. If you want to screw the Arduino to the wooden base, figure out the screw size yourself and get them yourself...

After reviewing a bit of the #2 video, I hooked up the Arduino Uno Rev 3 to a breadboard, a 10K ohm resistor, a switch and an LED (light emitting diode). I watched what Jeremy did in the video, I connected the components with the jumper wires, then I rechecked to make sure everything was the same as in the video. One issue I didnt think about the first time I hooked up this circuit was whether it matters which way the current runs through a resistor or, said another way, whether it matters which lead on a resistor is connected to ground. I tried looking that up in the
SparkFun tutorial on resistors, but couldnt find the answer. I decided to just make sure it was hooked up the same way shown in the video, and Ill search later on Google to find the answer about whether resistors are ok with current going either way through them.

With all the components hooked up, I connected the USB cable into my laptop, then into the Arduino. The LED was supposed to only light up when I pushed the switch, but as soon as I hooked up the USB cable, the LED started flashing on and off. Drat! Didnt do that before when I hooked it up. Unplugged the USB cable, then hooked it back up again. LED still flashed on and off.

Then I realized it was a brand new Arduino Uno, fresh from the manufacturer, and it didnt have the Arduino sketch, or program, uploaded to it yet which would make the LED only come on when I held down the button. Once I uploaded the program, which I had written a week ago when I had the borrowed Arduino, the LED worked properly, lighting up when I held the switch down and going off when I let up on the switch. Success!

Getting late, so time to stop for tonight. Tomorrow Ill try to finish Blum video #2.

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