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Our reed beds
Once our biodigester has taken the slurry from our waste (which we will use as fertiliser in the orchard, after it has been mixed with lime and turned into pellets), we further cleanse the water by running it through our reed bed. Reed beds, are a great, natural way to cleanse water and the joy is that anyone can have one in their garden!
Oxygenating water
As the water leaves the biodigester, it does not contain much oxygen - much of it has been used in the degradation process. This would normally present us with a problem, as it is full of nitrogen instead and once it returns outside, the water is no good to plants because it does not contain the oxygen that they need to grow.
Using the flowforms
To help oxygenate our water, we run it through flowforms, water features that agitate the water and encourage it to reoxygenate. The water can then pass into the reed bed with enough oxygen for the reeds to grow and thrive, meaning they can fulfill their intended task of taking any remaining toxins from the water and allowing us to return it to the ecosystem in a clean condition!
Further capacity for waste water management
Our reed bed is home to papyrus, comfrey, watermint, bullrushes and yellow flag irises, among other plants and is full of frogspawn in spring and dragonflies in summer. At present because there are only a handful of households on the land, this means that the output from the biodigester is not sufficient to populate all of our reed beds, but it does mean that we know we have the capacity to be home too more families on the land without having to worry about dealing with the extra water treatment required - we already have extra capacity.
To find out more about our reed beds, please contact us or come and visit to see them for yourself!