What I am attempting is an experiment in Terra Preta, the phenomenal Black Earth of the Amazonian jungle.

It seems the native people there (prior to disovery by Europeans) lived in a rain-heavy area that washed the nutrients out of the poor, acidic soil. Scientists have been trying to discover how the local tribes along the Amazon (specifically) created an incredibly rich, black soil that seems to reproduce itself.

Going by what they know of the way the people lived, farmed, and disposed of their debris, most scientists suspect that it was mostly accidental, a combination of farming practices and debris disposal. But they think that charcoal played an important part, creating a way for the nutrients to be caught and held in the charcoal, preventing the loss to the rains.

They are fairly certain that they did some low-temperature burning of their fields to reduce weeds. I think that they probably shoveled out the ash and burned bones from their fireplaces and dumped it into the fields (potash, phosphorus), kept their livestock near their huts to prevent loss to jungle animals (manure). They may have also bled out their animals there (nitrogen), and buried dead animals and possibly even people.

Some people involved in permaculture have done some small experiments, adding things like charcoal and burned gummy vegetation (done in a pot as suggested above) to their ordinary dirt that was amended with older manures. Some kept controls (all done in large planting pots) and they seem to be finding that the plants do much better with the 'homemade' amendments than regular dirt with just manures, or regular dirt with chemical fertilizers, etc.

So, I thought I would do some experiments also, but mostly in the ground, rather than pots.

And that's why I wanted to know how to make my own charcoal, and was sure that someone here would know how!

Sue