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Apr 15, 2020 7 tweets 4 min read Read on X
Sustainable forestry: lumber without cutting down trees. Daisugi is a Japanese forestry technique where specially planted cedar trees are pruned heavily (think of it as giant bonsai) to produce "shoots" that become perfectly uniform, straight and completely knot free lumber.
The shoots are carefully and gently pruned by hand every two years leaving only the top boughs, allowing them to grow straight. Harvesting takes 20 years and old "tree stock" can grow up to a hundred shoots at a time. The technique originated in the 14th century.
In the 14th c. a form of very straight and stylized sukiya-zukuri architecture was high fashion, but there simply weren't nearly enough raw materials to build these homes for every noble or samurai who wanted one. Hence this clever solution of using bonsai techniques on trees.
But it wasn't all for show: the lumber produced in this method is 140% as flexible as standard cedar and 200% as dense/strong, in other words it was absolutely perfect for rafters and roof timber where aesthetics called for slender yet typhoon resistant perfectly straight lumber.
The daisugi looks very peculiar, so even when demand for the lumber dropped off in the 16th century demand for them in ornamental gardens kept the forest wardens busy.
Here and there in the forests around Kyoto you will find abandoned giant daisugi (they only produce lumber for 200-300 years before being worn out), still alive, some with trunk diameters of over 15 meters. Out of this world beautiful.
Bonus: why do Japanese arborists (niwashi) and gadeners wear only natural blue dyed cotton? The dye in the cloth comes from a plant that is naturally insect repellant, keeping insects away without chemicals.

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More from @wrathofgnon

Apr 1
It is well known warehouses built in earth plaster using inoculated fermented straw and soil keeps fruits, vegetables fresh longer and inhibits mold and microbial growth on paper, books, clothes, antiques etc. Hence Japanese "Dozō". But you can build miniature storage boxes too.
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A Japanese master plasterer designed boxes built exactly like regular earthen warehouse walls, except he reused wooden wine crates. He sells kits, or you can use your own materials to make your own if you feel up to it.


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These boxes are intended for grain, vegetables and fruit that you would normally keep in a "dark and cool" place. And they work. Here is a comparison with a polystyrene box and three mandarin oranges after 45 days. The blue box is more like what most modern homes are built like.
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Read 8 tweets
Mar 25
The practical skills in thatching can be difficult to acquire by videos or books alone, especially how to find materials and the binding. In Finland there is a traditional thatching technique that uses only easy to find reed and no binding: just spread it out and weigh it down. Image
A bound reed roof is far steeper and thus lasts longer, but it requires more skill to do correctly. Reed is often available for free and in vast quantities anywhere it grows, harvesting it is doing nature a favor. All materials used in a reed roof are compostable, all hand tools.


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For a standard roof of say 100m² you need to harvest about three hectares. You can harvest that by hand in about a month, or in a day if you have a reed harvesting machine. In Finland you harvest in March, April.
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Read 5 tweets
Feb 29
Maybe one of the oddest professions in Japan is that of the bokka (歩荷). Porters who carry supplies to remote mountain guesthouses inaccessible to vehicles. A bokka uses customized wooden ladder frames to carry 100-165kg of supplies on day long marches (walk up, run down).


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The job is popular: not surprisingly veteran bokka routinely tests as fitter and healthier than elite athletes. Both men and women take on the job, the average weight of a bokka is 60-70kg.


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Still not much of a chore compared to what some farmers used to handle.
Read 5 tweets
Sep 28, 2023
Iriairinya (入会林野) is the Japanese term for "commons". In the West the term "commons" are usually meant as fields for grazing but Japanese commons were traditionally the mixed grass and forest lands between mountains and flatlands usable in agriculture. Image
Iriairinya are typically from a couple of hectares up to 50-60 hectares. Still a valid legal concept, village's who manage commons also have the option to incorporate them (as modern organizations), to make them more compatible with modern legal practices. Image
Commons were meant to be vital lifelines for rural villages, providing its members with food (forage), feed (for livestock), fertilizer (leaves), fuel (wood, charcoal), building material (roof thatch). When modern lifestyles took over in the 1970s commons were mostly abandoned.


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Read 6 tweets
Aug 24, 2023
The miracle of Usami: at 11:58 A.M. Sept. 1st 1923 a great earthquake struck the Tokyo region. Near the epicenter was Usami village, where no one was killed or injured while neighboring villages each had hundreds dead and wounded. How?
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The villagers of Usami had an exceptionally long memory. Records, monuments and tales of a huge 1703 quake had been preserved and stories of what happened was still in vivid memory. The locals acted unbelievably fast, evacuations started as soon as the trembling stopped.
An 8m tsunami struck the seaside village only 5 min after the quake. Locals were already arrived at and safe within historical evacuation grounds: temples, bamboo thickets, stands of trees, where their ancestors had marked out safe spots centuries before (circle: 1703 tsunami) Image
Read 4 tweets
Aug 11, 2023
The post town Tsumago-Juku (pop 400) in Japan was founded in 1601. In 1960 it took a unique decision to dedicate itself to its own preservation by three golden rules: "No selling, no letting, no destroying." Every renovation or rebuilding even of private homes is done in common.


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The town's main income is obviously tourism, but in order to preserve the town the locals figured out a method where they build and renovate as much as possible by themselves, together. One ex. is the town's six remaining "ancient style" ishiokiyane: shingle roofs held by rocks. Image
The roofs are made of wood shingles, only the bottom row nailed, the rest held down by horizontal battens and rocks. They are relaid every few years, broken shingles discarded, leaks fixed etc. Work is led by the most skilled townsperson while a team of 5-20 volunteers help out. Image
Read 5 tweets

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