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One Straw Permaculture

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16.01.2022 It is a great pleasure looking after Dave and Lissa's Permaculture farm! Using patterns: Cell grazing chickens from permanent coop, it pays to build an extension tunnel and to run the cells as long narrow petals to get the most coverage. Observation: Moments after the first photo, a Peewee we gave the warning for "hawk!" And as one, all chickens silently dashed for the cover of the tunnel.

15.01.2022 Recently, I've been collaborating with Yandina Community Gardens to provide community gardening workshops for social housing communities on the Sunshine Coast. Community gardens are essential in our society for building social inclusiveness while sharing knowledge and promoting health and independence.

14.01.2022 In August we moved to Yandina Creek, to 25 acre place called 'The Farm. Our job is to look after it and give it a permaculturalist's touch, so I've become a permaculture locum! One of the first actions was to cut some of the waist-high grass, lay the mulch on contour and plant in some potatoes. Just three tools used, although the Kama would have been enough. The potatoes will loosen and improve the soil, evolving it beyond pasture without damaging it.

13.01.2022 One of the most important aspects of Permaculture thinking is to develop a sense of inquiry, without imposing judgements or motivations. It is more important to observe the connections and energy flow than to be thinking I’m not getting the result I want in the time frame I hoped. What disturbance will I create to make it happen? For example: If you are worried your mulch isn’t working, what are your observations: How deep is your mulch? How deep is the moist layer at the bottom? How long has it been there? What material is it? How coarse are the particles? Is there a range of partical sizes? Is material beginning to compost in the bottom of the mulch?

13.01.2022 New life at the farm. No incubators here! The mums are crested hens. One was mostly Silver-Spangled Apenzeller Spitzhauben. The main mum is this one - possibly Polish x Appenzeller. We really don't know. In regard to permaculture, their journey to us was one moving pollution toward balance and of sharing surplus in the gift economy: Noise pollution from the Dad's crowing at a customer's place in the suburbs meant future eggs at ours, room to stretch for the chicks and chooks and some goodwill in the bank. One action, multiple outcomes.

12.01.2022 With more than 350mm rain in the past few days, I've been busy at the farm with permaculture earthworks - "one straw style." In this case, with a mattock and spade. I love the rain because it gives you an opportunity to learn the land. I spent the whole weekend following the water from top to bottom, observing and interacting: Managing inundation by intercepting the subsoil flow and reducing erosion by pacifying and redirecting hurried waters. All was done using principles of finding small and slow solutions and working where it counts. I am pleased to say we can already circle the house without gumboots!

11.01.2022 So what is a food forest anyway? As a permie, I am seldom impressed when a new term gets pulled into the vernacular and so overused that it loses its original meaning. Food forest is one of these terms. Personally I have never been comfortable with the term Food Forest. From the outset, I found it confused zoning - was it a zone 3 orchard polyculture or a food-based managed forest (zone 4)? ... Given it’s exotic feel for suburban living, for many, it became the former. Then it became a way to describe any polyculture that produced food and a few useful volunteers. Your community networks could be a food forest! Well, they are, aren’t they! So ... the term is meaningless. Sort of. We do still need a useful name for a managed forest that produces food, and today Nick Ritar nailed it for me: Forest Garden. Thank you, Nick. Forest Garden is a useful term. I much prefer this for both designating zones and describing their function. A cultivated food garden can mimic a forest, but it isn’t one. An orchard can be a polyculture, but it is still an orchard. Perhaps we shall call this one an Orchard-based Polyculture. A forest garden can provide food, but not exclusively for us. Yes, Forest Garden is a much better term for both design and teaching. Pics: A selection of ... food forests?

09.01.2022 Permaculture is in one very important respect, a design science. Patterns exist everywhere in nature and so permaculture can be applied to whole-of-life design. For all design, you need specific goals to design for. My first design goal was for an education space, a place to experiment, a source of healthy food that produced more than it cost and a place that provided 80% of our vegetable needs. With specific goals in place, it allowed me to be creative, to learn and to thin...k dynamically. If you are interested in permaculture and wondering where to just get started, it may be helpful to develop a Needs Analysis for yourself: Describe specifically, your needs for eg. quality water, healthy food, safe clothing, secure shelter, valuable community connections, worthwhile personal development and meaningful work. Then you will have a set of values that will guide your approach and you will be able to pick one small area at a time and get it moving toward permanence! Good luck!

06.01.2022 Warmth and overnight dew are making things move again. It pays to protect your plants from dry conditions with a deep mulch. It saves so much on watering. Looking for the best way to mulch and look after your garden? Phone, email or message me and ask me how!