Techincal Magical Dreamspace

So today the Food Forests Across America program was launched. I am having mixed feelings about this. By that I mean that I am really happy and excited that the sustainable gardening and food production movement is spreading further and further, but I am also a little put off by the fact it's Forest Gardening that is getting the spotlight.

Permaculture and Forest Gardening are seen as distinctly different things, especially by those who have learned and bought into Forest Gardening before even hearing about Permaculture. Food Forest advocates have gone as far as to create charts listing the different methods of growing techniques from Agriculture to Food Forestry, putting Food Forests at the very top and Permaculture somewhere in the high mid-range. Permaculture advocates see it differently, stating that Forest Gardening is merely a strategy to design by using the companion planting, analogue and accelerated succession techniques. This differing point of view does not necessarily make for good bedfellows.

Food Forestry, or Edible Forest Gardening, was pioneered by Robert Hart in Shropshire, England. Permaculture was founded by Bill Mollison in Australia. Both have had other authors expound upon the subjects at length through many different books and workshops. So what's the big deal? Well, for one Permaculture is older than Forest Gardening. I would be hard pressed to believe that there isn't just a little bit of Mollison's work in Hart's design system, seeing that Hart openly said he was using a companion planting method. The other thing getting me all riled up is the simple fact Permaculture is a more developed and effective system than Forest Gardening, being able to work in many more environments and with a higher level of yield through time.

Still, Forest Gardening is the current buzz and I guess I can't complain too much. It's easier to imagine, more romantic in it's name and certainly has a better marketing system behind it. Little steps are better than no steps I guess.

[Final days here are very busy. I am behind on posting and likely will stay behind until the course work is done]

Today we had a guest speaker, Jenny Pell, who has done a lot of work in the tropics. Before I continue though I need to address a few things.

This blog, for the last few days, has been the target of some passionate commentary from our friends somewhere across the Atlantic. After much consideration I have decided that the comments being left were taking a decidedly negative turn and rather than allow this experiment to be undermined, I have removed them and locked the comments to my friends. If they really wish to be a constructive part of this dialogue then I am sure they will start their own blog and befriend me to that purpose.

Regarding this I feel I need to say that this blog was intended to be a small scale view of my experience at this Permaculture Design Course, an experiential resource that may give an idea what it's like to take a course, not an academic resource to be analyzed and compared to other materials or courses. Additionally, it should be assumed that the people who are teaching the course I am taking would not be teaching it if they were not capable. Michael Pilarsky hand picked the speakers and assistants that are present here as a master Permaculturist. As far as Michael's creditability goes, he was the one of the very first Americans trained by Bill Mollison here on the North American continent. If that isn't good enough for a 'permaculture lineage', then I am not sure what is.

That being said let me continue on to today's lessons. We started the day with natural and vernacular building methods. By vernacular we are referring to indigenous or culturally specific building methods. The benefit of looking at those methods is that they are often time tested and in turn cultivated to work extremely well in the climates you find them in. Igloos, tree houses, adobe, cord wood, cob, etc are all demonstrations of vernacular building methods. Recreating these methods is not necessarily helpful or advised base on the materials available and the area you live in, but the underlying philosophies and techniques are incredibly important to observe and understand before attempt natural building on your own site.

Natural building on the other hand is a little more vague. For this class natural building methods can be defined as using low tech, low energy use materials and techniques to create a home that is more friendly both to the people and the environment. Now before you go out looking to build a new home from scratch, think about the ways you can retrofit your current house to be more efficient and in turn cleaner and lower cost.

A very simple option for retrofitting your home is gray water and roof water catchment. Rain water catchment is fairly straight forward, bearing in mind that roof run off is not safe for drinking in most areas. Rain water can be caught in several places on site and channeled into barrels or a cistern for irrigation or other uses. This is a fundamental permaculture theory at work: capture energy inputs and cycle them through the system. Gray water on the other hand is defined as waste water from your home that is not contaminated. Dishwater, laundry water, and to a degree shower water are all gray water examples. Here in Washington State, gray water is legal for use in your garden provided it is kept underground. Check your local laws about gray water usage to make sure you don't get on the wrong side of the law trying to be more sustainable.

Passive Solar heating is another simple and effective way to save energy by capturing the input of sunlight. Using a Passive Solar System has a very low carbon footprint in comparison to a Solar Electric System. The downside to passive solar systems is two fold though. For one they rely on direct sunlight to generate heat, something that can be a problem for an area like the Pacific Northwest. The other issue is that there is no temperature control like there is with a conventional electric system, making a Passive Solar System less versatile than other systems. Most Passive Solar Systems can be made cheaply and easily at home from common materials. Tutorials on building your own are available and easy to find on the internet.

The last addition I'll mention is the Attached Greenhouse. Greenhouses are of course an excellent resource for food production, which is an energy saving resource in itself. In addition to it's many inherent benefits, when connected to your house it becomes an even more valuable structure. Primarily, attached to a house, the greenhouse acts as a kind of Passive Solar System making the need for heating less, though it may make your house a bit warm in the summer. More than that though the plants growing in your attached greenhouse improve the air quality in the house and increases the available oxygen in the immediate environment. Other uses include using your attached greenhouse as a bathing or relaxation area. Part of retrofitting an existing house is being creative and daring.

How creative and daring are you?

[Posted late because of migraine. I cannot blog with a migraine.]

Today there was a lot of talk about Arid Land Design. There are many problems with arid land as it applies to permaculture. As with all permaculture, the system takes a high input of energy to keep going, but unlike most other areas of cultivation arid land take an even higher input of intensive energy over a longer period of time to get the system to become self sustaining.

The biggest stumbling blocks in arid land are water and soil quality. As some of you may know Bill Mollison hails from Australia, where exists some of the most arid land in the world. Location and protection of water sources is important no matter where you are trying to design a site, but in areas where there is less rain this is even more important to address. Soil quality is directly related to water storage, which should be obvious, but there are more reasons than may be immediately obvious. One of the places on a forest floor where water is stored during a rainy period is the forest floor itself. The humas and litter on the ground under the trees acts as a natural sponge that temporarily stores and slows down water as it travels into the top soil. That is important to note because it means much of the available water is on the surface of the soil. In arid landscapes though that organic matter is not as commonly present on the ground, giving little resistance to both erosion and evaporation.

So where is the water? As it turns out the water is actually underground. The roots of arid climate plants and trees are significantly larger and more established than the above surface parts of the plants. This allows the water that does get captured and enter the soil to be absorbed and redeposited in the sub soil, away from the hot sun and blowing winds.

So how does this apply to arid land farming? That all depends on how arid the land is. Often surface water is available somewhere and can be channeled to the areas where it's needed. Channels, swails, berms and ponds are all possible on some scale in even an arid landscape. The act of growing plants themselves is also a method of creating more available water because of the micro climates created by transpiration. The more plants, the more moisture and the easier the environment is to grow in. Once the system is setup, even arid climates will slowly transform into excellent growing regions.

Still, what about places like Central Australia? In the most arid areas of the world it is very difficult, but still possible to grow enough food to live off of. Again there is the water and soil problem, and without a source of moisture to draw on getting the system kick started is a challenge. One of the common methods we learned about is the wheat-fallow system and dust mulching. The problem with raising food on land with sparse growth is that when the resources for growth are present all sorts of life starts to grow, including small weed plants. Normally weeds may be tolerated, but like all plants they use water. When the only source of water is underground it becomes essential to discourage all transpiration expect in the plants you are trying to grow. The wheat-fallow method is based in this idea of discouraging plant growth through dust mulching. After it rains weeds will begin to immediately grow in the soil. If you till or hoe the land as soon as it is no longer wet, but still moist, those processes can be interrupted and the water conserved. This biomass is laid out over the topsoil to insulate it from evaporation, similar to the forest floor. This process is then repeated over and over right after each rain to control which plants getting the water and which are laid 'fallow' to enrich the soil.

The upside to wheat-fallow is that it acutally works, to a degree anyway, in near to desert climates. The downside is that it is extremely intensive for years at a time and if growing annual crops the process can be never ending as there is no chance for a self supporting system to become established.

Permaculture can look very different, and even agricultural, in different environments. I'm still having trouble myself figuring out where I draw the line in defining a permacultural method and as my education continues I get a better idea of where in the spectrum I sit.

[Posting late due to dealing with a minor back injury. All is well again.]

Today was a major Design Team day for the group, which left less time for lecture and hands on practice than we might have on a normal day. Design teams reported today on the work of the last few days and there were a lot of great site specific ideas put forward. I personally had to shift groups after it was all said and done though, so I am left feeling like I am starting at square one again. If nothing else though I have learned a whole lot about what it feels like to work with a difficult client and the dangers of putting the client in charge of his own design team. Suffice to say it is neither comfortable or productive. I guess just I wasn't prepared to learn politics and permaculture in the same week. Things should improve with the new groupings though, so stay tuned.

The other subject we had a chance to cover today was Human Waste Recycling. This is a subject that is of great interest to me and wow was there a lot of information. We covered 8 separate systems of composting and moldering toilets and the theories behind them as well as the theory of black water(toilet water)usage from septic tanks. Fruiting plants, from vines and bushes to trees, are excellent to plant if you must make use of contaminated soil. The fruit of the plant is a reproductive environment and no matter the toxins in the soil, the plant itself will endeavor to keep the fruit as pure and clean as possible.

The options regarding composting toilets vary is detail, but all more or less revolve around the idea of mixing human waste with organic material and then letting it break down into a clean composting matter that can be applied to the growing area.

There are many brands of varying cost and value, but it really comes down to the top three if you are serious about saving water and reusing your waste to produce more food.

The best of the moldering toilets is the Sunny John, created by permaculturist John Cruickshank. The Sunny John is a two bin composting toilet which makes use of passive solar gain to heat the waste and red wiggler earth worms to help break it down. One of the bins is used to deposit waste into, with organic matter, until full. The bin is then closed, toilet shifted and the process is repeated with the second bin. Once the second bin is full the first bin should be broken down and biologically safe to handle and spread on the growing area. The two bin method is the key point of the Sunny John system, making it much safer to compost human waste in this fashion. The benefit of this system is that there is a constant supply of usable materials. The downside of the Sunny John is that the investment in materials and setup necessary to start the system.

The Sol Viva method is a direct composting system where a small container is used to deposit waste. The container, once full, is taken to a bed of solar heated organic matter, usually a small greenhouse setup, where it is inverted and left. The organisms in the soil will work up into the contained waste and break it down. The bed should be able to contain 12-24 containers of waste and the best Sol Viva systems use multiple beds so that when the last bed is full the first can be worked safely. The main benefit of the Sol Viva system is that it is a very low cost and easy setup method. The downside is having to handle raw waste between the toilet and the composting area.

Finally we look at the Clivus Multrum system. Clivus means "inclined" and Multrum is a swiss word for "composting room". The Clivus Multrum toilet uses no bins, but rather a large inclined chute to deposit into. The chute should be of the appropriate grade and size to accommodate the waste input and if done properly gravity and waste addition will slowly move the biomass down the chute. By the time it comes out the end the waste should be all but completely decomposed and usable. The upside of the Clivus Multrum system is that the output requires no amendment with organic matter. The downsides are the intital setup cost and the fact that, depending on the size of your chute, it may as long as a year or more to begin harvesting useful material.

Reader Ian Rowcliffe from Portugal took the time to send in a whole slew of questions today, so stay turned for an additional update to answer all of his queries. Thanks Ian!

Today was a short day. Turns out I wasn't the only one who found the trip to Wild Thyme Farm grueling. Almost everyone was exhausted much of the day and the mistake was made to keep trying to push the early breakfast schedule. In turn the day ended earlier than planned so there will be some catch up to do course wise for the instructors. Everyone was grateful for the break though and settled in for some kava kava and a slideshow after dinner.

We did cover a few things today though. Besides more design team work we briefly covered the stages of abundance that Bill Mollison laid out in his permaculture theory. As a permaculture project matures it increases more and more in production. This is due both to the plant systems becoming more established and the fact that more kinds of yield becomes available as time goes on. A short list of the first 5 stages are below:

1st Year- Vegetables and Annual Seeds

2nd Year- Propagation Materials

3rd Year- Berry Bushes and Vines

7th Year- Fruit Trees

12th Year- Nut Trees

As you can see the space becomes greater and greater between each stage. It's important to remember though that each previous stage is producing at a higher and higher rate during the years in between.

Before the proverbial school day we did some more hands on labor and when the downpour forced us inside we had some Q&A which led to a discussion on pest control in orchards. It was an interesting introduction to the subject and some good common sense was highlighted regarding how to naturally control common fruit tree pests from rodents to insects. We will revisit the topic and I will have more to say on the subject then.

Short day, short blog. Questions and comments are always welcome!

Today was an all day field trip to Wild Thyme Farm. Wild Thyme Farm is considered to be one of the top three permaculture sites in Washington State due in large to it's sustainable forestry project. While I forestry project is impressive, and proves without doubt that for a small lumber production facility there is no reason to clear cut, I was unimpressed with the rest of the property.

Understandably there are some mitigating reasons that Wild Thyme Farm does not stand out as a great permaculture site. The garden steward has been absent until just recently, the owner is not a trained permaculturist, etc. Still, being on a field trip to see permaculture in action, I have reasons to be disappointed. The gardens have laid fallow for years, much of the land is uncultivated lawn, the forest is damaged and struggling, the fruit trees wounded. I could see, in it's way, how Wild Thyme Farm was once, and could be again, a premiere site in the Northwest. It just isn't right now.

If anything at all, I learned a whole lot about how I think about permaculture and what I value about it. I value it's elegance and wholeness as a system of both thought and practice. It bothers me to hear someone say that they are doing permaculture and then to learn that they are merely leveraging some of the techniques.

I learned what not to do on a site from the mistakes displayed on this one. Masanobu Fukuoka put best when he said "Do nothing. Observe everything. Timing is important." Many of the problems that exist on Wild Thyme Farm are due to not adhering to this principal.

I learned about the importance of scale. Much of the uncultivated land I saw today is due not to lack of desire or care really, but rather a lack of labor and skilled attention. The initial energy output is simply too high for the people living there to put out. Size does matter and there is such a thing as too much land.

I learned that there is a vary level of dedication to the permacultural philosophies and ideals. Some people are more dedicated than others and the lack of consistency to even some of the most basic principals, letting convenience overshadow best practices. Some of this was displayed in the decision to work the soil while it was too wet because of the extra labor resource the class presented. Another example was the amount of energy wasted on site because it was simply not convenient to harvest all the available resources rather than the 60% of them that were being used.

Most importantly though I became very clear on what I would have done differently and how that informs my future in permaculture design both personally and professionally. Sometimes seeing something that we disagree with is one of the best learning experiences we can have. If we can see it way, which I admit is still very hard for me. After all as Bill Mollison is fond of saying: "The problem is the solution!"

This morning started for me with Aquaculture. Like Forest Gardening, Aquaculture is a specific strategy and method within the umbra of permaculture. It involves everything from water management to pond building and raising fish. Ponds have many advantages in a permaculture design. The water is already surface temperature to begin with, which is better for irrigation and watering than cold water, and if there is life growing in the pond the water is enriched with micro organisms. Ponds also create micro climates for plant growth and habitats for aquatic and insect life. For instance honey bees, an essential element for pollination, need water edges to drink from. Toads as well are very valuable elements being a natural form of pest control for your growing area.

The other side of Aquaculture involves managing water flow in a landscape. Swails and berms, which I have mentioned in previous posts, are common and extremely useful in water control. A similar and less common method in this country is keyline ripping to create a series of channels to control and direct runoff on a slope. A less common tool used to manage stream is the flow form, in which water falls into a series of shallow basins that swirl and oxygenate the water. By the time the water exits the flow form it is very oxygen rich and cleaner than the source water.

Following Aquaculture we moved on into Ethnoecology. Ethnoecology refers to the methods and strategies used by naive peoples to manage and cultivate the plants and areas they lived in for food and natural resource production. For the purposes of this class we focused on the native people of the North American continent. Below are five of the most common we discussed:

Fire- Fire was often used for controlled burning. Controlled burns could be used to direct grasslands, burn out invasive species, drive animals and create hunting grounds.

Coppicing- To coppice a tree is to cut it down leaving a stump to encourage the side shoots to grow tall and relatively straight. Most hardwoods can be coppiced. This is a very important permaculture technique for light and shade control.

Hunting- Not only is hunting a great way of using animal resources for food, it helps the environment too. Over grazing and browsing by deer and rabbits can seriously harm an ecology and the natives knew this. Hunting was in turn done as a control mechanism as well as a resource gathering technique.

Root Digging- Root digging is more than is sounds. It is a method of crop cultivation wherein the sod in a bulb patch is torn up and the bulbs pulled out of it. After the appropriate bulbs are harvest, the sod is replanted. This allowed the natives to control where and how bulb plants grew as well as harvesting a food source.

Planting and Moving- Useful species were not simply left to their own devices in the forests and grasslands. Often plants would be grown in or moved to better locations as they grew. The regular management of the forest was on going and regular despite what the Europeans thought.

That's just five of the most common management techniques in Ethnoecology. If nothing else it's good to think about how the native people did things and what plants they favored so you too can make use of that knowledge in your own design or forest garden.

[Still behind, fighting the flu]

Today started off with Humid Land Profiles. In permaculture there some basic strategies for designing projects based on the kind of environment you are working with. This morning we learned all about air and water management in a humid ecosystem.

Air management? You read that correctly. Understanding and managing how warm and cold air move through the landscape is essential to success. Cold air, of course, sinks while warm air rises. Without wind or other disturbances the cold and warm air will flow over each over instead of mixing, creating a flow that can be observed and managed, especially on slopes and terraces. Cold air sinks and slides like a thick syrup down slopes and off terraces towards the lowest point in the area, where it will often collect. Planting in these low places is to be avoided because of this phenomenon. Even more importantly if bushes or trees are planted too close together on a slope they will capture the cold air creating a 'frost belt' in the middle of the otherwise warm slope. Any plants caught in this area will suffer the effects of the added cold so it is important to leave holes for the cold air to run through when planting a row of shrubs on a slope or terrace.

Another important concept we learned was Keyline Theory. Keyline theory was pioneered by P.A. Yarrows for his system of land and water management. Without getting to complicated, the keyline on a slope is the point where the slope meets the valley floor. The theory states that this area is much warmer than the valley or higher slope and is an excellent place for livestock or dwellings. It should also be noted though that keyline theory is only accurate in grasslands or grazing areas where trees do not populate the slope and alter the air flow.

We also learned about landscape dams, specifically saddle and contour dams, and their uses in water catchment and flow control. Saddle dams are placed between two ridges on the land, creating a low dam for pond creation. Contour dams on the other hand are raised berms that follow the contour of the valley between the ridges. Contour dams are excellent for slowing water flow and are less likely to break poorly during heavy rains.

Finally we learned about building guilds. Guilds, or companion planting systems, are essential to growing a successful permaculture system. Guilds require plants that work well together biochemically and functionally. The basic idea comes from the concepts of succession in the plant world. Without going into it deeply. a guild requires a ground cover, a nitrogen fixer, and an edible variety or two. Other good options to consider are insect attractors, cane and vine plants in combination, trees and bushes, nectar plants, and animal forage. The combinations range from simple and short term to complex forest garden systems. The most difficult thing about guilds are the vast amount of plant information that in necessary to fully understand and design them. Fortunate for beginners like me there a books like Gaia's Garden by Toby Hemenway that have common successful guild combinations listed in the back.

There is much more to guild creation and management than we learned or I could possibly express in this medium. It's a very demanding subject both in knowledge and creativity and really demonstrates the elegance and subtle nature of agriculture.

As always questions and comments are great. If I don't know the answer to your query, I'll make sure to find out and post an answer is response.

[Due to circumstances this entry is being posted later than intended]

Today was a lot of lecture on forests and some practical hands on site design. Forests play many important roles in nature at large. Rain, for instance, interacts with forest belts in a very interesting way.

When the rain hits the trees the water it drip through the trees collecting all sorts of matter, bacteria and nutrients becoming what is called 'through fall' water. That water then soaks into the forest little and the humus(decomposed biomass)on the forest floor, further enriching the water that will reach the roots of the plants and trees. Once past the forest floor the water drains into the deep soil through the channels created by old root growth and underground life such as voles and earthworms. The forest will then absorb nearly 50% of the total rainfall from the storm and via transpiration return much of it the the atmosphere creating another rain cloud. All of this and more happen during a simple rain event.

But what happens when the forest is removed? The results are dramatic. Not only do wind and rain now begin to erode the soil, but the water that falls on these former forests is un-enriched from the lack of remaining organic matter. Not that it matters much anyway though as the water cannot drain into the underground system as easily, causing potential floods, and does not get returned to the air to continue to travel inland. Other areas get dryer as a result while the former forest land gets drowned and washed out.

I don't mean to sound like a hardcore environmentalist here, but you have to admit that is pretty moving. The earth has lost over half of it's forests in the industrial era of our time, increasing erosion, creating deserts and lowering the oxygen levels in the breathable air. It makes a person think.

Following this sobering discussion we had a guest speaker on the subject of Forest Gardening. Forest Gardening is an analogue forestry planting system, meaning that the edible plants and food producing trees are arranged and planted in a way analogous to naturally occurring forests. Forest Gardening as a permaculture strategy has the obvious benefits of combining food production with tree restoration and it can be done more easily on a larger scale than more conventional permaculture methods.

After lunch was time for some more hands-on training, this time in the local landscape. The work crew united with gloves and tools to work hard to clear the landscape of blackberry bushes and cut down three cottonwood trees that were shading out the southern slope. The cottonwood sections will be used for mushroom propagation and the tops of each tree will be sunk in the ground. Cottonwood trees are of the variety that will root from cuttings, so even though they were cut down they are far from dead and many of the sections will root and regrow. Very cool.

Then on to design. The hillside is intended to be planted with blueberry plants, but the challenge is that part of the slope is too wet and rest too dry. Teams argued and theorized for half an hour or so and then we reconvened to discuss what methods could be used to better make use of the land and water before the actual planting begun. There were many innovative ideas discussed, but it will be towards the end of the course before any work is done on implementing them. Design is becoming a bigger and bigger part of the day as the course continues and I will of course keep you all updated on the most interesting and inspired ideas that come forward during our sessions.

As always, questions and comments are welcome!

[Due to power outages from the windstorm last night, this entry is being posted late]

Today started off with some of a truisms and mottoes of Bill Mollison's Permaculture. Permaculture, in addition to ethics and principals, has a series of mottos that are repeated regularly to act as an easy reminder of some of the foundational ideas of permaculture. Some of the most common are as follows:

Everything Gardens
Everything is connected to everything else
The Yield of a System is Theoretically Unlimited;
The Only Limit is the Skill and Imagination of the Designer
The Problem is the Solution
Stay Out of the Bush, it's Already in Good Order
Plan to Lose
Seize the Headwaters
Ordered Chaos is not Chaotic Order
1 + 1 = 3
Edges are Dynamic

All of these mottoes have a specific meaning and a principal of design behind them that are important to remember when moving into the design phase of a permaculture project.

Moving on we covered a short into to native vs. non-native plants and how both are viewed and used in permaculture. Native plants are, of course, favored in permaculture theory, but that doesn't mean there is any hesitation to using non-native plants in permaculture design. The common danger of using non-native plants is that if they are allowed to escape the area of use or grow out of control a helpful non-native species can become invasive and possibly damaging to the environment. Non-native plants are very helpful though if controlled and tended to, many having properties that are excellent in starting or stabilizing a permaculture design while the native equivalent plants get better established. Of course what is native in one region is not native in another so it's important for a well-rounded permaculture designer to know which is which based on the area they are designing in. Plant knowledge is probably one of the most daunting and important subjects in permaculture.

After lunch we brainstormed some design projects for the group to work on and after settling on 6 of them we broke up into teams. Before recessing to work on our separate design projects we went over basic design theory, including how to work with a client, determine goals and limitations, write a site proposal, map a design, estimate cost and time, and implement the plan once completed. I will post more of these basics in coming days.

From then until dinner was the client interview process and the design team meetings. I have been assigned to a suburban property near Portland, a happy chance because I adore urban permaculture design. We got through basic goals and a fuzzy time line, but not much further. It's very easy to get lost in the detailed things and pass over the basic structure of the design. As the course continues we will work on our projects. More updates on that as well through the process.

Hope you are getting a feel for the course and the experiences that you might have if you choose to learn permaculture yourself. Comments and questions are much appreciated!

Today was all about soil and site design. Soils are defined the thin and fragile crust of the earth that develops slowly over time. Soils can, and some argue that you should, be seen as a organism in itself. Soil, like a natural system, is a living structure made up of many organisms and processes. It has a skeletal system, made up of minerals and soil type. It has a digestive system in the form of micro organisms that break down the organic matter in the soil much like out stomach breaks down food for absorption. Soil also has a circulatory system in the way of rainfall and how water filters down through it, dissolving minerals and nutrients along the way to be recycled and refreshed in the underground water systems that flow beneath the bedrock.

Healthy soil as it turns out is very well balanced with 30% or so being made of minerals, 33% air and 32% water(give or take) with only 5% being organic matter. Mineral contents vary depending on the health of the soil and what kind it is, but in a good mixture that is more or less accurate.

I also learned about the three kinds of soil: clay, sand and silt. Sand being on one extreme having the largest granules and holding the least water and minerals; and clay on the other end being made of the finest material and holding the most water and minerals. In fact clay hows onto so many minerals in the soil it can account for up to 50% of the total minerals available.

After soils we finally got into some practical urban permaculture design. Taking an average sized city house, with backyard and garage, we went through the basics of transforming an urban housing area into a rich permaculture garden lot. Below are only some of the techniques and options explored:

-Water Catchment
-Swails and Berms
-Ponds
-Trellising
-Fruit Trees
-Sun Trapping
-Convert Lawn to Vegetable Gardens
-Keyhole Beds
-Pathway Planting
-Chicken Runs/Tractors
-Goat Barns
-Rooftop Gardening

Oh course that is all only on paper, but still a fantastic exercise in how to start putting some of our new skills and information into action.

The day wrapped up with our first round of outdoor hands-on practice. In a flurry of activity, 31 people in all, we completed a Hugelkultur, a series of Double Digging channels and got halfway through a fair sized sheet composting area. Nearly half of it in the rain I might add. There are pictures of the Hugelkultur being built and time permitting I will post a step-by-step how-to on my LiVEJOURNAL. It's an easy project on the same level as the herb spiral and perfectly suited the the limited urban environment.

Time again to sign off I think, got to get some sleep if I want to be awake for breakfast. Comments and questions are always welcome!

Today was the first day of real class. The morning started earlier than usual and we proceeded through a quicker version of the morning gathering than we did on day one to make room for all the lecture planned for the day.

We started right in on the 3 major Permaculture Ethics as outlined by Bill Mollison: Care for the Land, Care of the People, and Dispersal of Surplus. These basic ideas outline the basic social and spiritual basis that Permaculture is rooted in. Caring for the land leads to caring for the people and in caring for the people it is important to share the abundance of your food production crops. These ethics include many varied concepts such as population control, environmental preservation and child education. Although the ethical stance of permaculture may seem trite or high-minded to some it has a very important function of steering the use and teaching of a highly effective and useful science.

Next on the agenda were the Permaculture Principals which I will list below:

1. Ethics
2. Relative Location
3. Multiple Functions for Single Elements
4. Multiple Elements for Single Functions
5. Zones and Sectors
6. Biological Resources
7. Energy Recycling
8. Natural Succession
9. Bio-Diversity
10. Stacking
11. Appropriate Technology
12. Appropriate Scale

These 12 Principals make up the 'Mollison-ian' principals. Other contributors to the field of Permaculture have similar but different lists of principals, but overall many are constant from one author to another.

Next Michael Pilarsky explained some of the 'facts of life' regarding nature and the things that a permaculturist should keep in mind when designing a space. First that a natural system will try to cover all the available soil with something, be it ground cover or foliage of some variety. Secondly that a natural system will always try to increase the height and range of it's canopy. Third, and related to the Second, is that a natural system is always trying to increase it's root width and depth. Fourth it should be remembered that a natural system is constantly trying to expand and improve photosynthesis. The Fifth observation is a natural system is constantly attempted to become more diverse and complex as a method of strengthening itself. Finally it should also be noted that nature will create it's own disruption methods in the form of thing like forest fires, wind storms, volcano's etc. Both on large and small scale natural disturbances are essential the the health of a natural system.

That was all before lunch.

After lunch we moved into Zones and Sectors, two essential parts of planning and design for a system. Permaculture is actually very scientific and at least as much energy goes into observation and design as it does the actual projects.

Zoning is a method of thinking about energy and activity. Each area of a design can fall into one fo 6 zones. Zone 0 is the origin point of a zoned system, usually a house or living center. Zone 1 is closest to the origin point and requires the most activity and care. Zones 2 - 4 are likewise further from the center and require progressively less attention and work to be productive. Zone 5 is the Wild Zone and symbolizes everything outside the design. It is a very important zone though because of the entering and exiting wildlife and how they benefit the whole system.

Sectors are the next step after zoning and require the mapping of all the external inputs to the area. Wind, temperature, seasonal sun exposure, animal activity and human activity are all examples of inputs that much be take into account.

After zoning and sectors are drawn out a gardener can have a pretty good diagram of their property and the process of deciding what to change and where can begin. All of this prior planning prevents some costly and possibly problematic mistakes. All mistakes can be learned from, but in some cases, like planting trees in the wrong place, the lesson may not be worth the cost and trouble that comes from it.

The evening end with a talk and slide show from Larry Korn, the translator and driving force behind the English edition of One Straw Revolution by Masanobu Fukuoka. He told many stories and related much of Fukuoka's thoughts and attitudes about cultivating land in the permacultural method. Of course Fukuoka did not refer to it this way, but his method of imitating nature and using diverse systems to his advantage are very much the way permaculture works.

Now it's 11pm and I'm finally blogging the whole thing, as promised. Wow, I'm tired. Best I head to bed, tomorrow we do it all over again.

Day one here at the Sahale Learning Center is almost done. Today was a light day for sure based on the rest of the schedule for the next 2 weeks. Today we took a tour of the site to get some familiarity with it as site survey and design are part of the course later down the line.

There was the morning circle, a daily tradition with names and singing, to bond us closer together as a group. Permaculture is a philosophy of interconnected systems, people and plants, so you can see from the get go we are being introduced to this idea in a very intimate way.

Another large chunk of the day was devoted to introductions to both the program and the participants. After the logistics and rules were laid out everyone had a chance to stand up and tell a bit about themselves and how they came to decide to take the course. It went awhile with 29+ people at 3-5 minutes a piece.

Still we learned a great deal about each other and are becoming a close group by the hour in many ways. I look forward to getting to know my classmates more and more as I learn this art called Permaculture.

It's nearly 11am writing this and I'm putting the finishing touches on my bags to go to the Pacific Northwest Permaculture Intensive. For those that don't know what that is, the PDC is a 2 week long residential permaculture course that will cover everything from basic permaculture theory, to sustainable forestry, to how permaculture works to promote social justice. It's a busy schedule with only a couple hours a day set aside for rest and relaxation.

That being said it in my intent to post each and everyday on the PDC, giving an overview of what we learned and why it was important to me. I hope other will find value in my experience and possibly even consider learning permaculture themselves. It's a system that has changed my life and might very well save the world. Wish me luck and keep reading!

Tonight, on the spur of moment really, Laura and I went to see Sepp Holtzer speak. Sepp Holtzer is considered by many to be the father of Permaculture and an iconic figure in the 'natural' farming movement in Europe. Don't be surprised that you've never head of him, most people haven't. He is the owner and operator of the Permaculture Krameterhof in the Swiss Apls of Austria. Krameterhof is a fully functioning permaculture farm that has been in it's time both a commercially viable food production farm and a learning/demonstration project proving how valuable and powerful the permaculture method is.

How powerful you ask? Sepp grows grapes, lemons, cherries and peaches in the Swiss Alps on Austria, a part of the world that is literally as cold and rocky as Siberia. This is truly amazing. Krameterhof is the culmination of 50 years of experience and 15 years of serious farming. It shows.

Tonight he spoke to us, in German with a translator, about a vast series of subjects. Water economy management, lake building, animal use, plant diversity, rock usage, heat trapping, terracing, soil management, seed selection, urban planting solutions, drinking water filtration, etc. All this in a little over 2 hours. It was amazing and my head is so full it's hard to know what to write down. All I can say at the moment is that it was brilliant and amazing to hear how he pioneered it and how he tackled some of his largest projects including food production in a landfill for families in Columbia and how he built a lake in one of the most arid parts of Spain.

On on the most important things I think I took away from the experience tonight is that to learn permaculture takes little more than genuine curiosity and careful observation. Permaculture is about emulating nature and creating processes that benefit both the land and the farmer. It's about using the land in a way that supports it rather than depleting it. It's about using everything for something and never seeing anything as waste. It's about a lot of things and it was the perfect thing to get me primed and ready to dive in to this next two weeks of permaculture education.

Check out Sepp Holtzer on YouTube. It's really worth your time.

Wow.

I just have to say that Re: Vos Cerveaux by Jonathan Coulton made me laugh out loud this morning. This should be hilarious to those in the know.

Hello my loyal, albeit small, group of readers! I hope everyone had a fabulous Valentine's Day. I had the best one to date I have to say and thinking about it still makes me smile.

I took my Laura, my beloved partner, to Build-A-Bear and she created the cutest rabbit friend I have seen in my 27 years. Then we came home and had a steak dinner to celebrate before settling in for a rousing game of 7th Sea which actually culminated in the end of the adventure we were running. Romance, food and games. Could anyone imagine a better time? Not I friends, not I.

From now until then though will be the hustle and bustle of getting things finalized and settled for the Permaculture Intensive. Yes I am aware that I still need to write my article on sheet composting. I've also been doing some light study on how to get the very most out of a small urban garden, like Mokie's raised bed. I will post my findings soon I hope so that she, and others with similar limitations, can start experiencing the joy and wonder of growing food. I will be planting Raspberry and Blueberry plants today as well seeing as it is so sunny.

I love my life.

As part of my continued fascination with permaculture I thought I might share not just a classic technique, but an experience Laura and I completed this afternoon in my very own front yard. Nothing like hands-on experience to really cement a theory.

What we built this afternoon is called an herb spiral, a three dimensional earth construct that takes advantage of a ramped spiral mound shape. Herb spirals can be more or less complex depending on your resources and needs, but for now we will be looking at a very simple one made exclusively out of salvaged and recycled materials. Herb spirals made be built on any surface from cultivated soil, to lawn space, to even concrete or asphalt. The shape and multiple elevations of the herb spiral create multiple micro climates of varying moisture and sun exposure through the day so you can grow a wide variety of herbs, even if they are suited to different environments, on the same mound. Additionally the herb spiral is very space efficient because of the the ramped spiral growing space. A modest sized herb spiral might be only 2 meters in diameter and 1 meter tall, but yields a generous 9 meters of total planting space. Oil rich herbs such as sage, thyme, oregano, etc. will enjoy the sunny dryer areas of the spiral(the top and southern faces) while moister and shadier areas on the spiral(the north facing lower areas) are more suitable to green foliage herbs like parsley, mint or coriander.

The herb spiral we will be seeing here is about half as large as a classic herb spiral, measuring somewhere around a meter wide and half a meter tall. First we find a site to build the herb spiral. We chose the ground next to the Apricot tree because the stones themselves will act as a heat sink for the warmth loving fruit tree as a secondary benefit.





Now we lay down cardboard to smother the grass and promote topsoil production. I will cover this basic idea further in a later post regarding the art and science of Sheet Composting. As you can see we have covered an ample amount of space for our herb spiral with a double think layer of cardboard. It should be noted that this step is unnecessary when making a spiral on concrete or prepared soil. This cardboard came from boxes laying around the house that were ready to be recycled.





Next we lay down a circle of rocks. It's important to stand the rocks on edge as much as possible to give the ground level of the herb spiral some depth. This is especially important when building one on concrete where there is no soil below your construct. Once the circle is set up we start filling with soil. The rocks came from the side of a road after a small slide and the dirt is from another project elsewhere in the yard.





After filling the stone circle with dirt we amend it with compost for fertility and then continue to add more soil to create the initial mound, giving the construct some height to build the spiral of stones into. Mounding is arguably the most important aspect of an herb spiral. The higher the mound and steeper the ramp, the more surface area is created and in theory that creates more planting space. This compost as well was leftover material from the sheet composting project.




Finally, taking smaller stones we create a spiral up and around the mound adding more amended soil as we go to achieve the desired height and ramped soil effect. Notice the spacing of the stones allows for a more or less uniform plantable area that increases in elevation as the spiral grows smaller. This is the key feature of the construct that provides the multiple micro climates and proportionally large surface area for planting.





TADA! There you have it. The cardboard would later be treated as a sheet composting project and capped with compost. There would be a final picture but the light got too dim as the project came to completion.

I really enjoyed this project. Building an herb spiral is a fun, productive and relatively cheap gardening project that can lead to a steady supply of culinary herbs for the kitchen. You can go further by decorating it with paints or crystals to personalize it. I suggest herb spirals to anyone who likes fresh herbs and wants a fun afternoon project that even the kids can enjoy. Try it yourself!

Alright, so yeah it's another movie related post in my journal. But wait, read on dear friends for this is not just any old movie, this is Coraline!

So for those who don't know, Coraline was one of Neil Gaiman's early works. It was a nightmarish young adult coming of age story about a young, bored and tragically misunderstood woman named Coraline who finds a doorway into a parallel dimension where are her dreams are made reality. And then the nightmare begins.

In the movie version, animated by Henry Selick of Nightmare Before Christmas fame, is similarly creepy and actually a bit more powerful than the book version of the story. Selick succeeds in a more organic and less heavy handed fashion of the story than Gaiman's original work. The loss of Coraline's internal dialogue makes her more approachable and less aloof to the audiance which, though a departure from Gaiman's initial work, is an improvement overall. Fans of the book may be disappointed to see some of the imagery tuned down to a less nightmarish quality, putting it on par with a Nightmare Before Christmas styled creepiness.

It too bad that this gem of an animated film, both magical in story and art, was released so early in the year, making Oscars more and more out of reach as the movie season continues. Not that I'm complaining though as Coraline is arguably the only movie really worth seeing this Feburary. Check it out, bring the kids even, and get lost in a little bit of nightmare about what happens when you actually get everything you want.

As you all may be able to tell I have been getting involved in some more serious programs and workshops recently. Yes, this is another one. :)

The Human Relations Laboratory is a yearly workshop put on by the Goodenough Community. It's about a week long and involves an immerse environment to experiment with relational ideas by actually trying them out in a contained environment for a week long period. Each year has a specific theme of what kind of relational concept that will be explored. Last year was Compassion as an internal self exploration. This year is Compassion again, but this time the focus is on Compassion as a method of interaction between people and within groups, more of a lifestyle method.

Anyway, it's my first year going to Human Relations Lab, but I understand it's a pretty powerful experience overall and it's not all work. Unlike the Permaculture Design Workshop there is plenty of downtime to relax, decompress, play games, sing, etc.

If this sounds interesting to you, look it up at www.goodenough.org and the schedule of events should have it listed. Rock on!