The Herb Spiral, An Adventure that Transforms your Gardening.
If you’re fairly new to gardening, the herb spiral is one of the best begining gardening adventures! Creating one of these beautiful, functional pieces of landscape art will naturally teach you some of the most important gardening wisdom, wisdom that’s often left out of other “beginning gardening” classes and programs. If you’ve been gardening a few years growing ornamentals or annual vegetables, making an herb spiral might just transform the way you garden forever! This is a spiral garden bed design promoted by Bill Mollison, is a great model of what we’re aiming for with “Transformative Adventures,” a learning experience … Continue reading The Herb Spiral, An Adventure that Transforms your Gardening.
Transformative Adventures Meeting Tonight
I’d like to invite you all to the first general meeting of the Transformative Adventures organization, the non-profit cooperative I’ve been working on forming to help support a “DIY Green New Deal.” The mission of the organization is to support … Continue reading Transformative Adventures Meeting Tonight
Announcing: The Transformative Adventures Permaculture Design Certificate Course.
Winter 2020-2021 December – March Monday/Wednesday evenings, 6-9 PM, EST. Want to become a leader in building a more just and sustainable society? Want to make a real career doing it? What we need is a DIY Green New Deal, … Continue reading Announcing: The Transformative Adventures Permaculture Design Certificate Course.
How to Learn What to Learn: The Pareto Principle
If we want to grow food, heal ecosystems, get healthy, or interact in pretty much any biological system (which includes human communities) probably the single most useful thing we can understand is the 80/20 principle, or the Pareto curve. Simply … Continue reading How to Learn What to Learn: The Pareto Principle
Q&A: Picking Walkable Plants for Planted Paths
With our class on Path and Bed Design this Sunday Morning, this question from a community member is very relevant and timely! Question: What plants would be best for paths in a garden? I’d like something low growing that would … Continue reading Q&A: Picking Walkable Plants for Planted Paths
An Impassioned Plea for the 3rd Ethic
Here’s my impassioned plea for the original 3rd ethic, and David Holmgren’s simplified version of it, “Fair Share.” To me, this is the single most important, personally impactful, and societally transformative concept in all of Permacutlure. “Setting limits” is the … Continue reading An Impassioned Plea for the 3rd Ethic
Relaxed evening in a Urban Permaculture Forest Garden
There’s no reason we can’t bring the best of nature and country life to the city, instead of fleeing the cities as though they’re monstrosities. Cities have many benefits of culture, diversity, access to resources, collaboration, etc. which make them … Continue reading Relaxed evening in a Urban Permaculture Forest Garden
The Lillie House Polyculture Seed Mix
LILLIE HOUSE POLYCULTURE Here’s the mix that Kim and I came up with for Lillie House, and I’ve now used it in gardens around the region. What’s different about this mix is that it uses “ecological succession,” mixing annuals (plants … Continue reading The Lillie House Polyculture Seed Mix
Designing Polycultures
Because polyculture, growing many plants together, instead of just one alone (monoculture), can reduce pests, disease, and weeds, conserve water, improve soil health and fertility, eliminate the need for tilling and reduce our dependence on chemicals, fossil fuels and poisonous biocides, polyculture is one of the most important elements of Permaculture. It can certainly be the key to a much easier way of gardening! And yet, because it’s an advanced kind of gardening that requires detailed plant knowledge, experience, observation and experimentation, it remains one of the most mysterious, and least discussed. Time to de-mystify polyculture! Because this type of … Continue reading Designing Polycultures
The Search for the Holy Hamburger Bush: Plants for an Easy Fast Food Garden
In foraging circles, you often hear of concepts like “hamburger bushes,” because, alas… they do not exist. There are no plants that produce fruits or vegetables that are easy and convenient, and provide a full balanced meal without any kind of processing. You can’t just go out into the woods and pick a hamburger off a tree. I was chatting about this with a foraging friend of mine on a drive across state, and he had a vegan chocolate chip protein cookie, that was basically a very tasty balanced meal. Even for those of us who are pretty resilient and … Continue reading The Search for the Holy Hamburger Bush: Plants for an Easy Fast Food Garden
