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Filed under: Projects
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r2r days 33-45 Bush skills, Project presentations, the course begins
During the final week of Ridge to Reef we explored survival and stone-aged skills during BUSH SKILLS. We also completed our final projects and presented these to the group and farm staff. Now the program is over, or everything else has begun.
I really enjoyed bush skills learning what many might think of as Boy Scout activities such fire making by hand drill and bow drill, basket and cordage making, creating natural pigments for dyes, instrument and tool making, flint napping, tracking, learning how to identify edible wild plants and more. It’s quite liberating to have these skills. There is nothing better than having the confidence that you can survive in your natural world without synthetic means. If you want to learn more about these skills and see some beautiful illustrations please purchase Earth Knack by one of my favorite instructors that week, Robin Blankenship.
After Bush Skills we presented our projects to each other. Jon and I finished up our hand book for a mini food forest and explained we planted a small urban/suburban demonstration garden at the farm- so visitors can take a piece of the beautiful farm home with them and learn to grow their own food.
Now the course is over and we are working on our next steps. Off to Vieques and then Puerto Rico next week. More on that soon.
r2r days 17 and 18
Solar panel install on electric car with Don Young.
Our first garden, more stages… raised beds consisting of top soil and compost, mulch… living trellis consisting of moringa and quick stick.
r2r day 10
This morning we worked in our focus groups to get some hands-on experience in that area. I have chosen organic cropping as my focus area and therefore spent my morning in the garden weeding, adding compost to some newly established cucumbers, and removed the non productive buds of a tomato plants to give the fruit more nutrients to develop. We also cut some stems from the plant to start new plants that will eventually go into my model garden project.
I got the chance to go over my project again with Nora who gave some great advice as to how I should prepare the site and what plant species will work best for the space. Jon and I are about to get our hands dirty and establish the first ” backyard garden” on the farm. We are purposely working with a small space, around 5×10 ft., to pay homage to all those small spaces throughout urban and suburban communities. Our goal is to show how you can grow a wide variety of organic food including fruit trees, vegetables, herbs and starches right in your backyard and do so with ease and high productivity.
In the afternoon we learned about different roofing materials and types of roofs, why some are better suited for certain climates and regions than others and finally worked on a thatch roof of the farm’s bohio. After some serious labor efforts I got a chance to return to my projects site and start preparing the space for raised beds which will will use as a way to boost up the otherwise poor soil in that area for our garden. Super tired tonight… that’s all for now.
R2R Day 6
Today Jon and I got to spend some time working on our project: hashing out the details, creating weekly goals and choosing the site we will work with on the farm property. We are both very excited about the potential the project has for both the farm and beyond. We are also somewhat overwhelmed with all the work we need to get done in the next six or seven weeks.
Our class met to spend some time talking about patterns and how we find them throughout all natural systems and in most of our man-made products as well. Patterns are very important and can be the key to understanding and unlocking everyday design challenges. Below are eight examples of patterns… take a look and see what around you has these patterns.
After a great tex-mex lunch with fresh habanero chilis from the garden we came back together to look into the fascinating world of maps. Permaculturists are particularly interested in looking at topographic maps to see the contours in the land and identify the best place to situate things like roads, homes, gardens and ponds. After examining a few maps courtesy of professional map makers, the Unites States Geological Services, and Google Earth we split apart to look at our project sites and understand where they fit into the greater picture of the VISFI farm map. We loctaed north, looked at boundaries, what was already on the site, both landforms and human made forms, and then charted out how our project will fit into the picture. Since we intend to design and plant a small home-scale garden we are looking at a site that is close to the kitchen and to a small building that students and relax in. The site is ideal in location but has very poor soil and will need a lot of tender love and care to make it work. We are up for the challenge. Off to learn.
R2R Day 5
January 19, 2010, 12:01 PM
Filed under: Design, Education, Food, Permaculture, Projects, Ridge to Reef
Filed under: Design, Education, Food, Permaculture, Projects, Ridge to Reef
Today we were assigned our advisers who will work with us to reach our goals and give guidance throughout the time we work on our final projects. I have been assigned to one of the farm managers, Nora, who has over twelves years experience running a CSA in New Mexico. I’m very happy to have been paired with her. It’s so important to be able to flush out your ideas with someone that has the experience and know-how and I’m glad that the R2R program offers this opportunity.
As I mentioned yesterday I will be working on my project in collaboration with Jon and we would like to create a model garden and hand book that urban and suburban dwellers can draw from to design their own small, bountiful home garden limiting their reliance on chemical-agriculture and bringing greater nutrition to the household’s family. There’s no reason why every household can’t have their own garden even if they have limited space, time or knowledge of how to start.
After working on our swale some more we came back together as a group and continued to discussed permaculture. We went over the process a permaculturist will take when working on a design. These are: Goals Articulation, Analysis and Assessment of Site, Design, Implementation, and Evaluation. After going over these in more details (please see my resources page for further reading) we continued to cover Sectors (such as sun, wind, animals, humans, water and vegetation of site) and zones (such as your home, the area closest to your home where a small herb or kitchen garden may be, the area beyond that where you may have a food forest garden and grazing animals, and the area beyond that which is mostly left wild or untouched.)
Tonight I am going to apply the Goals Articulation to our project and work out exactly what we want to achieve while we are here and how we plan to do that.
Natural Mentors Logo
In addition to ridge to Reef Jon and I have been busy creating design work for the farm. Our first project was to create a logo for the Natural Mentors program that they offer. This program offers opportunities in – Nature Awareness, Survival Skills, Food Growing Techniques, and Mentoring. Check out the new logo!
Urban Project #2
Conserve toilet water.
Around 40% of your water use comes from flushing the toilet. You have some choices: Set up a compost toilet system which uses no water, buy a water efficient toilet, or place a brick or jug of water in the bottom of the water tank of your toilet. The last option may be the easiest, cheapest and most comfortable for urbanites.
By placing a brick or plastic jug of water in your toilet you are displacing the amount of water you would normally use in each flush. This typically saves over 1 gallon of water a day if not more.
