On New Ground

Hooray! A team of filmmakers and permaculture practitioners have just made a powerful film about permaculture. If I've ever tried to explain permaculture to you and failed, look no further for a comprehensive, beautiful rendition of how permaculture manifests in urban, suburban, and rural communities to transform natural systems and the lives of those who "inhabit" them. Here's a little taste. If you like it, you can download the full film for about $5 or search the filmmakers' website for a screening near you. There is so much wisdom that our world really needs here. Enjoy!

Even though I live in the Bay Area, where you can grow tons of plants and veggies year round, it's still that time of year, when folks are cleaning out old garden beds and dreaming up ideas for spring gardens. When deciding what to plant, I usually start from a basic question, like, "What do I like to eat?", or "Which plant would grow best in that shady area?", or "What would look nice over there by the fence?". These are important things to consider, but they overlook the idea that one plant can often serve many functions, beyond just food or aesthetic. One of the approaches repeatedly emphasized in permaculture is "stacking functions," or getting the most yield out of each element in a given system. In other words, getting the most bang for your buck, in this case, out of each plant. It makes a lot of sense. Why not plant your shrub so that it provides a wind block, builds your soil, and also attracts insects that benefit your neighbori

I just finished reading this page-turner about Eustace Conway, a man who lives entirely off the land in the Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina. He takes the art of self-sustained living to the extreme, eating only food he has hunted or grown, wearing clothes that he has made out of animal skins and plant-fiber thread, and building houses from wood he has fallen on the 1,000 acres where he lives and operates his educational camp called Turtle Island . I initially picked up the book because I fall into the following dreamy category that Gilbert dispels in the first chapter:  “Eustace told me that people tended to romanticize his lifestyle. Because when people first ask him what he does for a living, he invariably replies, 'I live in the woods.' Then people get all dreamy and say, 'Ah! The woods! The woods! I love the woods!' as if Eustace spends his day sipping the dew off clover blossoms. But that’s not what living in the woods means to Eustace

Here is an excellent article about the connections between regenerative, organic agriculture and carbon sequestration. In the words of my grandma, who read this just two weeks before she passed away at age 85: "I have just read the the whole piece, including the responses. How about that? I know I don't understand it all, but I know enough to worry a lot about what we're doing to the ocean." She was sharp as a tack until the day she passed, and I'm sure she understood much more than she let on. However, I figure if she could read this and be concerned about the fate of a world that she would not spend that much more time in, so surely should the rest of us.

Sacred Ecology recently visited and ranked the top 10 ecology centers and permaculture programs in California. Happily, the Regenerative Design Institute was picked #1! Here is a link to beautiful photos and information about these inspiring programs around the state.

In honor of our recent class on water, I'm sharing this excellent blog post on what the U.S. would look like if our state boundaries were defined by our watersheds. It's a fascinating idea that changes the way you think about how we define where we live, our sense of place. Writer John Lavey states, "...at this stage in our national historic narrative, we are in no position to adjust state boundaries this radically – and while it’s intriguing to write about, it’s not an idea I’m boosting. But perhaps there is the chance that if John Wesley Powell had had his way, communities would have grown up with a different water ethic, one that considered longer term into the future than the next cycle of the plow." Click on the image for the entire blog post, or just to see a larger version of this map.

I'm excited to say that after an extended search for a permaculture program that works with my schedule, last October I joined a year-long course offered by the Regenerative Design Institute out in Bolinas. This means that for one Saturday a month, I get to travel to lovely Bolinas and gather with a group of people who are also wading slowly into the vast waters of sustainable, integrated ecology and design. Stinson and Bolinas Beaches Greenhouse at the gardens It is dense. So far, we've covered the ethics and principles of permaculture , soil, and water, but by the end of each day, it is clear how deep a person can go with these topics. Technically, you could get an entire master's degree in soil science and water management alone, so I'm taking each nugget of wisdom and skill as an invitation to explore. We've also had a lot of time for hands-on work, like digging swales to "teach water how to walk" or move it away from unwanted areas