Indigenous Land Management Practices in the USA (Videos)
Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Medicinal Plants, Plant Systems, Seeds — by Eric Toensmeier April 24, 2012
I’ve been interested in indigenous land management for many years, but since the publication of M. Kat Anderson’s phenomenal Tending the Wild: Native American Knowledge and the Management of California’s Natural Resources I’ve been engaged in active research. This has included collaboration with the Woodbine Ecology Center and my work on a publication (read an excerpt here) for them about indigenous management in the prairie and Rocky Mountain regions where they are located. As part of this learning process I’ve created several short videos.
Here’s my overview of indigenous management practices with examples from the Woodbine region:
The next video covers one of our efforts at eco-cultural restoration at Woodbine, enhancing a “wild” edible riparian area:
Comments (3)Our Seeds: Seeds Blong Yumi – Watch for Free
Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Medicinal Plants, Seeds, Soil Conservation, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Trees, Water Contaminaton & Loss — by Michel Fanton April 4, 2012
In September 2008 Seed Savers released their first film, “Our Seeds: Seeds Blong Yumi”, a 57 minute documentary that celebrates traditional food plants and the people that grow them.
We have now released this documentary on the net for free viewing (with English audio and Portuguese subtitles — we will put French, Chinese and Japanese subtitled versions online in the future). Watch it now (or read more about it below the video):
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Seeds from the Kitchen Cupboard
Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Medicinal Plants, Seeds — by Emma Crameri March 15, 2012
by Emma Crameri
Seeds from the kitchen cupboard
As an experiment, I wondered if I could grow any plants for free from our kitchen cupboards.
Comments (8)12th Annual Pan-Hellenic Festival for the Exchange of Local Seed Varieties
Community Projects, Conferences, Courses/Workshops, Seeds, Social Gatherings — by Spencer Woodard
If you’re in Europe this April, consider a trip to the Peliti Seedbank in Mesochori, Greece.
On April 21st – 23rd Peliti will be hosting the 12th Pan-Hellenic Festival for the Exchange of Local Seed Varieties.
This annual festival, organized by Peliti (www.peliti.gr) since 1999, includes farmers, activists, researchers, students and thousands of visitors from all over the world who will come to share knowledge and experience, and exchange seed. The Festival includes speeches, seminars, workshops, distribution of local seeds, eating, dancing, music, money-free barter of goods, etc. The activities take place from 11am to 5pm. Entrance to the festival is open to all visitors and it is free.
The event is made possible this year with the support of the Europe-wide Seed Campaign, as well as with the support of the Municipality of Paranesti and the Centre for Environmental Education of Paranesti.
Comments (0)Perennial Staple Crops of the World
Animal Forage, Food Forests, Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Medicinal Plants, Plant Systems, Seeds, Trees — by Eric Toensmeier February 25, 2012
This article reviews perennial staple crops, a little-known group of species with tremendous potential to address world problems.
Ricardo Romero of Las Cañadas in perennial staple food forest featuring
peach palm, macadamia, air potato, banana, and perennial beans.
Perennial Staple Crops are basic foodstuffs that grow on perennial plants. These plant sources of protein, carbohydrates, and fats can be harvested non-destructively – that is, harvest does not kill the plant or prevent future harvests. This group of crops includes grains, pulses (dry beans), nuts, dry pods, starchy fruits, oilseeds, high-protein leaves, and some more exotic products like starch-filled trunks, sugary palm saps, and aerial tubers.
These trees, palms, grasses, and other long-lived crops offer the unique possibility of crops grown for basic human food that can simultaneously sequester carbon, stabilize slopes, and build soils as part of no-till perennial agricultural systems. Such production models seem the most likely of all regenerative farming practices to approach the carbon sequestering capacity of natural forest, because they can mimic the structure of a forest most closely.
Comments (21)Seeds of Freedom, 2012 (Official Trailer Release)
DVDs/Books, Seeds — by Keveen Gabet February 22, 2012
To see things in the seed, that is genius. – Lao Tzu
I guess Lao Tzu did not factor that there would be two types of geniuses born. Those, like a handful of greedy corporations, who use seeds to control, govern and enslave, and those — like traditional farmers and permaculturists — who nurture the future of humanity through them.
Comments (0)Food Forests, Part 2: Looking for Clues
Deforestation, Food Forests, Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Land, Medicinal Plants, Plant Systems, Regional Water Cycle, Seeds, Soil Composition, Structure, Trees — by Chris McLeod January 24, 2012
Click for larger view
As people become urbanised, they start looking at the world in urban ways. What does that car or house say about that person? How does that person’s occupation affect their social standing? People may not admit it, but they understand the answers to these questions intuitively. As permaculturalists, we need to apply these same observational skills to our permacultural adventures.
These observational skills are important for permaculture because they allow you to read a landscape. No two pieces of land are ever the same! Whether that land is in an urban area or a rural area you can gather a huge amount of information as to its suitability for your next permaculture project simply by observation over a period of time. These skills will also allow you to identify ways to adapt your land to your particular purpose.
Reading a landscape is an observational skill so I have decided to take you on a virtual tour of the mountain range that I live in and tell you what I see in the different spots that we stop off at. I will highlight things at each location that I have learned on my food forest permaculture journey, and that I hope to impart to you the reader. I hope you enjoy the tour!
Comments (16)Food Security and Seed Saving
Courses/Workshops, Seeds — by Kay Baxter January 23, 2012
5-Day Workshop with Kay Baxter (from NZ’s Koanga Institute) at the PRI’s Zaytuna Farm, NSW, Australia
In our changing and unstable world, the question of food security is becoming increasingly relevant. Our ability to grow healthy food locally and sustainably is dependent in many ways on the quality of our seeds. It has been a focus of the Koanga Institute for many years to support home gardeners with the skills needed for self reliance, and understanding the process of saving high quality seed that is well adapted to local climates is fundamental to this. Almost all seed available commercially today is grown by large companies either in Europe or the USA. This leaves the home gardener extremely vulnerable to global instability if they are not saving their own seeds. Genetic diversity in our food crops has been lost on a drastic scale due to the industrialisation of our food production. The incredible diversity we once had, with thousands of genetically unique varieties, has been reduced to a tiny number of varieties that have been selected for their suitability to commercial applications (not the requirements of a home gardener).
When Orthodox Science Meets Permaculture Principles, Techniques and Design Process
Animal Forage, Bird Life, Food Forests, Food Plants - Perennial, Insects, Livestock, Medicinal Plants, Plant Systems, Seeds, Trees — by Nicollas Mauro January 20, 2012
Design science is at the root of any definition of permaculture or put simply, permaculture is design science. — Bill Mollison
Permaculture is a design/holistic/integrative science, whereas the mainstream/academic science is reductionist — that is, to understand how things work, scientists break a system and study the tiny parts.
Nevertheless, permaculture can benefit from reductionist science, to find relevant knowledge and new design ideas, but above all to gain some academic arguments to demonstrate the validity and legitimacy of its principles and techniques.
This is an article which shows some of the links I’ve found between scientific articles published in national and international journals, while searching facts and numbers to help me design my property. During the process, some ideas just popped, so I included them to make the article a “live performance” of the usefulness of lurking in the scientific jungle sometimes.
Comments (4)Winter Sowing – Germinating the Natural Way
Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Nurseries & Propogation, Seeds — by Sunny Soleil January 10, 2012
When you consider how seeds germinate in nature, it makes sense to sow our own seeds the same way.
In late summer, left to their own devices, seeds fall into the ground. They slowly get covered with leaves and other natural material ready to begin their long winter hibernation in the soil.
As the cold weather sets in and snow covers the ground, the seed toughens up and as spring sets in that little seed will emerge in its own good time, when conditions are perfect for it to start peeking above ground.
July through August (or, in the northern hemisphere, from December through January) is generally a ‘rest time’ for the annual gardener, so if you’re anxious to be ‘out there’ doing something, winter sowing is a perfect way to keep your green fingers active!
Comments (9)Rental Permaculture: How to Fill the Void
Community Projects, Food Forests, Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Nurseries & Propogation, Plant Systems, Seeds, Society, Trees, Urban Projects, Village Development — by Bob Nekrasov January 6, 2012
by Bob Nekrasov
I hear you comrade. ‘I want those acres and to start my food forest and have a permaculture demonstration Eden – but alas, I am a humble renter with big bloody dreams and typically uncreative landlords’.
As us ‘renters’ forlornly scan open fields and acres — seeing real estate listings of eroded soils sitting below beautiful key points — we are designing lush, abundant landscape in our minds and whinging about the price and how we could easily ‘turn this place into a self-sustaining paradise’. Well, at least I am! But, we can get caught in the dream trap — thinking we will start the big permaculture project when we get that dream plot of land. But it is really a void that needs to be filled. When you know how much good you can do you do feel a little crippled by renting a place where you feel you cannot do much. Having this deluded mindset a few years back I set out to figure out what I can do. Hooray!
Comments (20)Hemp seeds grown in Australia’s first Hemp Farm
Commercial Farm Projects, Food Plants - Annual, Medicinal Plants, Seeds — by Paul Benhaim November 24, 2011
The Hemp Farm is the world’s first public demonstration, education and working farm growing low-THC industrial hemp.
Based on the North Coast of NSW (Byron Bay), the hemp farm is dedicated to the many uses of this estranged plant. Grown under Government license, hemp does not contain psychoactive quantities of the drug ingredient.
The benefits of growing hemp fit with permaculture principles. Hemp requires no pesticides or herbicides, can clean up waste water (of which it does not require much) and offers many uses from both its stem and seed.
Comments (7)Maarten Stapper: “Biological Agriculture – a Third Way?” (IPC10 Presentation – Video)
Animal Forage, Biodiversity, Commercial Farm Projects, Compost, Conferences, Courses/Workshops, Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Fungi, GMOs, Health & Disease, Plant Systems, Presentations/Demonstrations, Rehabilitation, Seeds, Soil Biology, Soil Composition, Soil Conservation, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Structure, Trees, Water Contaminaton & Loss — by Craig Mackintosh PRI Editor October 25, 2011
If you didn’t catch it already, be sure to check out the previous post with Dr. Maarten Stapper’s first IPC10 convergence presentation. And, after several attempts, I finally managed to get his second presentation uploaded — you can click play above to watch this as well. With decades of experience in the farming industry, Dr. Stapper has a great deal to share, and a lot of insight to go with it.
Comments (1)Review of Geoff Lawton’s Food Forest DVD, by Paul Wheaton and Helen Atthowe
Compost, DVDs/Books, Dams, Food Forests, Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Fungi, Land, Medicinal Plants, Plant Systems, Rehabilitation, Seeds, Soil Biology, Soil Composition, Soil Conservation, Structure, Swales, Trees — by Paul Wheaton October 8, 2011
Click play to hear the talk!
Review of Geoff Lawton's Food Forest DVD, by Paul Wheaton and Helen Atthowe
Paul Wheaton and Helen Atthowe (www.veganicpermaculture.com) watch Geoff Lawton‘s Food Forest video and Helen really loved it. It shows a food forest as they start it, at 6 months, a year, 3 years, 10 years.
Paul thinks it is one of the best permaculture videos. Lawton starts by talking about three concepts: the layering of systems (there are 7-10 layers of a forest), succession of systems (how nature repairs itself), and time (working with different events — eg: sun, shade, flood over time). Paul shares Helen’s hesitancy using the word “permaculture.” They also talk about the word “science” and “studies.” Lawton has 1st, 2nd, and 3rd recovery plants. The first are: annuals, nitrogen fixers, ground covers and leguminous shrubs. The second are medium size nitrogen fixing trees (later to be chopped at head height in order to nurture the longer term trees). The third are longer term nitrogen fixing trees.
Comments (1)Tony Rinaudo: “Against the odds: Reversing desertification in arid and semi arid lands” (IPC Presentation – Video)
Aid Projects, Animal Forage, Biodiversity, Community Projects, Conferences, Deforestation, Food Forests, Food Plants - Annual, Food Plants - Perennial, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, Health & Disease, Land, Medicinal Plants, Nurseries & Propogation, Plant Systems, Presentations/Demonstrations, Regional Water Cycle, Rehabilitation, Seeds, Trees — by Craig Mackintosh PRI Editor October 3, 2011
Tony Rinaudo’s IPC10 conference presentation was one of the highlights of the event for three good reasons — 1) because of the scale of impact his Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration (FMNR) work has achieved (more than 30,000 km² of re-greened, regenerated land to date); 2) the utter simplicity — and thus doability — of this work (it requires no financial investment or out-of-reach technologies, only a little educational guidance and community collaboration), and 3) the speed at which this regeneration can occur and lives can improve.
We’ve brought people’s attention to FMNR before…
… and now I have the great pleasure of being able to share Tony’s IPC10 conference talk in high definition video (at top). Note: If you want to see the slides in higher quality, you can download Tony’s presentation (9mb Powerpoint) and click through it in a different window as Tony talks if you like.
Readers can also download:
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