Big thanks to the volunteers and Nola for her amazing photos from the day!
The food forest has flushed green after a harsh summer that stripped the ground bare. The survivors: those born hardy or who retreated to the shadows of apple trees.
It was clear that we hadn’t quite gotten the balance right in terms of perennial plants, I blame the nasturtiums, they make everything seem so lush in spring but when it gets hot they are gone over night abandoning their companions to bake and burn. The same thing can happen in winter when a icy wind dislodges the last of the orange leaves and herbaceous plants tick their faces under the soil until next spring, it ends up looking like a forest of twigs and dirt, not ideal. That elusive perfect blend not only of the 7 layers of a food forest but of evergreen, deciduous, semi-deciduous, herbaceous and annual, a continuous dance of seasonal succession.
But thanks to a surprise donation from some nuns (I just love the randomness of that sentence, thanks ladies!) we were able to have a “take two” with our planting plan. And what a turn out! Despite our number limit, facebook invites are always a game of chance – is a yes a yes? what does maybe mean? This time Yes Yes Yes. Overwhelming at first, but once we got into our groove everyone worked together so well and we got so much done. We cheekily extended our boundary into an overgrown tree planter that the council’s gardening henchmen had neglected, it was a nest of grass and my hat goes off to the brave souls who bravely hacked back the jungle.
The most exciting part of the day was seeing our special flip top signs oiled and installed. Tom and Pat are the superstars who made my sign designs a reality.
Next food swap/permabee will be 2-3pm on Saturday 27th June! I hope to see you there to finish putting up the signs and adding the laminated “treasure hunt” style plant descriptions! It’s going to be so much fun! Check out the Flemington Food Swap facebook for information. (No facebook? Just comment on this post and I’ll add you to the mailing list) We will be having a potluck afternoon tea/food swap afternoon tea afterwards at 3pm! Hope to see you there!
The food forest a month earlier in need of some drought tolerant plants!Drought tolerant plants are concentrated around the edges whilst moisture loving plants are sheltered in the “natural swale” of the land near the fence which is supplemented by drip irrigation.Hardy indigenous bush tucker that was once eaten by Victorian Aborigines and is accustomed to our harsh, dry summers.Signs are made from off-cuts from Tom’s renovation! Can’t get much more sustainable than that!
Sign posts in! Thanks Tom!shop discount beach wedding dresses UK at prombee.co.uk
Taming the jungle! It is important to control grass at the edges especially fences and under trees where it is hard to remove once the garden grows up.
Running grass gone! Looking so much more spacious!This was a beautiful, fun and productive day. Activities like Permabees are a fantastic low stress way to build a sustainable community. I’ve tried organising other social community building events like picnics and food swaps, but when the main attendees were my friends and my family I realised two important facts: strangers are shy and won’t show up to “social” events without a “pack of friends” as a buffer, I’m shy and organising these things stresses me out too! You just can’t force these things. And after repackaging the food swap as a permabee, it made it clear if you make it attractive they will come and if it involves and activity rather than talking you’ll have 30 people there without even trying and it will be a blast! We’re already planning our July Food Swap as a documentary night. I’ve learnt my lesson.Below is a little brainstorm about the highs and lows of building a community, the things that make it worthwhile and the pitfalls to avoid. Maybe you can help me add to the list! At the end of the day if it’s stressful and isn’t fun for you, the organiser, then it’s time to rethink the path you have taken or perhaps you just need to find more people to support to make the going easier. A highlight of the last Food Swap Permabee was that one of my uni classmates showed up who I hadn’t seen for about five years! We hadn’t actually spoken much at uni, but we soon found out we had SO much in common and it was exciting to discuss possible joint ventures and remember that Architecture can be holistic if you can shake yourself free of all that convention spouted as truths.
Attractive
Activities and workshops where you can meet like minded people without social pressure.
Sharing knowledge, learning a new skill.
Swapping tools and food
Supporting each other, banding together for or against an important cause
Making hard tasks easier by delegating and utilising individuals’ strengths
Building friendships, combating the loneliness of the city and the isolation one can feel when fighting the sustainable cause. Connection.
Being re-energised by other people’s passionate and determination
Having fun, celebrating and eating amazing food other people have brought along
Mentally and physically healthy alternative to sitting alone on the computer or watching TV.
Unattractive
Awkward social situations
Burning out because everyone relies on you (or a small group of you) to take charge and organise everything
No one showing up to your events
Stress of organising events where a lot of people come
Insurance and oh&s associated with community events
Pressure to come up with ideas
Pressure to instigate other people’s ideas
Lack of privacy when you have one of those yuk days when you don’t want anyone to recognise you and you run into about 5 acquaintances on the journey. (don’t pretend you don’t know what I mean)
Dylan installing drip irrigation along the fence. We wanted to minimised irrigation so we have concentrated plants that need moisture like berries along the fence leaving outlying areas for drought tolerant herbs, shrubs and bush tucker.
It’s been six months since we had to say goodbye to our old house and garden. It’s sad to lose all that productive space, anyone who has bought or built up beautiful new soil will know how it feels, but I guess the positive is that it has really driven me to pour my heart and energy into the community gardens I’ve designed.
I had a lovely email from Annelies asking me to answer some questions for her research project on backyard food growing and I thought this was a good chance to share my last thoughts and photos of our garden which six housemates could get a salad out of for every dinner and a lot more in peak harvest season. It wasn’t going to replace farming, but with nearly every baby spinach encased in plastic nowadays it sure cut down on our garbage, water waste and pesticide ingestion. We’re not going to cover our wheat and rice requirements in a 9x9m backyard but salad is easy, and everyone, even an apartment dweller can do it and be a lot healthier for it.
It was actually really therapeutic to reflect on our first permaculture garden journey and I’d like to thank Annelies for the idea. I had forgotten how much we actually got from that garden and it has given me the inspiration to transform our new garden! I hope it inspires you too!
I love reading your comments and enjoy responding to your questions, so keep them coming! 🙂
From humble beginnings
Earth bag raised garden beds filled wit herbs and salad plants.
How much of the food you eat do you grow on your property?
SALAD NOT STAPLES
– know your gardens limits & understand your climate
We didn’t grow staples such as rice, wheat, lentils, chickpeas or corn. We have experimented with them, but with our climate, space constraints, time required in ground and their nutrient demands it just wasn’t feasible.
We concentrated on growing greens and fruit. We were about 90% self-sufficient in greens (e.g. lettuce, spinach, chard, bok choy, tatsoi, etc). We grew almost all our herbs including bay, rosemary, oregano, thyme and chives. Our fruit and nut trees required a few years to fruit productively but by the time we left we were getting: bananas, avocados, apples, nectarines, peaches, almonds, plums, babacos, strawberries, lilly pillies, oranges, lemons. We also had kiwiberry, currants, pomegranate, elderberry, passionfruit, goji berry and lime trees that were yet to fruit. In a few years this would have easily been enough fruit for the year, but not enough nuts.
Other seasonal treats such as tomatoes, cape gooseberries, eggplants, broccoli, pumpkin, zucchini etc were enough for 1-2 months of the year when they were in season, but there was not enough to preserve for the rest of the year.
How have you managed to grow this quantity?
PERENNIALS, KING OF THE LOW MAINTENANCE POTAGER
We had raised garden beds for annuals, but from experience you can get a greater yield with less maintenance from a food forest system primarily comprised of perennial edible plants.
GROW UP – make use of vertical space in small gardens
Where space and light is limited using fences and other vertical space is important.
KNOW YOUR MICRO CLIMATE
Careful analysis of miroclimates on your site is important, for instance our garden was south facing, but one corner in the south west got sun all day and this is where we planted out cool banana.
– save time, water and grow more resilient deep rooted veg
The most effective annual garden beds are wicking beds as they require less time for watering in summer and plants in them are more resistant to extreme heat which were are getting a lot of in Melbourne.
We practiced a four year crop rotation to reduce the risk of disease and keep proper nutrient balances in our soil. Plants from the same family generally have different nutrient/pH requirements as well as propensity to fall victim to the same soil borne diseases so letting the ground have a rest from a plant family for three years helps avoid issues. Green manures and legumes help fix nitrogen in the soil and improve its quality.
The tropical corner, a microclimate warm enough for a ‘Cool Banana’ to fruit
AVOID CHEMICALS
Chemicals are a quick and dirty fix that lead to long term problems. Killing pests will stop beneficial insects immigrating to your garden to take care of the job for you and might even harm the good guys you already have. Likewise herbicides & fungicides damage the delicate balance in your soil not only getting rid of weeds but killing off the good bacteria, mycelia fungi and earthworms that contribute to rich beautiful soil.
It might take a few years to get your garden in balance and some plants might be sacrificed, but once it is filled with soil life, ladybugs, birds and bees you’ll never look back.
COMPANION PLANTING
– nurse maid plants, beneficial pairings and alleopathy
In Australia we have plenty of light so the English way of planting in neat little rows with a halo of dirt around in unnecessary. Grow plants tighter so they shelter each other and use a mixture of plants to confuse pests with silhouette and smell. Some plants work especially well together such as carrots and onions. companions-planting
RETHINK WHAT IS A WEED
Nutrient filled, hardy, self-propagating, edible, when is a weed not a weed? Instead of pulling out those dandelions why not try the leaves in salad and the peeled root in a stir fry? Nettles make a tasty pesto and attract butterflies and protect their larvae. edible-weeds
WORM FARMS & CHICKENS
– garden helpers to improve your soil
These permaculture pets area great source of manure and soil conditioner without the need to increase your lettuce’s food miles with the bought stuff. Worm castings also help your soil retain moisture and both are great way to quickly process food scraps. diy-worm-farm pascoe-vale-permablitz
MULCH
Protects your soil from drying out and adds nutrients as it decomposes. Why note try 1. Living green mulch – ground covers such as clover, 2. Chop & drop, 3. Seaweed. seaweed-mulch using-seaweed-mulch chop-drop
Bamboo & bananas need a lot of water, but can tolerate the salts and soaps grey water. They also grow very fast and are great for screening out neighbours to the southIn our garden edible flowers are fixed with vegetables, not just to add colour to a salad but as bee forage.
– support small business rather than the duopoly supermarkets (people versus corporation)
We also support our local Foodworks grocery store where the owners know us and we feel loyalty towards them. For staples we visit various organic grocery stores and buy things in bulk and use our own containers. Some include: friends of the earth, Ceres, Lygon organics
BUY IN BULK
(affordable organics, dried staples, less packaging)
Organic food is more expensive and as backwards as it seems things made in Australia can also be! If you buy dried instead of tinned and buy in bulk organic is a lot more affordable (about the same as the small packets of non organics in the supermarket. Plus there is the added bonus that you use your own containers so you don’t have to feel guilty about packaging. wholefoods friends of the earth ceres grocery
What changes have you had to make to your diet to source food sustainably?
ETHICAL MEAT
(reduce over consumption of meat, degradation of land, animal cruelty & trawling)
We now eat mostly vegetarian with the exception of fish/seafood we have caught ourselves or sustainably sourced. Dylan also has a little bit of kangaroo or beef from the Farmer’s market where you can talk directly to the farmer about how their animals have been raised. fishing adventures
BUY AUSTRALIAN GROWN & MADE
We limit tofu and soy in our diet and try to get bulk NSW rain fed rice and Tasmanian quinoa. This is starting to sound a bit Portlandia so I might as well go all the way there…we eat a lot of Australian nuts, seeds and berries. (Yikes what hipsters! ha!)
Affordable, fresh, local, nutrients not lost, well-rounded balanced diet
David Holmgren’s wife Sue told us how one year she didn’t eat tomatoes all winter because she hadn’t grown enough and couldn’t bear to buy any. She said she felt really good, better than she had felt in ages and although she would preserve tomato for the coming winter it illustrated how even good things should be eaten in moderation because toxicities can build up. It’s good to give your a body a break every now and then like we would have before cheap oil made all year tomatoes, bananas and strawberries a thing.
I try to limit packaged foods to reduce waste and plan on trying a rubbish free month this winter which hopefully will help me develop better habits.
We try to eat as seasonally as possible and buy organic preserves such as canned tomatoes if we can.
(don’t get caught out when your at your most vulnerable – tired, hungry, under pressure)
Being prepared is a must: soaking dried pulses for future meals, making excess so we have meals to take to work makes a huge difference so we don’t end up having to head out for a sneaky takeaway too often. We try to make eating out a fun treat not a lazy convenience (but we haven’t perfected this one).
I work full time and Dylan is at uni so our blender has made a huge difference in making it possible to quickly and painlessly make pasta sauces and soups from scratch come dinner time.
Has there been an impact on your wider lifestyle?
With only a small shady backyard there has been a real incentive to actively contribute to local food security. The Flemington Food Forest I designed with the support of The Farnham St Neighbourhood learning centre has morphed from a fun community garden in a local park to an education tool with signs for school students and I get a lot of joy from it. I have also taken over organising the Flemington Food Swap which my housemate set up, I am really trying hard to develop a nurturing sustainable community in my suburb to bring together like minded people and make sustainability fun and social. Someone’s glut is someone else’s zucchini brownie after all.
What are the groups/networks that you utilise to source your food? Both formal and informal.
Flemington Farmers Market
Racecourse Road Foodworks (if you ask them to get something organic or ethical they are always happy to oblige)
Organic Wholefoods Brunswick & Flemington
Friends of the Earth
Ceres
Natural Tucker Bakery
What food items have you found difficult to source locally and/or sustainably?
Coffee
Tea
Fish/seafood
Chocolate
Coconut
Monocultures – corn, rice, wheat, etc
Bananas and other tropical fruit
Sugar
Cashews
Pine nuts
Brazil nuts
Pepitas not hulled overseas (many are grown here then exported to China for processing)
Dates
Are there any alternatives to this?
We use a lot of beans for our main staple as we can grow some at home and they add nitrogen to the soil.
Almonds are the main nut we eat and we occasionally make almond milk as it is not so easy to find milk such as Elgaar where they rest their cows and reuse their glass bottles. No soy milk!
Honey instead of sugar and maple syrup, we keep our own bees. We are also growing yacon as this is meant to be a great sugar substitute. We grow stevia, Dylan likes it, but I don’t.
Peppermint and other herbal teas
Dylan likes his coffee but he gets it from Streat where it is Faritrade and they hire & support local homeless people.
our beloved chooks, more trouble than they’re worth, but lovable all the same
say goodbye to the old life, losing something but gaining more
A clunking trailer bouncing: chicken coop, couches and a mobile garden over speed humps. There was something delightfully outlandish about our arrival at our new home, chook in the boot, we were the Beverly Hill Billies of Flemington (alas no rocking chair grandma on the roof). Books and plants and tools, that is what our worldly possessions amounted to, but after months on the road even those few items chaffed a little, there was no carrying them on bike and back.
Downsizing in house size and housemates was a huge relief after months self-indulgently alone. Even now, months after touching down, my brain fills with static when the emotions and drama of others grow too intense. A rising desire to flee to the quiet recesses of my own brain. Time to slip into my most fluid friendships, easy-going and nurturing they’ll help build back my tolerance to the world we live in.
Here are my top 5 tips for a mobile garden:
Deciduous trees
Cut a circle around deciduous trees a few weeks before you move them, prune braches so root loss to branch loss is about even. An arborist friend says this gives them a chance to regrow their feeder roots before being transplanted.
Evergreens
Grow dwarf evergreens in barrels/planters with wheels. We have all our citrus in barrels as well as a devil plant so when moving garden they can just be wheeled to the trailer. Make sure wheels you buy are strong, we’ve had one collapse before and it’s no fun.
Infrastructure
Make things dismantleable. Our chicken coop can be dismantled into three pieces which I can carry by myself although I prefer not to. This is also good if you want to rotate your chickens every few months for hygiene and to make use of the super rich soil under their coop.
Cuttings
Before perennials get to the point where they can no longer be moved without risking death take cuttings as a back up and pot them up. Take cuttings of deciduous plants while they are dormant. You are more likely to have more success if you catch them before they have expended all that stored energy.
The Everyday
As a renter you never know when your lease might be suddenly broken, keep a copy of all your most useful herbs and vegetables in a window sill planter so you at least have your salad, oregano, chives etc flourishing while you go about trying to get to know and establish your new garden.
What are your tricks? Let me know it the comments section!
The fantastic view from our deck. It’s like being in the bush! We will not miss the three storey apartments that looked into the backyard of our old place.
This sleeper planter full of succulents was my house warming present to myself, 50% off though!This is going to need some work!
I just threw my lettuce seed heads in pots so they’d sprout as cut and come again salad so I wouldn’t have to mess around with punnets. Just snip the tops off and they will regrow 3-4 times!
First cup of tea at the new place! We have a chest fridge/freezer, a “Ghillie Kettle” and a biomass stove that we fuel with dropped gum tree twigs, it’s a bit like camping! So much fun!
Gracie the old Border Collie is very sceptical of the whole arrangement, and Clem the pup is so stick obsessed we had to stop her retrieving the twigs from the fire! never a dull moment!
Nosey neighbour! My parents live behind us now and their dogs are very curious about the goings on over the fence!
Hidden away, just off busy Mount Alexander Road there is a little community with a patch of lawn that dreamed of being something more.
After months of life-affirming moments: fly-fishing with a reconstructive surgeon in Oregon, building Earthships in New Mexico, green woodworking in the Sussex forest, wild camping in Napoleon’s pine forests; it was hard to find inspiration touching down into the old rhythm. After weeks of work, eat, sleep, finally a project brought me out of my stupor and gave colour, energy and meaning back into my world. I hope it touches others as deeply.
The residents of Norfolk Terrace are coping with long-term serious mental illness and disability and we were asked to design a permaculture garden to engage them in growing their own fresh food. We hope as well as turning a bland patch of grass into an edible garden, this becomes a place to building connections and community.
6am awaking with a start to a downpour, 3 years to the day since our own Permablitz was a near wash out, who says Melbourne weather is unpredictable? 8:30 ticked over and the rain had eased so…what the heck, let’s just go for it, if only a hand full of people show for two hours it would still accomplish more than us slogging to complete it by ourselves (and more importantly the sausages and vegetarian delights were already prepared and waiting)!
The residents hadn’t slept well, what with the hot night and the storm, they might not be roused to show up, Greg, a staff member, informed us with an apologetic grimace. We’d heard it before, don’t expect too much, wandering enthusiasm, and the like, but in my honest heart a Permablitz without the residents would be disappointing. Oh well, our volunteers (those undeterred by rain) were pouring in and there was a promising crevasse in the clouds, we threw ourselves into the business of making a permaculture paradise!
It only took a few minutes for Tony to prove him wrong, rocking up to observe, joke and water when required despite his tricky heart. Then another shy smiling resident came to tuck our pile of turf into bed, our main man when it came to covering grass with hessian to stop it sprouting. Tony pointed out it looked like the grave of someone with a loooong body, a boa constrictor a volunteer suggested.
To the delight of the workers the rain restrained itself to only spitting and that only after we had worked in warm sun long enough to need cooling off. Smiles were wide and laughter was easy, everyone was excited to construct raised garden wicking beds, despite having to do some tricky levelling off the ground beforehand. Elsewhere the brick laying gang finished their pretty angled edging of the no-dig gardens and were rewarded with a little planting. Although unplanned the CERES donations of punnets and punnets of corn and white cucumbers meant we could try out the three sisters’ method of planting: hungry/thirsty corn, with trailing vines to keep the soil moist and beans to climb up the stalks and fix nitrogen into the soil.
Lunch was ready just in time as hard working bellies began to growl. Sausages went down a treat with the omnivores who were also pleasantly suprised by the vegetarian fare of beetroot burgers and delicious quinoa salad with grilled mushrooms. The work had been going along well so volunteers, residents and staff relaxed for a chat while everything digested.
After the last crumbs were brushed from beards and raincoats Dylan ran a wicking bed workshop, which I will paraphrase in a future post. Sand and compost went in and then those who had been pushing wheelbarrows for most of the day had a chance to finish it off with some onions and eggplant seedlings.
The sun started to halo our workers as the afternoon wore on just as the finishing touches were going into the second brick no-dig garden. It was planted with adwarf manderine, buddha’s fingers, tea plant, maqui berry and artichokes which would form an edible evergreen hedge to the south of the raised vegetable gardens. As the sand was levelled in the second wicking bed it struck 5pm and Dylan could only usher everyone off by promising a second Permabee to finish off the two other wicking beds this Tuesday. Now if having to bribe your volunteers with another day of labouring isn’t a sign of a happy and successful Blitz, I don’t know what is! Thanks to everyone who came and a special thank you to Norfolk Terrace and the Flemington Neigbourhood Learning Centre for making this happen.
If anyone is interested in attenting the Permabee on Tuesday 4th November contact us at info@thedesertecho.com and to be involved as a volunteer at the Norfolk garden please contact pip@fsnlc.net 9376 9088, we will be running workshops for residents every Friday morning and welcome volunteers to help out.
