Garden

Our Permablitz Garden on BH&G

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Jo's Permablitz Permaculture Inner City Home Garden on Better Homes & Gardens with Jason Hodges
Jo's Permablitz Permaculture Inner City Home Garden on Better Homes & Gardens with Jason Hodges

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better homes and gardens australia
segment on community gardens featuring
our inner city permaculture garden


For anyone who missed it here’s a link to the Better Homes & Garden’s episode featuring our inner city permaculture garden! (We’re on second, third if you count the ad) I was away hiking at Wilson’s Promontory so missed the whole thing and came home to a whole inbox of messages from friends saying “you have bees?!?! what….why????”, they obviously haven’t tasted homemade honey before, or been frustrated with unpollinated pumpkins (we permaculturists have slightly left of centre concerns don’t we?)

Here at the Desert Echo we like to spread Permaculture 1.5 minutes at a time. hee!

Easily digestible in length, I hope this segment showed people that a beautiful, productive edible garden is possible for everyone, no matter what their budget, no matter their level of inexperience. Stay tuned to see our latest design for a garden in Pascoe Vale on a tight budget that aims not only to produce enough food to keep the cash strapped host fed, but also create a lovely garden for them to relax and entertain in!

If you want to help spread the word about Permaculture send BH&G a message that you’d love to see more of it on their show!

Check out the behind the scenes photos of the filming.


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Garden

Better
Homes & Gardens

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behind the scenes of a permaculture home garden

camera-filming-jason-hodge-bh&g

The sky turned from white to crystal blue as a hot air balloon gently rose to greet the day. Creeping slowly above the treetops and up, up and away. Surely such clear skies and glorious golden rays of light would be a film makers dream! But not so, they piled through our door at 8:30am one by one horrified at the hot spots and wishing for overcast skies, a mini crew from Better Homes and Gardens…it was no ordinary day.

Here at The Desert Echo Permaculture Design HQ we are exicted to have our flemington permaculture garden feature as part of the Community Gardening segment on BH&G on 31st May this month! A great big shout out to the Permablitz team for suggesting us for the show.

Dylan did his very best to avoid camera time by acquiring a black eye two days before filming at Jujitsu practice (Accident or intentional? we’ll never know!) Which removed my fear of being relegated a mute nodding head in the back of every frame, to a new and far more terrifying prospect of being the main talking head! The English language (my native tongue) leaves me at the best of times, but in front of a camera! Eek! Luckily Jason Hodges, the host, and his crew were so lovely and down to earth, chatting so warmly with us between takes, it was actually an amazingly fun experience. It didn’t stop me from making some clangers, (my attempt at saying “reciprocity” a highlight), but it really was so so cool seeing how a show is made.

I hope you all tune in 4 weeks from now to show how popular Permaculture is, it would be so great for BH&G to pick it up in a big way! I might even gift you with some unintentionally terrible soundbites, hopefully some good ones to, but definitely a great close-up shot of me picking an eggplant! Hand modelling, with my gardener’s hands?…. probably not.

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behind-the-scenes-permaculture-garden

filming--better-homes-and-gardens-crew

jason-hodge-host-permaculture-community-garden

flemington-pemaculture-garden-filming

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Garden, Permaculture design

LESSONS AMONGST THE POPPIES

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David Holmgren showing the group around his zone 1 vegetable garden at Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

Mark from Purple Pear Organics at Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

David Holmgren amongst the poppies in his vegetable garden at Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

Mathias listening to David Holmgren at Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

David Holmgren explaining the water plan in the vegetable garden at Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

The tricycle chook tractor at Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

The huge orchard trees at Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

Tour around Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

Geese at Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

David Holmgren pointing out the different animal fodder trees at Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

Thr group listening to David Holgren explaining his site design for Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

The treehouse in the ild pear tree at Melliodora, Hepburn, Victoria, Australia

 

We packed our car full of Germans (as is the custom when heading to Hepburn for some Advanced Principles David Holmgren style) and set off, but not before taking a little detour to the airport to pick up a stranded Permaculture Pilgrimager (I told you it’s not a religion!!). Fashionably late as always we filled up on soup and set up tent in a dark paddock, my head nodded as I tried to cram in the last 10 pages of David’s book, 4 to go I succumbed to sleep.

The Advanced Principles course is well worth the trip, but as always my head was fairly bursting with knowledge at the end of the first day and I am still digesting it and working out how to apply it to life as I know it. Some people have all the luck, oh to have David Holmgren brains!

Whilst fascinating, the photographic opportunities at the primary school hall were not so scenic so I’ll leave you with some snaps from around David’s place at Melliodora. I won’t recommend the chook tractor tricycle as its inhabitants came to a sticky end at the paw of a Hepburn fox, but I promise if you visit Melliodora you will be dreaming of a tree house in ancient pear tree for years to come.

 

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Eco building, Garden

THE SOUTH MELBOURNE PERMABLITZ – COMMUNITY & CURVES

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Digging out soil from earth bag garden bed, at the South Melbourne Commons Permablitz

Digging a hole for a Medlar fruit tree, at the South Melbourne Commons Permablitz

Measuring hole for the Medlar fruit tree, at the South Melbourne Commons Permablitz

Digging out the old soil from the earth bag garden bed, at the South Melbourne Commons Permablitz

Curving earth bag wall, at the South Melbourne Commons Permablitz

Little boy climbing sand pile, at the South Melbourne Commons Permablitz

Pile of gloves, at the South Melbourne Commons Permablitz

Compost pile, at the South Melbourne Permablitz

Unkinking irrigation hose for erth bag garden beds, at the South Melbourne Commons Permablitz

Little girl playing, at the South Melbourne Commons Permablitz

Little boy sitting on the pile of sand, at the South Melbourne Commons Permablitz

My shoulder and arm muscles had finally forgiven me after my first Blitz and I decided to try another, at which thankfully, I was neither designer nor facilitator. Not in a backyard this time, but at the South Melbourne Commons in the capable hands of designers Seila and Charlie.

It was lovely to see all those veggie beds in a shared public space, all nestled around that lovely old brick building. The earth bag beds had already been constructed at a past Blitz which I wish I’d been to as this is something we would like to do for our Blitz. They were lovely and curving, and our main job for the day was to fill them up with compost for the cafe garden. Warm windy days are not ideal for shifting compost, but after a few eye watering encounters we managed to move the huge pile before lunch.

After some serious matocking the soil gave way just enough to let us plant some Medlar fruit trees, I’ll be curious to see how they go as I don’t think i’ve ever seen, let alone tasted their fruit. Whenever someone turned their head the kids at the Blitz cheekily tried to fill in the holes again, nothing like a little bit of mischief to keep us on our toes.

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