Green Temple

[Grahame]

Hi Folks, I do like the idea of this sub-forum but I reckon it would be much more betterer if we could put stacks of photos in. I guess this is sort of a primitive version of the proposed Permaculture Network thingy Craig is working on.

So I'll have a go at it...

We are calling our place Green Temple, based on the idea that it is a fusion of Permaculture principles and spiritual practices aimed at caring for ourselves through caring for the Earth to bring about peace and wholeness of mind, body and spirit. Or, Just as my body is my temple so too is my Earth.

We bought this 3 acre property with an existing weatherboard 3 bedroom house in a small rural Victorian town. The area is mostly irrigated dairy and cropping land, with little indication of anything other than conventional farming and the thought that GM cropping is an idea worth exploring.

The house has a basic East-West orientation, albeit with a few too windows on the North and too many on the south

We inherited a fine (although mistreated) Lemon tree and a heavy-bearing Apricot.

More later...

[purplepear]

I await - baited

[Grahame]

So...

We've been here for 3 years now and sometimes I wonder what I was doing for the first 2. I made a lot of 'mistakes' in the first year or so in my hurry to get trees started. I reckon I have moved almost all of the original 40 odd fruit and nut trees since then. I've built semi-temporary fences that have now moved as the plans changed. But all of those mistakes were ones I have learnt a lot from.

But now I feel like I have settled on a rough plan I like. Now, I don't know if you can really call what we do Permaculture, but the principles and pathways are our guiding light.

The paddocks are basically clay with a thin layer of top soil held together by a variety of paddock weeds (more on those later).

The intensive garden (to the East of the house) is in the mould of Linda Woodrow's Mandala type gardens. I've had these going for just over a year now and I'm starting to see real improvement in the soil. I suspect I might even get a couple of good harvests this year. What was once heavy clay is now host to many worms and can actually hold a bit of water, rather than cracking at the first sign of the summer sun.

I think there are 24 fruit trees in the Mandala 'Complex' with others and vines on and planned for the surrounding 'trellis/fencing' (3 of 6 sides completed).

Apart from some conventionally grown and cheaply sourced straw of various types used for mulch and some supplementary grain for the chickens we basically have no inputs. We don't use machinery if we can avoid it, although the judicious use of someone to do some earthworks seems worthwhile. I do also use a mower for the time being to collect compost materials and chook fodder. But hopefully, eventually we can phase this out.

We still plan to make some money buy growing garlics for sale or trade.

In addition to the intensive garden we have the beginnings of a food forest to the north of the house.

The rest of the property is basically weeds at the moment.

I'm still battling with some ideas on Water, but I can talk about that as we come up with some plans, solutions, innovations in the future.

Best get back to the little one now.

Peace

Grahame

[pebble]

Lovely to hear all that Grahame :-)

[sun burn]

Yes very interesting. I'd like to see pictures of a fully established and flourishing mandala garden.

Put your stacks of pictures on photoblog.com. Its so much easier to show them and view them. You can blow them up big or leave them small which is still a lot bigger than a thumbnail. You can have it private to public (only friends can view) or leave it open. You can puts little notes all over your pictures. You can add text easily. Its a great site. I don't understand why some people here are resisting it. It is after all made for photography but they are almost all amateurs. I just post a link ot my own thread when ever I've got something new to show. But if people wanted they can always flick back through hte blog to see it. There are many ways to navigate through your own photos - date, title of post, category, thumbnail, month etc.

I also like facebook albums. You can set up an album on facebook then just post the link to a post here.

[purplepear]

Is the apricot ready to bear? Mine are slow this year for some reason but I do love it when they come. Keep it coming Grahame more more more

[Grahame]

Thanks guys.

Sunburn, I'm generally suspicious of the Internet, and more so things that are 'free'. Perhaps it's paranoia , Facebook in particular is something I am pretty sceptical about. Having said that I might just start a photoblog - if it's good enough for Purplepear its good enough for me . Having seen Marks photos though I can't believe how neat and tidy his mandala is! Photos of mine will show a distinct contrast.

The apricot is doing OK this year Mark, but I suspect this is its 'off' year - some apricots tend to have alternating heavy and lighter years. The crop we had last year was massive. We've finished off all the bottled fruit and the jam we made but we still have some puree left that I might turn into jam for Christmas presents.

Every night at dinner we play a game called "What was your favourite thing about today". Usually there is something that really stands about about my day. Yesterday's for me was when we all (Me, wifey and the two little girls) went out into the garden on a 'Strawberry' hunt. We ended up having a travelling post breakfast feast of strawberries, fresh peas, broad beans and mulberries (unripe but that never stops my girls) right there in the garden. We also collected a big bucket full of passionfruit. I just love watching the girls devouring the things fresh from the garden.

To the girls milk thistles are know as 'chicken lollies', collecting snails for the chooks is fun (especially when you let one 'trail' across your hand). Kids are just so observant and I love watching them as they explore, because they see so many things that I might have walked right by. This is the sort of thing that sustains me when I seem to be falling behind. This is what it is all about. I guess you could say this is all part of my 'system'