People often ask me what I think about greenhouses, as a permaculture designer. I've been meaning to write this article for so long that I was beaten to it; Kris de Decker wrote an excellent article, Fruit Walls: Urban Farming in the 1600s followed by Reinventing the Greenhouse.
[Revised 1/9/16 to add November and December income]
When people ask about our tenth of an acre, I frequently say, "We call it an urban farm, but it's more of a market garden." That's because for the last six years (2009-2015), we've brought essentially all of our produce to the farmers' market. What doesn't sell, we eat ourselves or preserve. We're going to try a different strategy in 2016, for a number of reasons, and I feel we owe our customers an explanation.
August 25-26, 2015, Emporia, Kansas
Watch a demonstration of a model of this system on YouTube!
When people here in Emporia learn that I'm into ecological gardening, they often ask me to install rain barrels for them. I'm resistent to doing this for a number of reasons, all of which have to do with limitations in how rain barrels are usually built and connected. I think I've finally cracked the problem, so here's my modest proposal for how to do it right. But first...
[Notes on a speech given October 26, 2014 at the Mother Earth News Fair, Topeka KS.]
Neighbors of Polyface Farm are not supportive, call names when interviewed.
Tension of heresy and orthodoxy is hardly a new thing, just gets applied to different things. Within living memory it was USDA policy to feed dead cows to cows. Orthodoxy today is that GMOs are great and will save the world.
Peter Bane, editor of Permaculture Activist magazine
workshop at North American Permaculture Convergence, August 31, 2014
Opening panel of the North American Permaculture Convergence, August 29, 2014
Penny Livingston-Stark, moderator
Scott Pittman, PRI USA and founder of Permaculture Credit Union: Bill Mollison took to the road teaching permaculture while Holmgren stayed put and did research. Mollison's first visit to the US was 1980-81. Pittman took every opportunity to learn from Mollison before his retirement. Mollison ended all classes by telling students they could now go teach and design, but this was not always a good idea and may be his biggest mistake.
Wes Roe, founding chair, Permaculture Credit Union
[notes from a workshop session at the North American Permaculture Convergence, August 30, 2014]
[Historical note: Less than a month later, PCU merged with Sandia Credit Union. There was no warning at the time that such a deal was in the works.]
Keynote address by Toby Hemenway, August 29, 2014 at North American Permaculture Convergence
Urban permaculture: transformations on the edge of chaos (soon to be a book)
