The Forest Garden

Lessons come when you arent really looking for them. Yesterday, by chance, I watched an interview with David Holmgren in which he makes a comment about goals. He says, in talking about reading landscape, that  "if we are in a rush, if we want to acheive some goal...then this doesnt sort of really help. We've got to be prepared to be just open and we accumulate understanding that turns out to be useful. In some context...over time...But if we are goal oriented and if we are in a rush then, you know... then its better to go off and get the recipe out of a book or do what your told, or, you know, people go, how can I learn by just staring at...you know, what is it? Where is the answer? Just tell me!" I experienced this  wisdom in a very practical way. We have two large vegetable bins that we planned to turn into wicking beds. We sourced them from a property about 40 minutes away, paying $40 each, and driving out there with a trailer to pick them up. We went to a bi

Today, we paid a visit to Tuki Trout Farm where Just add Water Daughter (Evie) had the great and indefinable joy of catching her first ever fish. It only took about 5 minutes, once we figured out what we were doing.  It was made so easy for us that its almost certain that Evie now believes that every time you drop a line in the water, within a few minutes, you will pull out a trout. And the sheer excitement on her face when she actually landed that 400 gram rainbow trout in her net was an absolute delight to behold. We followed this with five more. Three kilos worth of fish. We brought four of them home to eat and left the other two at the farm where they will be smoked or used on the menu. When we brought those fish home and prepared them for cooking, I was very surprised to see Evie enthusiasm and curiosity about  the fish as I salted them on the kitchen sink. Being a girl, she is usually grossed out by such things.  Its rarer still, for her to be interested in any way in par

Apples and Hawthorn Berries The Autumn sun has been warming the forest garden this week. A reprieve from the impending cold and wet months to come.  The clocks were turned back one hour and the earlier dusk settling over rooftops and neighbourhoods in town has been a small shock to the system. But like all seasonal changes, our minds and bodies adapt and adjust. Usually very quickly so that within a few days you forget that longer days ever existed. I've just finished trudging through six days of labor in the Industrial Health Care Complex. One of modern societies largest and most profitable industries. While it does put food on the table, it also has an awful draining effect on some part or parts of me that are in sore need of regeneration and nourishment. And as usual, a whole bunch of apparently unconnected things coalesce into a congealed jelly of thoughts and musings. I  THE BRAIN Im reading a book called,"The Fat Of The Land" by John Seymour,

The cold weather is setting in right on cue. The fire has needed to be lit for the last three days, and today it was lit first thing in the morning and will be kept going all day.  And so begins our four or five month romance with wood smoke, maintaining heat and woolen jumpers. Some of the wood for this year Wood collection and maintenance has been a failure this summer, despite my good intentions. I planned to cut heaps of kindling and even build a larger woodshed, but the finishing of the vegetable garden and fence took priority.Luckily for us, a generous family member brings a trailer load each time they visit. And if it werent for them, we would be buying it in. Which, as a colleague of mine commented recently, seems like burning money.   I've chopped and split enough to top up his contribution which has filled our makeshift wood shed to capacity, and attempted to restock our kindling reserves as best I can. But I fear that again we will be scraping by and running out

We discussed this excerpt from a facebook post by this guy on the porch this afternoon. "Komlosy argues from a world-historical perspective that the meaning of "work" has changed since the thirteenth century so that it now refers only to those things that produce exchange values or, at best, directly support the production of exchange values through reproducing labor. The exertion of energies in ways that do not directly support the production of exchange values, by being redefined as *not* work, are thus devalued, not simply made worthless or even invisible, but even *negatively valued* as "time wasting." Moreover, it was only under capitalism and colonialism that work became associated with pain (disutility). According to the *work ethic*, expenditures of energy in ways that are fun cannot be work. By contrast, indigenous people have specific terms for each activity they engage in but no general term to denote work and differentiate it from *non*work..

1.0 Im thinking about the practical things I need to do before winter sets in. Like cleaning out the gutters, and chopping and storing the dry wood and some boxes of kindling before the colder weather gets here. When winter comes, it sets in your bones. There is something nourishing about it, even though it strips you down to barest necessities, like keeping the fire going. Last winter, my first here in the forest Garden, I got pretty grumpy being closed in this small space as we are.  The winters here are notorious, and you get cabin fever. But its also nourishing, that dormancy. That death. Because, like the ecology that surrounds us, when spring comes, you have such gratitude and appreciation for the spreading warmth, and even just the appearance of the sun, that growth is explosive. You want so much to make the most of these warm months. So, in a strange way, I am grateful for the impending dark months. We will collect wood ash to feed the fruit trees and compost when

From left: Hawthorn Berries, roadside apples, Bullrush, cherry tomatoes and blackberries All of this, except the cherry tomatoes which are from our garden, were picked free from our local roadsides and creek edges. All of it edible or useful. The Hawthorn Berries on the left were used following this poem recipe.  The Bullrush, I simply picked and tried. Finding  that it is only the inner stalk that is edible. The rest is quite fibrous.  It has a peppery flavour, and you can certainly taste the siltiness of the creek in it which may not be to everyones taste.  But it can be steamed, used in salads, and with some seasoning, I am sure would be very tasty. Not unlike bamboo shoots.   Lets face it, learning to eat and live all over again, particularly when it comes to food that is outside of our sick, convenience and sugar saturated lifestyle, is not an easy task. Preparing these things is very labor intensive. And you might say, (as I did in my mind through out this experiment)

We're going back to work today. Which means being immersed in large corporate systems, work place politics and a general disconnect from a simpler way of being. What I would really like to do today, is return to Union Jack Creek, and harvest some of those bullrushes. They have many uses, including food, making useful tools, like string, woven baskets and all sorts of things. But I must return to my day job... One of a series of Cartoons I am working on around buddhist sayings

One of my great joys about our journey, is seeing the joy in our daughters being when we get out and about picking free food. Its a stark contrast to her reaction to having to be dragged along to the supermarket which unfortunately, we do alot more often. picking berries at our secret spot Blackberries for eyes While walking along Union Jack Creek, today, we came to where the water course ends, and this is a spot where she loves to let her imagination free. Often looking for gold,  Or finding some rock that might have a fossil in it, or as she did today, picking blackberries for a little picnic. Along the way, I noticed the proliferation of Bullrush,   Something I know was a staple indigenous food and can be eaten, but I am yet to try. There is also a proliferation of onion weed along this creek in the cooler months. Despite having potentially edible plants all around us, on we went to the supermarket. While standing in the checkout queue,  with my pre packaged bags of l

We made a trip to Creswick   on Thursday to dig out some raspberry canes and some currant bushes that were offered free on a social media page. Its always inspiring when you meet people of a like mind. A family full of artists, musicians and gardeners greeted us and gave generously of their time and energy. We left feeling grateful, and inspired by the combining of aesthetics and productivity they had achieved. (they built a gypsy caravan from salvaged materials in their backyard)  Its something we are passionate about aswell, though  we are just beginning. But we  hope to grow in all directions creatively and continue growing to the point where we can inspire others aswell. Currants planted out on the south facing side of the Garden  Thanks to these generous people, we have added to our growing list of berries. Its been a delight to see our daughter picking blueberries straight from the bush to have with pancakes on saturday mornings over the summer months and showing a keen

Today I made a gate for Ginny's Garden. Its made from some old disparate bits of wood that come from very different previous uses and purposes, but have come together to create this humble, yet aesthetically pleasing entrance into a space for growing food that we have been dreaming, talking about and planning for nearly two years. The gate to Ginny's garden It occured to me this afternoon, that what we have built here, is in many ways no different to what the early European settlers built when they first arrived here and almost everywhere else in Victoria. The first Europeans to arrive from Van Diemens land with the intention of making a profit from the port Phillip District, landed at Indented Head on the Bellarine Peninsula, and set about constructing a dwelling and vegetable Garden. It didnt prosper. We know the European history of Australia is littered with failure and ignorance. We cannot hope to think that we are that much different in our thinking but we at least