The Alternative Lifestyle Site

Living Your Passion from the Heart

I came across this video via one of my YouTube subscriptions – Peak Moment – and although it’s about Permaculture it’s about so much more.

As this (almost half hour) clip comes toward the end I realised that here were two people who were living their passions and their purpose and luckily for all of us, that meant that they would share them with the world. Permaculture is Permanent Culture and Community as Common Unity. These guys have it on so many levels and they touched me today so now I’m passing it on to you.

Transition Projects #4: Creating a Resilient Orchard

So now I’m working on yet another project to help us Transition from a high energy lifestyle, to a lower energy lifestyle. Transforming our old neglected fruit orchard into a resilient Food Forest.

If you’ve been following this blog for a little while you will have subscribed to the newsletter in order to receive the 20 video “Energy Series” (which are free by the way) that help you take control of your energy bills by giving you excellent hints, tips and advice on what to do to reduce your consumption, save energy and save money. Recently though, we’ve raised the bar a little and began sharing with you our other major projects.

Project 1: The Food Project – beginning with the construction of our shade house. This totally revolutionised our food production last year and this year it has morphed into a berry and herb growing house with our main potato crop and some soft summer salad vegetables planned for a few weeks time. There will be a part two shortly.

Project 2: The Chook Project – these are our wonderful animal companions and they do so much work for us, eating our scraps, weeding our gardens, eatings pests and they give us eggs and fertiliser in return. Not to mention the sheer joy of having them around. There are plans afoot to upgrade their lodgings but it may be a while before that gets done due to the next big project below.

Project 3: The House - this is our long term project to build ourselves a sustainable home. We are literally building it ourselves so it’s slow, but we are using recycled materials, waste material, natural materials, energy efficient design as well as new and old technologies and materials to create a healthy, efficient, welcoming abode.

Project 4: The Food Forest Orchard

Which brings us to the first steps towards creating a resilient orchard which will one day be a Food Forest. Now my definition of a food forest as it stands today is a food garden incorporating fruiting and non-fruiting trees, shrubs, bushes, ground covers and underground edible items. I’m a long, long way from being able to claim any such thing right now but I am making a start.

This picture shows some of our apple trees which are planted alongside the shadehouse. They are not particularly old trees but from my observation they were planted a few years ago and no-one has touched them since.

This small orchard contains apples, cherries, plums, nectarines, peaches and quinces. There are four rows of six trees in each row and many of these trees are old, overgrown, filled with dead wood, crossed branches and lots of pests and diseases.

Despite this horrid state, they continue to produce fruit.

Imagine what they will do when someone starts to appreciate and care for them.

I recently purchased a DVD from the Australian Permaculture Institute, on Food Forests and it was so inspiring but I found myself a little overwhelmed. Most of the projects were of such a large scale I just couldn’t see how I could do such a thing in my garden.

Then I got onto YouTube and typed in Food Forest and came across a couple of video’s by or about Robert Hart from the UK who has developed a forest garden on a scale that is very applicable to my circumstances. YouTube is an absolute gold mine for visual images and information on this subject so go there and get inspired … well it certainly worked for me!

In our garden we have a limited amount of time in which to work to create and maintain things due to most of our time being spent building the house. However, Spring certainly worked it’s magic this year here in Australia with rain turning our parched land into a green oasis in a matter of weeks and creating an irresistible urge to get out there and do some work of a different nature.

I chose just one tree, in this case a fairly mature plum that has been shaped and pruned in the past but is badly in need of some nurturing. I’ll admit right here that I’m new to orchard maintenance and the details of how to properly care for each different tree are not yet part of my knowledge base without resort to books. However, I do know that dead wood has to go – that is where I always begin. Then diseased wood and wood that is crossing other branches or which for some reason are just not where you want them. Pruning is hard work but very rewarding.

Using my spade length as a measure, I dug a circle around the base of the tree, pulled out all the weeds and grass (some went to the chooks and ducks and some to the compost bins) and gave the whole area a nice long drink.

As you can see from the picture, this kind of activity is like a beacon to the chickens who come from wherever they are to “help” – on this occasion, they gobbled up lots of lawn/grass bugs and unfortunately a few worms too but their scratching also dislodged a few of the weeds I had missed so it seems we make a good team.

This activity was followed up with a good few handfuls of blood and bone, dynamic lifter and cow manure (I used all my homemade compost on the vegetable gardens this year) and another good water in.

Finally, we topped the lot with straw as a mulch to keep the moisture in the soil and attract the chickens back to this spot over the next few weeks.

Why do I want the chickens to come and spend time in this spot? They love straw – mine find it impossible to resist – so they come and scratch about and in the process dig up any new weed seedlings which may be popping up and they drop their nutrient rich manure right there where I want it and I don’t have to do a thing!

At the end of the day this is what I had and the tree looked much happier. This is the first tree on the second row in the orchard and I’ve already given all the trees in the first row the same treatment. Hopefully this time next year all the trees in the orchard will be feeling this kind of love!

Our plan is to begin turning this orchard into a food forest and I’ve begun on the trees in the first row already by reading up on companion planting for fruit trees.

This is part of my pest management strategy and so far I’ve planted apple mint, hollyhocks and lemon grass under an apple tree. Chamomile under a nectarine, strawberries, rosemary, garlic, lavender and catnip under the remaining peach and nectarine trees in that row. These are my herb layer and I have to say they look very attractive, the bees love them and they make me smile when I walk through the trees.

There is a lot more work and learning to be done but already the rewards are showing me that it’s most certainly worth it.

Where ever you are, what ever the season you can do something similar in your garden. If it’s cold and dark right now, get out the books and start planning to plant a new fruit tree and it’s companion plants next season, if it’s growing season where you are right now, go outside and see what you can do to add diversity and complimentary plantings to what you already have in your garden or orchard. Watch some video’s, buy a DVD, read a book or two.

Your garden will love you, your food will be healthier and you will glow with pride and health. Go to it.

Transition Project #2: The Chook (Chicken) Project – part 1

Transition Projects are those steps we have taken to help up move to a more sustainable lifestyle. Some of them are idealogical, some of them are practical and some of them are just dreams to be acted on in the future. Here we share some of our steps with you in the hope you will become inspire to adopt and adapt some of them to suit your circumstances.

We’ve been here on our property for about two and a half years now and the very first thing we did (after lighting a fire because we were freezing!) was construct a house and yard for our fine feathered friends.

We have both Chooks (chickens) and Ducks and they give us fantastic eggs, manure and garden maintenance services as well as lots of entertainment with their antics.

You can probably tell by now that we just love them.

They spent their first week or so living in our box trailer (with a mesh cage fitted to the top) and a tarpaulin and plywood on the top. They didn’t seem to mind too much and were happy to free range all over the place during the day.

As a ‘quick’ fix we purchased a flat pack steel garden shed and set them up a weather and fox proof home. It works OK but we would prefer to provide them with first class accommodations as they provide us with such first class companionship and services.

We built them a small holding yard from timber posts, welded “dog” mesh and corrugated iron. The iron goes all the way around the bottom of the enclosure and is dug into the ground to deter foxes digging underneath and also to help keep snakes out of their pen. We have some shade-cloth over the top to provide them with some shade and protection from the elements. I’ve planted a grapevine that will eventually grow up and over the yard and give them the kind of environment that they really love.

Chooks are originally forest floor birds and prefer a good cover overhead so the grapevine will give them shade, cover and even some fallen grapes which they will adore.

Our birds are only put into this yard (so they have access to their shed) in the evenings at feeding time. We let them out in the mornings and they range freely all over the property all day long.

This has proved a fairly successful strategy as they clean up all sorts of bugs in the garden, eat fallen fruit in the orchard and dig around in the fallen leaves all winter looking for tasty morsels.

Ducks on the other hand don’t really seem to mind. What they do like though is water. Now we don’t have a dam or a pond but they will find water wherever it is – as you can see from this photo. What we have done is rescue an old bathtub from the tip (rubbish dump) and dig it into the ground just outside the chook (and duck) yard.

We have lost two ducks to foxes since we arrived here but both of those were taken during the day. No chooks were taken at all so it appears our local foxes have a preference in what type of fowl they eat! Hopefully we will prevent any further losses as we now have some gorgeous dogs who also roam around during the day and this may deter the foxes. Sure hope so.

This post is Part One of the Chook Project because we’ve now decided that we would like to upgrade the housing for these wonderful animals who share our lives and we are in the planning stages for new and improved chicken coop building and perhaps an expanded holding yard just so that they have some extra room for those times when we need to have them contained.

There will be follow up posts giving you the low down on where we are up to, so keep an eye out for updates. Everyone can take Transition Steps To Sustainable Living and we’d love to hear about some of your Transition Projects – so leave us a comment.

Transition Projects #1: The Shade House (Growing Your Own Food)

Well Spring is attempting to poke it’s head through the clouds here in Australia – it seems to be a little bit shy so far, despite the equinox giving it the green light!

Needless to say I’ve been busy in the garden, well the enormous weed patch really.

We have a shadehouse that we constructed from timber that used to think it was a shed but now firmly believes it’s a shadehouse.

Pulling down the old shed was a real adventure – it was covered in ivy, jasmin and passionfruit vines… in the end we had to set fire to it to finally overcome all the greenery! I’m not joking, just check out the picture below.

We find that we need it in the summer to stop things getting burnt by the sun. The year we constructed it I went from watering twice a day (and feeling like I was losing badly) to watering about three times a week. A BIG saving in time and water and with Summer temperatures on the rise I think we may end up with more than one shady area around our food production.

The construction is very simple (like us really). An arrangement of star pickets (fence droppers), 2 inch poly pipe (which just happens to fit perfectly over the pickets) and a nice timber “spine” down the middle to keeps things nice and upright. We covered the lot in shadecloth with bird netting at the ends. We also had a door made up using some left over welded wire mesh and some corrugated iron.

We have a couple of raised beds in the middle and beds all around the edges. Right now they are without hard edges but our intention is to give them either hardwood or recycled brick edges and to put gravel around the pathways.

All in good time as resources become available.

I’ve already got my potatoes in.

There are also raspberries, strawberries, feijoa, blueberries, rhubarb, artichoke, currants and lots of different herbs. We intend to add an asparagus bed in time for next Spring too. In summer I’ll plant some soft herbs like corriander, basil and maybe some soft lettuce to have in salads.

The shadehouse has such a nice little microclimate for most of the season that it’s hard to go past all the yummy goodies growing inside it. Of course, they are all organic – I mean what else would you expect?

So what are you growing this season? Even fresh herbs can add a whole new dimension to your food, your health and your life. Go on – get planting.

Green At Home: What Are You Growing?

I’m feeling a little envious of those who are experiencing a different weather pattern from me right now. It’s winter here in the Southern Hemisphere and because I live in the mountains the fog didn’t lift until around 2 pm this afternoon. I know, I know, before that it was too hot and everything around us was burning and smoke filled. Aaaah, the joys of living in a dynamic world!

As I was sitting here today wishing I was out there gardening I began to plan what I’ll do on the next sunny winters day we have.

• I have to clear up the left over vegetation in at least on vegetable bed.
• I need to stake a new olive tree I planted a few weeks ago, it’s very young and not yet able to stand up straight.
• I want to get on top of some of the winter weeds that are appearing due to our ample rainfall this month and
• I want to plant some more food.

What are You Growing?

• I’ve got black Kale which is so stunning (tastes a little like broccoli which we love),
• silverbeet – lovely green leaves which we add to just about everything,
• there are some onions, beetroot, broccoli, asian greens like boc choy which self seeded from last year,
• herbs such as coriander, parsley, and mint which just seem to appear like magic, along with a number of different cut and come again lettuce varieties. I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that I let them go to seed and then run around the garden waving them like magic wands to spread them everywhere?

I still feel the need for some more ‘stuff’ to be growing in my garden. I’m thinking in a couple of months I put some potatoes under straw but in the meantime, more broccoli ( We never seem to get sick of it), some carrots, more onions and maybe some garlic although I might be a bit early for that. Snow peas in the shade-house so the frost doesn’t get their flowers sound good too. I might even try parsnips on more time.

What are YOU Growing?

Even if you have only space for a few pots, or a polystyrene box you can grow fresh winter herbs to add to soups and stews. Fresh parsley, wet with dew is a delight just to pick and nibble as you walk by. Mint in tea gives it a real flavour boost – we just nibble on it whenever we walk past our many plants – so fresh and happy a taste and smell it really lifts your spirits.

In just one polystyrene box I can grow lettuce, parsley, baby carrots and beetroot and a good size broccoli plant. In two of them I can add kale, more lettuce, coriander and asian greens. In a hanging basket I can have all the sweet snow peas I could want and they take up no floor space at all. I no longer have to grow in containers as I have a big garden but don’t let a lack of ground-space stop you. Fresh, healthy, easy to grow food is a joy to behold and a big step towards creating as sustainable way of life. Your very own greener alternative lifestyle.

What are you growing? Share with me as I sit here in the cold and just dream of sun ripened tomatoes and strawberries still warm from the sun…..