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Where we began – August 2017 photos

As I mentioned in a previous post, I started my little veggie garden/farming project in August, 2017, making it a little over three months now. (As an aside, August in South Africa is the end of Winter and the optimal time to start planting bed preparation and soil enrichment.)

And, in three short months, it’s gone from a grass-filled, dry, dilapidated space to a thriving garden from which we can harvest food on a weekly basis.

There is an existing shade cloth structure which was in desperate need of repair when we began the project.  It was overgrown, dry, dusty, and had grass growing to knee height.

We first started clearing the grass away from inside to allow us to move around more freely, then we began clearing the tree branches and leaves from the roof. These had accumulated over the years and had many little insect (especially spiders) residents. Needless to say, our improvised methods of cleaning the roof, which included hitting at it with brooms, left us full of dust and unwelcome visitors. But, eventually, we managed to clear the top.

Most of the surrounding trees were cut back to avoid the leaves and debris gathering on the roof again.

This is what it looked like when we started (first week of August):

Later, we then started to patch the holes in the shade cloth, and we sewed the panels which had either been cut to allow for the clearing of debris, leaves, and branches, or which had split from age back together. It was very good exercise for the arms, as one has to work above one’s head to reach. Luckily, the structure is not that high! Otherwise, I bet we would have still been there repairing shade cloth now. 😛

Once the actual structure had been repaired and the area cleared, we could start bed planning and preparation.  We decided to go with the keyhole approach, so that the beds would be a bit more accessible. We left a wide, main path and a secondary path, connected by a shorter path. As you can see in the photo below, we used dry grass as a mulch, which was mostly due to convenience with the plot having an abundance of dry grass and leaves.

Second week of August:

 

Towards the end of August, we started our first planting. Yay! All the hard prep  had finally paid off! 😀 Most of the seedlings came from my favourite seed and seedling supplier – Living Seeds from Henley-on-Klip. When planting the seedlings, we added a layer of seedling mix from Just Nature Organics to give them a good boost and because we didn’t know what kind of soil we were really dealing with yet. You can also see in the second photo that we put up an extra layer of bird mesh fencing around the base of the shade cloth structure because the shade cloth had so many holes towards the bottom.

Ps. The lemons in the photos came in with the mulch. 😛

So that was August in a nutshell – lots of manual labour, sweat, and hard work. But also a great reward with the first planting. 🙂

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It’s a process – Growing from nothing to something

Three months ago, at the beginning of August 2017, I decided to turn a piece of my family’s plot into a vegetable garden based on permaculture growing principles.

It’s a work in progress, and it’s not easy, but it is definitely rewarding – in more ways than one! Of course, we get to grow our own food, and that is a huge plus. I am also learning a multitude of new skills and building essential knowledge. But, for me, personally, I get to spend time OUTDOORS in the sun, working with soil, plants, and living things. And this, perhaps, has been my biggest reward so far. I get to exercise, get fit, get a tan (although, I must say, I’ve always loved my porcelain-perfect skin), AND soak up the sun (which is a must for my chornic-yet-hopefully-soon-to-be-a-thing-of-the-past vitamin D deficiency).

I am in my late twenties, and I finished my last degree just over a year and a half ago. The process of trying to find direction after studying was and still is a challenge, and not always a good one. The endless feeling of being lost seldom leaves me. But, creating this vegetable garden has given me some sort of path to follow.

It all happened very organically, so to speak. My good friend from Urban Food Forest South Africa started to get me interested about permaculture and growing my own food ever since we became friends in late 2016. Even though I stay in a duplex with a very small (and paved) garden, she encouraged me to try my hand at growing a few things. She then promptly and very generously gave me my very first seedlings (a mix of lettuces, kale, spinach, and other plants) to try. Now, I wasn’t exactly a first-time gardener, as I had always loved planting things and nurturing them, but I had mostly grown flowers, some basic herbs, and house plants. As far back as I can remember, plants have always been a part of my life, especially with my mom encouraging us to plant flowers and herbs as kids.

I had a small number of plants already – very low-maintenance and water-wise plants, as there was (and still largely is) an extreme drought in South Africa. So, I thought a few more couldn’t hurt, and so I accepted the gift, and she sent me on a magical journey of discovery. I slowly began to want to grow more and more plants, and I would tell anyone who would listen about my new-found hobby and, especially, about permaculture. Most people just dismiss permaculture as “hippy nonsense”, or I get told that I am “one of those environmentalists”. But, it isn’t about being an environmentalist or a hippy; it’s about being interested in food security, in future generations having access to healthy, pesticide-free, nutritious food.

So, come August of this year, I decided to ask my parents if I could plant a few things on the family plot. They agreed and then the (slow but steady) journey of turning a dry, dusty, and grassy corner of the plot into an abundant vegetable garden began. Sometimes, it’s all too overwhelming, and sometimes, I lose hope, but seeing the progress we’ve made helps me to want to carry on trying. And that is all we can do – TRY. (Before and after photos to follow soon!)

We started small and having been growing 😉 from strength to strength ever since. With the help and expertise of Urban Food Forest,  and the support (both financial and otherwise) of my family, the little piece of grass-filled, dry land, basically the nothing, has turned into something to be proud of and something that is the first step on the road to being more self-sustainable, more eco-aware, and more earth-friendly. It is still small, but who knows what it could turn into, and that is the fun part!

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What is permaculture?

Permaculture, which is short for permanent agriculture or permanent culture, was developed by Bill Mollison and David Holmgren in  the late 1970s. The term describes a holistic approach to farming that incorporates plant, animal, and human systems into a diverse yet fully integrated ecosystem promoting abundance. It can be applied on any scale from domestic to commercial farming, and its approach is to mimic natural ecosystems by using the flow of energy that exists in and between the various individual components to create harmonious and regenerative relationships. Through this approach, food production becomes a sustainable process supporting and encouraging diversity and abundance.

There are three core ideas in permaculture practice – earth care, people care, and fair share or “return of surplus”, as Geoff Lawton, a well-known permaculturist, puts it.

Earth care is simply the aim to do no harm to the earth and all the creatures, plants, and resources with which we share it. It includes environmental concerns, the use of bio- and alternative fuels, the promotion of eco-approaches,  and the environmental conservation that goes beyond simply preserving the resources, plants, and animals that remain after years of destruction – it aims for regeneration and the creation of a state of bountifulness. It especially tries to minimise and repair the impact and damage of our activities on the planet. In permaculture, all things have an intrinsic or inherent value which permaculture systems attempt to harness without causing harm and for the greater good of all things. Earth care implies a change in one’s way of thinking – from how one can exploit resources to  their maximum potential to how one can form systems which work in harmony with one another.

People care is the care of the people involved in the maintenance and use of natural systems. The aim here is to provide for the current and even future food needs of people, while still keeping earth care in mind.  Food production should occur in a sustainable and enduring way.  Permaculture emphasises the creation of healthy, pesticide-free, organic produce that can promote and sustain human and environmental health and wellness.

Fair share is the idea of sharing the surplus which is (hopefully) created through the permaculture process. It is the end of the permaculture cycle, where surplus food is fed back into the system to ensure the system’s continued existence. Permaculture systems should not only survive, but thrive. People receive food and produce to eat as a result of their labours, while the soil is restored and fed nutrients from surplus production and plant matter which is allowed to fall to the ground using the “chop and drop” method. Organic waste is turned into nutrient-rich compost through compost heaps and worm bins, and animals are fed the food grown in abundance, which in turn they help to fertilize. Plants grow stronger and produce more through soil amendments, natural fertilizer, and better management of the process of food production. And so the cycle continues. Energy flows through the cycle, giving nutrients back to the system and supplying each individual element’s needs. Fair share not only applies to surplus food production, but also to the sharing and continuous redistribution of time, resources, and information. It also means that the system should inherently cater to its own needs.

From these three, simple ideas, permaculture grows into a complete and comprehensive approach to gardening and farming. And it is easy to see how important and applicable these ideas are to food production in a time where resources are scarce, the environment is under huge amounts of strain, and the changing climate and temperatures and human activities are wreaking havoc on the earth.