Cardinal Island Farms is a highly diversified regenerative farm located in the beautiful New River Gorge area in rural WV, USA. We hosted 6 live-in volunteers in 2015 and we are looking for live-in help for April-October 2016. We offer spacious room and board, shared meals, farm goods and tons of education and experience in exchange for 25+ hours per week of honest labor on our working farm.
The farm is young and the food to table movement is just about to start getting big in the area. There is more demand than we can keep up with and we have only been on the site for two years.
This is a great opportunity for any motivated person interested in:
-Hands-on experience with animals
-Learning more homesteading skills
-Thinking of starting their own farm
-Getting closer to nature and “getting out of the grind” for a season
-Accessing some of the best outdoor adventure in the eastern US
We are working to build our business around pastured pigs, agroforestry and silvopasture, annual and perennial veggies, fruits and nuts, pastured poultry & eggs (quail, turkey, chickens), forest farming, shiitake and oyster mushrooms, dairy (cow and/or goat), lumber and firewood, soap making, syrup making.
Projects we are tackling in 2016 include
-Finishing the barn with our own milled lumber
-Fencing
-Spring water system development (to add to our current rain catchment system, creek, ponds, swales)
-Hugelculture construction (5 large hugelswales already constructed)
- More tree plantings / food forest establishment
-Expand the perennial gardens (asparagus, blueberry, raspberry, mulberry etc.)
-Improving the efficiency of our pastures and rotational grazing
-Access more restaurants and farmers markets with our products
-Expanding our wood production with our sawmill and firewood business
There is no real limit to how much a person can learn and grow on this farm. I doubt there is a two-week PDC that can come close to actually living and working on a design-oriented farm.
Applicants are expected to be interested in regenerative agriculture and/or permaculture, motivated, able to work and learn on their own or in a group, comfortable with rural living (plus wifi), easy to get along with, physically and mentally well, committed to living in a more sustainable, present way. We enjoy a quiet peaceful environment in our home and we try to be as respectful to helpers' individual needs as we can. We are omnivores. Some dietary flexibility is possible (such as gluten free).
email jnau12@hotmail.com for more info
The discussions on permies have yeilded inspiration and insight. They have contributed to the evolving of many permaculture systems, rmh systems, animal systems and ideas. The value of these discussions can be seen in the threads, but there is an unseen component of massive inspiration and information dissemination that can go unnoticed on first glance. Each contributor whether they are a moderator, poster, or programmer behind the scenes is the only one able to say if there time contribution is worthwhile.
Part of permaculture is working smarter. If there were no discussions or info being made available then everyone would have to start at square one. Maybe your first impulse is to plant as much food forest as possible, but if you research the information available perhaps you will find a better, smarter way to get to your end goal? There are a boatload of folks out there who popped 20-200 trees in the ground only to have them all die, if they dont take the time to share that, they might never find out what happened, and in turn others will go about making the exact same mistakes. In short, part of my practicing permaculture is never arriving at a point where I have it all figured out, and always improving on the systems I do have. I personally choose to do 8 hours of research and 1 hour of work to get the results i am after rather than spending 1 hour researching and 16 hours working only to get inferior results. Being open to discussions is part of being open in general, if permies aint worth it to you than i hope you find somewhere to share your trials and successes with your acres of food forestry.
I agree with this. at no point did i intend to bash permies, if anything i have praised it and have turned many, many other people on to it. For some reason, I keep getting talked to like I don't understand how it works, or that I am unfamiliar with the site. Or that I am unaware of the vast amount of useful info here etc. I don't have a lot of cred as a member because I have been following this site as a non-member for a long time. There is a reason for that. I was reluctant to join and share because something felt a little off... now that I've felt it out a bit I feel more comfortable as a passive voyeur than as a contributor. Nothing wrong with that I hope.
"being open to discussion is part of being open in general"
um yes. that's what I've been saying. Permies, for all of it's great qualities is NOT open to discussion per se, as it is a heavily moderated site. That is Paul's right. It works for Ya'll? GREAT! I know how reality works.
My food forest and other projects embrace a 90% failure rate (though I do a lot of research, too)... Failure is good. that is how innovation occurs. I'm putting my experiences in a book that I am working on. I don't think I can share it on this site, though. I appreciate your thoughts, Zach
"the cheapest thing on the planet is a good intention" -jm
Ann Torrence wrote:
The question is whether we can be a good match right now for your needs. Dave pointed out an interesting sample of the kinds of discussions that we engage in. Certainly something like that attracted you in the first place. There exists a permies culture that has deeply adopted the "be nice" philosophy. I like that part of the culture, it's part of why I come back. There's a phrase from another part of my world, "take what you like and leave the rest." It's nice to think I can post a poorly-conceived scheme and not get blasted for it, which promotes a different kind of free exchange than I see on other forums. I hope you find enough of what you like here to be a long-time contributor, because I admire your articulation and energy in the posts you have made. Tell us (perhaps start a project thread?) about the epic shit you are doing and let us all get better acquainted before carrying on.
Welp, Thanks Dave, Zach and Ann. You all took some time out of your day to give a thoughtful response and I appreciate that.
That's exactly it, Ann. That's the exact question I am trying to answer here. Is permies a good match for me? Do I want to share my epic shit with this crowd? Do i want to call what I do "permauculture". I appreciate Paul's work and all the info he has shared with me and I've learned a lot from the site... This little bump in the road hasn't hurt my ego at all, but it has made me, as a "gentle soul", reluctant to share my ideas and epic shit when I really have no way of knowing if those ideas are going to meet the publishing standards. Forgive me for being so ignorant and obtuse in understanding what "being nice" actually means. thanks for your time. I know how valuable a persons time is... That is why I may be AFRAID to share any more, because I am a high school kid living with my parents and i am just trying to plant acres and acres of food forest. I think of all the time folks spend moderating forums and I wonder, would that time be better spent practicing pemaculture? NOT make a "should" statement or anything... not stepping on a gentle soul.... just counting teh hours you folks must spend on this screen for the sake of permies. I hope that sacrifice is worthwhile and creates the most yield for the fewest inputs.
Yeah I agree with Paul on ethics in that video... I like the idea of taking the "cult" out of permaculture... and building profitable permaculture models... and being accepting of differing permaculture approaches... all of which are compatible with being anti-censorship. One of the things I really like about Paul is that he's not afraid to take on the "asshole" label. "Assholes" get things done. I don't know exactly what his ideas of "being nice" are, though i have an idea from the podcasts...... but It seems inconsistent to me to prune our ideas and NOT prune apple trees; or to encourage polyculture in our gardens, but NOT in our discussions... to be ORGANIC in our approach to plants and livestock but inorganic in our approach to discussions and debate; to be friendly to weeds in our garden, but to be intolerant to weeds in our populace... to be passionate against gylphosate for "unpleasant" plants, but to be in favor of deleting "unpleasant" words. WHen you exclude weeds form your garden you exclude that chance of an unforseeable magic happening with the way that weed interacts with others, and the same is true in discussions... I don't think censorship is consistent with permaculture ethics... just my opinion.
My response to your preemptive strike was removed and put somewhere else out of context. I would consider that censorship. It's kinda worse than censorship because I did not wish to start a new topic with my out-of-context words as the opener, so that was a bit rude. I would've loved to have spent more of my afternoon discussing carpet mulch with people whose opinions are different than my own, in an organic way, without "deteriorating". But the deterioration has already occurred by an inorganic disruption, and that time has been wasted.
Not only have I been censored for the first time... but my comment was moved and a new topic stating me as the author... out of context...
I guess i'm gonna roll with it...
So I was having a very interesting discussion with some folks on here about using paper and carpet and other waste in the garden as means to remediate the waste as well as making a direct use of the waste stream. Some of the people felt that sending certain toxic things to the landfill is better, and we discussed our differences of opinions and the topic touched on ethics. then a message came through warning that ALL political and ethical discussion are CONFINED to the cider press.
It occurred to me that ethics and permaculture are inextricable, and doesn't that confine a large percentage of the information on permies to the cider press??? This is where I find censorship to be sad and gross. The logic is quite fuzzy... as there was no harm being done or anyone being excluded yet someone felt the need to "step in" and disrupt a nice discussion. I read some things about the permies policies and I have to say I am disappointed by the pro censorship vibe. I can understand blocking corporate trolls and shills and problematic people... but I find censoring a discussion on a neat topic because it might make a hypersensitive person uncomfortable, counterproductive and degenerative.
Any thoughts from anyone else on this?? I realize this is a private website and Paul can make his own rules... certainly respectful of that. I just kind-of stumbled on this and found it to be a major turn-off. Debate is very, very important and no one is being forced to participate.... Why censor?? why?? No harm, no foul?? Freedom of speech, anyone? Don't we need to talk about things even if it makes some people a little woozy??? Dumbfounded.
Burra Maluca wrote:Can I just remind everyone that all political and ethical discussion is confined to the cider press.
This entire topic and thread is rooted in food production ethics and waste remediation ethics. Much of every permaculture practice topic and issue is intertwined with ethics. I thought we were having a productive discussion on a forum where ideas are shared. If all ethical discussion is confined to the cider press, that confines a whole lot of useful stuff I read on here to the cider press. Disappointed by the subtle censorship in an otherwise productive and interesting discussion.
As for the idea that not keeping it on your own property for disposal is just passing the buck and not taking responsibility - The real focus should not be on making people feel inadequate for not taking responsibility for stuff they have limited control over, but on trying to get the parties producing the dubious materials to stop doing it. Until we can get them to stop producing the stuff, disposing of it is all a shell game. Trying to burden people with guilt over handling that waste is not something I consider productive.
I don't think anyone is focusing on making others feel inadequate, but I know for my own part that I want for others to feel empowered... sometimes that comes off as guilting to certain people... to me it sounds empowering. I hear... "there's more I can easily do to help be the change... great! what an opporonity" as opposed to responding with " Ohhh, Im not doing enough... I'm going to feel bad and continue " ... It's a question of whether or not a person can hear constructive criticism and change opinions based on new ideas... has nothing to do with guilt: that construct exists in the listener.
on socio-political ethics here:
Responsibility is always, always, always on the demand side. The only way they would stop producing the materials is if the demand stopped because of better alternatives. The idea of getting producers to "stop producing the dubious materials" is like trying to get people to stop drinking with prohibition. The only way to do something like that is with authoritarianism, which is bad and never really works. People have the power. And again I gotta say that's passing the buck from "me" to "we", where "we" equals big, oppressive government instead of focusing on "me", my role and living by example. By taking responsibility for the waste you are doing your part plus some other waste producers (the consumer, NOT the producer) part, and that is empowering, postitive and regenerative... not guilting, or making people feel inadaquate or negative. If someone feels guilty, maybe they should "tit up"
The waste is NOT going away... Just trying to be real
Max Madalinski wrote:I don't particularly understand the idea that seems to be getting stated a lot here that burying potentially toxic materials, that may or may not contain heavy metals, in your own soil is somehow a good idea because you are taking "responsibility" for it. If you are putting toxic stuff into your soil what happens when you die or sell your land and no one else knows where you have buried these materials? What if you happened to have a can of lead paint around? Would you use this to paint your house or bury it in the soil around your own house rather than sending it to a landfill as a means of taking responsibility for it? I guess I am personally much more inclined to send it to a landfill where at least future generations will know that this is a landfill that is filled with highly toxic junk than to bury it my own backyard where it can poison future generations.
In your garden, nature has a chance to use the waste and potentially clean it. In a landfill, there is little chance that mycellium and/or other living, cleaning magic happening... piling up toxins for others to clean later into a massive vat is messier to me than giving nature a chance to utilize it in an bio active aerobic environment. It's a little like saying that a feedlot is better than pasturing animals because at least then people know that it is a feedlot and they know how dirty it is.... when a feedlot is qualitatively destructive and smart grazing is qualitatively regenerative. Also, just to clarify... no one that I have read has suggested burying garbage. It is being used by the gardener and has a direct function, as well as potential indirect fuinctions that we may not be able to comprehend. Also no one is suggesting that lead paint should be buried on your property. THat's a strawman argument. By sending something like plastic to the landfill you are pretty much ensuring that the toxic waste remains toxic waste and is a debt for future generations to pay. whereas "taking responsibility" for it means you are giving the waste a best possible chance to degrade, become cleaner etc. while you get a real, tangible function from a material that is not going away, is becoming even more prevalent and abundant, and so much so that we need to adapt to its presence. The biomimicry thing to do... and the "turning problems into solutions" thing to do is to make best of use of those materials... which may, in some cases mean paying a diesel truck to move the material 100 miles away to be put i a hole with other bad stuff, because we don't know what else to do with it.
just my take
Also wanted to add... I wonder if saving seed from plants grown in relatively toxic soils would be a worthwhile venture? maybe a BPA-tolerant heirloom pumpkin?? or an arsenic-filtering paw paw??
Alder Burns wrote:I can see several rationales for using paper products in spite of potential contamination:
1. The stuff is already here in the world. There is no "away" to send it to, even paper recycling is itself a toxic and polluting process. Someone has to deal with it, so it might as well be the people who use paper products to begin with (i.e. all of us!) If one looks at the early permaculture literature, I believe that Mollison said that if you bring something onto your land, you should take responsibility of disposing of it there. The descriptions of some of the early sheetmulch gardens are truly appalling....plastic, tin cans, old carpets and mattresses....all ended up in the garden!! Obviously one thing at play here is the balance between the health of the earth and one's personal health. Another thing at play is that a living soil, full of microbes and fungi, is one of the best processors of toxics of many sorts. Whether that soil is to be used to grow food at the same time as it is actively involved in bioremediation is the issue....
2. The other issue is that permaculture reaches a global audience, not all (perhaps even not most) of whom have the freedom and affluence to think or take action on issues more far-reaching than basic food security. In other words eating (and therefore, producing food) today and this year is more important than the risk of cancer or whatever in the long term. That might be harsh, but that's the world so many of us live in, and permaculture is about giving people in such situations proactive and productive solutions. Sheet mulching is one such solution, which enables food production in spite of otherwise impossible soil and weed issues.....
3. Additionally there is the principle that many things are permissible in system startup that are not viable to continue in ongoing maintenance. The use of earthmoving equipment and mineral-based fertilizers are well known examples in permaculture. Perhaps a one-time heavy sheetmulch; being as selective as one chooses with the materials used; to bring something like a bermudagrass sod into food production; is a good use of time and resources, and compromises made; versus the potential alternatives, and failures, and compromises, and costs, to achieve this goal by other methods.....
I agree with this and would just like to add... Just because YOU didn't purchase the piece of trash or bring it onto your property, that doesn't make it "go away", nor is anyone else likely to take responsibility for it and make the best possible ecological use of it. I think the beyond organic, beyond permaculture thing to do is to take as much responsibility for other peoples trash as much as possible, and make that waste stream regenerative and help it break down thousands of times more quickly than it would in a landfill. Most recycling processes are extremely toxic and energy intensive. I would like for people to get rid of the idea of sending waste "AWAY", be it to a so called recycling facility ( a brainwash) or a landfill. Take responsibility for it and use it for something good. The idea of being able to pick and choose the cleanest and best and most orgainic gardening methods is a first-world privilege. As a rule of thumb and a benchmark of truth, I ask myself "does this work as well in the third world as it does here". GO visit the third world and you will see that they have trash all over the place and in abundance, not because they consume more. I think trying to shove the waste "AWAY" and get it "out of site. out of mind" is duplicitous and destructive adn obfuscates personal responsibility.
I go out of my way to pick up used carpet to use for weed suppression, and mulch... and I take responsibility for the toxic gick (produced by others) in it and I try to minimize that impact on my property and in my own body (should it even get into my body). Basically if youi want a super clean garden and you want to obfuscate responsibility for the waste streams that are ubiqitous today , you are saying... "i'm ok with this poisoning someone else, a landfill, an ocean, but I'm too privileged to live close to garbage and i am passing off this responsibility to someone else. And i want to conscoiusly and actively ignore the presence of this waste on my planet" We are integrated with the garbage.. and we need to find ways to coexist and evolve with it if we want to pretend to call what we do "sustainable". it is here to stay and it is %100 yours and my responsibilty to utilize it and turn teh problem into solution.
Walter Jeffries wrote:We raise pigs year round in the central mountains of northern Vermont. Cold climate. Pasture. No commercial feed. Weekly deliveries to area stores, restaurants and individuals. Farrow to finish and soon to cutting.
We have Yorkshire, Berkshire, Large Black (2 lines), Tamworth and our Mainline, Blackieline and Redline (not Tam) crosses all on pasture using managed rotational grazing. We've been doing this for about twelve years and not feeding any commercial hog feed / grain. Most of what our pigs eat (~80%) is pasture followed by about 7% dairy (mostly whey), then apples, a little spent barley and occasional treat of dated bread which works great for training. See more about how we pasture and feed them on this page: http://SugarMtnFarm.com/pigs and follow the feeding and grazing links.
Speaking from our experience with what we have on our farm of the pure bred lines - all of these are heritage breeds:
Yorkshire are the best mother, best growers, best pasturers but very alert and a little lean. Yorkshire is perhaps the oldest heritage breed and has very good genetics which is why it became the foundation of so many other breeds;
Berkshire have the marbling I want and are second best growers. Good on pasture. Good mothers. Quite alert;
Large Black have some marbling are very calm, good mothers, slower growers, good on pasture. We have two separate lines of these; and
Tamworths are calm, okay summer pasture mothers, poor winter mothers, lean, slowest growers. I have some with 18 teats in this line - not a normal Tam characteristic.
From our cross lines:
Mainline is the one I've been working for the longest period so it is the best of all of our lines. This is primarily Yorkshire x Berkshire x GOS with something else in it. They are the fastest growers, best mothers, best on pasture, good marbling towards the Berkshire, excellent wintering;
Blackieline is high teat count (all our lines are 14 as base, this line tends toward 16), high litter counts (this is more controlled by diet, stress, matings, boar and other factors so don't put too much emphasis on that when picking lines - do use it as a tendency), many of the Blackieline farrow three times a year of their own choice, winter litter well and are excellent mothers. Slower growing than the Mainline but faster than the pure lines; and
Redline is a variant of the Mainline that is slightly slower growing than Mainline but faster and bigger than Blackieline and a deep mahogany red as adults. Excellent mothers. Slightly leaner than Mainline.
All the lines we have now do well in our cold environment through the winter on hay and in the warm months on pasture as their primary diet. That was not always the case. When we started there were clearly pigs who did not winter as well. They stopped growing in the winter or slowed down. I culled them hard and with each generation what was left to breed improved our genetics. What we have now winters very well and most of the lines farrow well right through the cold seasons. There are tricks to it such as wind blocks, deep bedding packs that compost, etc. See: http://SugarMtnFarm.com/deep-bedding-pack
I've been working and weeding our genetics hard for over a decade. Our goal is animals that do well in our climate outdoors on a pasture based diet. Each year we improve them in the new generation. Ultimately I see merging all the lines into a single line in the long term future but for now I maintain them as separate lines. Realize that "heritage" breeds were developed either intentionally to deal with local resource and climate issues or they were created accidentally from reduced populations. The third case is where a flaw such as mule's foot or wattles were used as a defining characteristic to create a new breed for novelty. All are valid reasons and ways and often multiple factors were involved. Heritage breed does not mean worthy, just that its been around for a long time. Also realize it takes a long time and a lot of animals to create a breed. A breed is a line that breeds true in subsequent generations maintaining the breed specific characteristics. We have about 400 pigs on pasture which represents thousands of animals over the years which I have selected from but I do not feel we have a separate breed, we have lines. A line is a thread of breeding like a family tree. Creating a breed is a decades long process that requires far more animals, perhaps an order of magnitude more, to get them to breed true with each generation. It also requires having a clear understanding of your breeding goals and that may take years to figure out. I mention this because I see some people claiming to have created "new" pastured breeds which are really cross lines.
Pasturing any breed is more challenging than simply grain feeding out of the commercial hog chow bag where someone else has thought out the nutrition for you. Grain isn't evil, it's just expensive. I enjoy the thinking. I like using my local resources. What we have most of all is pasture so that is the dominant resource I use for feeding all of our livestock. If you want to pasture any breed there are some things to think about:
Managed rotational grazing is key. This is not free-ranging. Move the animals. More smaller paddocks moving faster are better than fewer larger paddocks moving slower. If you don't know how to rotational grazing, get sheep. They're excellent easy grazers to learn on. Pigs rotational graze very well but are harder than sheep to get right. We learned on sheep in the 1990's. See:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Managed_intensive_rotational_grazing http://www.sugarmtnfarm.com/?s=rotational%20grazing
Good pasture is key - pasture is more than grass. Seed is cheaper than feed. We cleared forest back to the original field walls and planted soft grasses, legumes, brassicas, millets, amaranth, chicory and other forages. Exactly what you choose will depend on your soils and climate. We're USDA Zone 3 on steep mountain land with thin gravel soils. I fence with the contours so the animals naturally help to create terraces, catching the water and soil from flowing downhill. See:
http://sugarmtnfarm.com/2012/10/01/perfect-pear/ http://sugarmtnfarm.com/2012/06/05/qmains-milk-bar-fencing-seeding/ http://sugarmtnfarm.com/2012/04/19/fencing-2/
Good pastured genetics is key - within any breed there are those who have been selected for confinement vs show vs pasture. Get pigs from someone already doing it the way you plan to do it if you want a leg up in the genetics. See:
http://sugarmtnfarm.com/2015/01/13/classic-large-white-sow/
We find that mixed species grazing is better than single species grazing. Our farm is a system of multiple types of plants and animals working together however the only thing we sell is the forestry products and the pork. Farming is what we do, it pays the mortgage and brings in our weekly paycheck. To do that I have found takes some specialization on the sales end as well as vertical integration. There's lots of talk about being diversified, and that works in practice, but don't be scattered. It takes a lot of anything to supply more than a few customers and to supply accounts on a weekly basis year round takes a lot of focus. Grow into it slowly.
When selecting a breed, ideally get them from someone raising pigs the way you want to do it and ideally in a similar climate so the pigs are adapted. This gives you a leg up on starting out with good genetics. Particular breeds are more a matter of overall conformation characteristics like color, ear shape, body shape, lard vs meat pigs, growth rate, adult size, etc - these really personal preferences. The flavor is in the fat and that comes from feeding, not breeding.
-Walter
Sugar Mountain Farm
in northern Vermont
USDA Zone 3
Walter,
Thank You.
Entering into my second season pasturing Mulefoots and Mulefoot/Tamworths. Your info here and on your website has been enlightening.
Still recruiting for spring/summer 2015. Many projects in the works including a new, flood plain ecosystem based community garden space along the new river.
Also another 10 acre site that is in mature hardwoods. I purchased a small saw mill for sustainable milling and intend on develping a forest farming enterprise there (ginseng, ramps, paws, ducks etc) Just picked up a 1974 camper (for $400) for the site. That would make a great camp for a couple or brave lone-wolf....
I had a feeling! I try not to argue with people who discount reality...
Yep. I just present my own perspective and try to stay open about theirs. I have learned a lot from people who are very zealous. They are usually so hard-headed because they care and feel strongly. The tough part is knowing when to listen and when to ignore
Cj,
lol. Some people are really zealous about goat care. Yes. They will argue with anybody about anything goat-related that is different from how they do it. "if you don't remove all toxic plants from your goats you are a murderer" - type attitude.
Most goat people are into feeding goats tons of hay. I am not. My boys will eat it. It makes fine bedding. Most of it goes to waste or becomes bedding. My girls basically don't eat it. In the winter, I cut fresh pine trees for them. they love the needles and they strip the bark for the sticky sap. People have scolded me for this. I say, look at my goats, look at my worm load, and look at my feed costs. enough said. My goats love pine.
experiment. watch your goats. spend time with them and listen and learn.
I think, much like people, goats kept long ago were simply less healthy and didn't live as long. When they were milked back in the day, they weren't milked so intensively so their systems were less taxed. I believe a variety of browse (trees and brush) is important and I only give my goats a tiny amount of extra minerals and this seems to prevent fish tail (copper deficiency) and improves overall health. I would say, use some of those mined minerals while we can. It doesn't take much. If they are no longer available, then worry about it. My goats do not like grass or hay very much at all and i don't think its what their bodies really need. I have seen them eat a whole lot of supposedly deadly brush and they are fine. in fact, my worm load is almost non-existent and I suspect (I do not KNOW) it is from all the "toxic" plants they eat.
Seaweed and kelp are supposedly superfoods for them but i have not tried it. I don't live near a sea.
Also i am starting to think that pure bred animals are mostly trash. Mutts are almost always the way to go for robustness, instincts and intelligence IMO. Back then, animals that sucked, died. animals that were super resilient passed on those genes. Now we coddle animals and plants that are not resilient and "weak" genes are passed on to form breeds that kinda suck.
If it wants to die, let it die. If it wants to live, encourage it.
Currently have one winter wwoofer who is working out great! we've been innovating ways to reuse waste paper products as fuel for the wood stoves. We came up with a method that really deserves a youtube video as it's one of the most efficient/effective methods I've seen!
I have one fella lined up for the spring and am seeking some more helpers. Great things happening.
I have experience as a wwoofer and hosting/managing wwoofers so i have a pretty good feel for how it goes. I'm most interested in hosting what I would call tenants. We agree on what it costs to house and feed you and you are expected compensate for that value with chores and other labor. I am not a fan of counting hours but I want things to be fair and synergistic. If I am supplying living space, food/cooked meals, and paying bills that might be a $600/month value... I would expect about 15-20 hrs a week of time and effort. There is also the possibility for a person to have their own patch of earth to steward and be responsible for (and potentially profit from): the individualist model... and i can be flexible about how an individual functions best and what their role might be.
It's basically just long term wwoofing with the option to become a live-in or tenant or community member. I do not care what it is called.
I expect a trial visit of a few days to feel things out. From there i expect (approximately) a month or longer stay to ensure that everyone gets something out of it. I prefer a longer stay if it is mutually agreeable. In return, a person receives food, housing, ample living space, education, experience, adventure.... and hopefully a sense that that they are making a real, meaningful difference in the world with their actions and "being the change you want to see". Also personal growth, experiencing beauty and being a part of something greater than ourselves.
I am easy to get a long with. Individuals diets will be respected as much as possible, especially if they can cook for themselves and others as part of their contribution. I like to cook and I cook a lot. I am a flexible eater. The three current people who will be eating here eat meat. l but I can cook any type of food. Much of our food will be inputs from the grocery store until more food systems are established/made use of.
I'm not big on schedules, but as more people are staying here, there will need to be some scheduling and task orientation/orginization i'm afraid to say. Ideally i like things to happen in a voluntarist, organic way. though big projects will require more management.
It sounds like you are well established in MI. I have plans, land and some infrastructure in place for outdoor mushroom cultivation here in Fayetteville, WV. I have 25 acres and nearly 20 of that is shaded enough for forest farming and there are two, moist watersheds on the property where fungi would be happy, particularly shitake and oysters. I posted in this forum a few weeks ago an you can read that offer as well "permaculture helpers wanted in WV". There are two large spare bedrooms and ample living space. Just an idea....
john
Hello,
I am have been living on this beautiful 25 acre property for a year by myself and it is slowly becoming an amazing model for Appalachian-style permaculture and restoration agriculture.
The house is very large and spacious. There is a couple moving in soon and room for more. There are many opportunities for work and recreation in the nearby outdoor adventure town of Fayetteville, WV. Rafting, rock climbing and more in the beautiful new river gorge are just minutes away.
I currently have three large hugelculture-swales finished or in construction. tremendous potential for forest farming in the 20 acre new-old-growth forest with water shed and quintessential babbling brook. I have constructed a water tower rain catchment system with gravity feeds into the house. I also plan on developing ponds and springs for redundant water systems and resiliency. I study Ben Falk, Mark Shepard, Sepp, and many others extensively. Artists and musicians will find inspiration here as well. This is the real deal, brown permaculture. Ask any questions of me and I will try to get some pictures up as soon as I get a functioning camera. Come co-create with amazing people in one of the most beautiful parts of the world. I want to start hosting a few wwoofers as well. I have mulefoot pigs, nigerian dwarf goats and chickens. I had 12 ducks but the fox got all of them. I embrace a 90% failure rate, but my first season has been more successful that that .
