Samantha Lewis

Craig Lewis wrote:I understand the overall goal and outcome.

Yet by placing limitations it can make it more difficult.

Hello Craig!
You are right.  Following all this specific criteria is making it more difficult in many ways.   I think almost anytime you are trying to help someone else it will be more difficult than just taking care of yourself.  

Craig Lewis wrote:For example. Not using cardboard. We can do a lot of things with cardboard. Ground cover, composting, seedpots, ...

I used to compost cardboard.  The master gardeners at my farmers market assured me that all the inks used now are non toxic and the worms break the material down to be perfectly safe.   I thought I was so clever to create worm breeding areas out of stacks of corrugated cardboard.   The worms would come and breed and lay tons of eggs.  Then one year, I got organic straw from a guy growing organic wheat.   I put a few bales of the straw out next to my cardboard composting area.  

When I opened up the bales in the spring, there were ten times more worms and eggs in the straw than I had ever seen in the cardboard.  I thought that was pretty cool but what really creeped me out was that the cardboard completely stopped breaking down.  It just laid there for a couple of years not breaking down and I eventually took it to the landfill.  I was so disgusted that I had been feeding my family garbage when I thought I was growing organic food.  
The animals have the wisdom and we can learn from them if we cannot see for ourselves.  When they have the choice they will eat the organic food rather than the chemical laden trash.  

Craig Lewis wrote:Not starting seedling. In the North, depending on the crops, we need to start seeds inside. Dame winters are too long lol.

You can grow your own starts.   Just keep track of your time.  

Craig Lewis wrote:Recycling plastic bottles, be it for seedlings and or micro greenhouses, slow water release units, hanging gardens. Many using to make gardening cheaper.

Yes I understand the micro plastic issue and being more down to Earth, about it. Yet being realistic about where most people are at or living. They have these items around them. As to those that do not.

Glass, ceramics and natural fibers will be nicer for GAMCOD.  They look a lot better and do not leach who knows what into your soil.

Craig Lewis wrote:Maybe I'm not getting something or thinking too much again.
I was thinking a raw forest/cutover plot, or unclean roadside plot.
Here in Newfoundland we can get up to 0.4 acres Home Garden lot, for $25.

Hello Craig!
Thanks for bringing all this up.    
Sounds like you have an opportunity for super cheap land.  That is really great.

Craig Lewis wrote:A shovel will cost more than what anyone spent, above.
So I'm drastic missing something. 4.65hr to 49 and $1 to $59.41.
Seems like numbers are way too low or off

This does not have to be a contest for how cheap you can garden.  Some people may have tools laying around or friends they can borrow from.   Maybe you will have to go buy a few things.  That is ok.  It will not disqualify you.  Just do your best and keep track of your time and how much you spend.

Craig Lewis wrote:Seems like a dirt plot is ready to go, with birds dropping seed right into the grown lol
If the goal is to make it seem like Gardening is cheap and simple, better to be more realistic and practical, about starting out.

The goal is to take away the blocks that keep people from getting started.  We want to teach people how to garden in ways that are fun and easy.   If we can create a movie showing a variety of gardening techniques, people will find a path that works for them.  They will give it a try and every year after, it will get easier.

Craig Lewis wrote:How long is this movie overall?

We will make the best movie we can with the video submitted.  How long exactly really depends on what we can get for content.  This will be a teaching video to show folks who are just getting started how to grow their own food, right where they are.  

Craig Lewis wrote:If 5 are chosen and get 10 mins each $4k. Maybe 5 seconds of all that submit a start. And 10 seconds of all that completed. ( not over 1min, gets nothing??)

We will include as many gardeners in different environments and demonstrating different techniques as we get good video for.   We want to show that anybody can do this, anywhere.  Not all people who submit raw footage will be included in the final video.  We will only use gardens that meet the criteria.

The time is pro-rated.  If only a tiny bit of the content you submit is usable, you will still get paid for it.  The payout is $400 per min, that comes out to about $6.50 per second.
I would not worry about that part too much.  Just do your best to produce great veggies and quality video.

https://permies.com/wiki/272678/Permaculture-smackdown-Week-solution-soil


Come join us for a live webinar with Paul this Saturday at 10 AM Mountain time.

We will be expanding on these ideas and answering personal questions.  

This is a special event for people in the Permaculture Inner Circle Elite (PIE)

You can get your slice of pie here:
https://permies.com/pie

Sign up for a monthly subscription and you will aways have plenty of pie!

Hello Tori!  
I raise up the young males and harvest them when they are big enough.   I do not castrate them.   I just separate them from the females so they are no trouble and cannot breed.

This will be a great one!  





What amendments have you used?   What kinds of mulches?  


Have you had successes or failures?  What have you learned?  

Ulla Bisgaard wrote:I think this is great, but I wish there were places where you could just order one installed. My husband and I do want one. Especially the stove and an oven, but non of us are very handy fixing and building things. Hence why it has been a year since a trellis broke, and it is still not fixed, and it has take my husband 2 months to far (he is not done) to build a chicken coop.
I really want an outdoor kitchen, but do not want to depends on propane gas as a solution, but there are no where you can buy even a regular rocket mass heather.

Hello Ulla!

There are folks who will come and build a rocket mass heater for you.

Uncle Mud is in Ohio and he travels all over.  
https://permies.com/u/164246/Chris-McClellan

He offered to come out to my place in Washington state and build one for me.  He teaches at Paul's place in Montana pretty regularly.    You can probably get on his schedule and have him come to your place.   He would be my first choice.  He is the master, a true artist and such a joy to hang out with.  He also loves to teach, so if you have him out to do a build for you, you can set up a workshop and sell tickets.  

Here is a link to a whole list of Rocket mass heater builders:
https://permies.com/w/rmh-builders-list

This is excellent Andrés!

Thank you so much for putting this together.  

This collection makes rocket mass heater technology accessible to new people and gives me everything I need to build my own.

E Sager wrote:I'm going to put a word in on this thread for dogs because there are too many posts encouraging death as a solution to the livestock dog problem. Even though it is true dogs are the greatest threat to livestock, they also offer one of the best, secure farm experiences.

Helo E!

Thank you.  I think this is really important. When I was getting started with gardening and livestock I had no dogs and I had a lot of problems with wildlife eating my gardens and losing lambs and chickens to predation.  

When I got dogs everything changed.   Gardening became so easy.  I have no threats to my garden now except my own animals and that is just a matter of fencing.  

E Sager wrote:
Dogs are a very advanced farm animal to have and need close monitoring and training.  

I was not fully aware of this when I got my dogs.  I watched videos of sheep dogs being raised with lambs and I thought that was about all there was to it.   I made mistakes and lost some stock.  They were my mistakes though.  There were times in the beginning, when I had to say "Bad Dog!"  

 To me, when I have a problem it points to a flaw in my design.   It is not necessarily that the element needs to be removed but that the system needs to be upgraded.    
Dogs have a strong desire to please us.   They want to do the right thing and once they know what that is they are a team member.   I would not be able to do what I do without my dogs.   We live in an area with a large coyote population, bobcats, cougars, bears even the occasional wolf.   My dogs are essential and I trust them.  It took time and I feel it has been a solid investment.

E Sager wrote:In my opinion, there's no better asset on a farm than a properly trained, working dog, but if you aren't willing to put in the effort that will prevent opportunities for them to fail, it's probably better to choose livestock or dogs; one over the other.

Whatever the discipline, a well trained working dog is a joy to watch!  

Hello Jr!

Welcome to permies!

Looks like you have some nice clay there.  I would add a mulch layer to cover the ground.   This will help with drainage by giving cover to worms and other decomposers.   They will poke holes in your clay and incorporate the porous organic material with the clay.  It could be leaves, straw, sticks and forest debris, whatever is easy for you to get that you know is organic (no chance of pesticides).

There is a lot of useful info for this in the World Domination Gardening movie.

https://permies.com/wiki/earthworks-gardening

I am really excited to hear what everybody is planning for their GAMCOD plots this year!