Hugo Morvan

@ eino keitta, don't know what group of chemicals make plants taste bitter, i don't know if herbivores care much if stuff is bitter. Bitter is a warning for humans in case something is poisonous, but many bitter foods are the most nutricious. And as we're addicted to sugars naturally as kids need them and as a society as a whole with an industry literally depleting veggie varieties of nutrients to cater to that addiction we have a bit of a problem. I try to push myself in just being grown up about taste. I like beer. My friend made a beer with 17 times the normal amount of hops, i loved that one, but he had to bring it down because he lost money and it's making people sleepy.. But yeah, i guess we're all in this together that it's hard to overcome this bitter veggie sentiment, so here is just one thing we can try to make this wonderfull perennial more usefull for us as Permies.
@ Nancy, yours is sooooo greeeen. Mine tasted sweet i dare say but the stems were a bit fibry so i cut them up with a pair of scissors.

I've put a big black container over the sprouting good king Henri. It's foliage yellows out, but is crunchy and sweet, not bitter at all, and i asked a friend what he thought of it who really doesn't like bitter tastes. Not bitter.

Wlecome to Permies. Is it fair to say the scientific method is not dealing with real soil life? It mostly focusses on seemingly sterile lab circumstances and adds or changes one disease-factor/ bacteria and draws conclusions based on replicable experimentation which doesn't take into account any of the complexities real soil life offers. With billions upon billions of differing species that constantly evolve/merge and interact, modern science is hardly equipped to offer definite real life outcomes. We're dealing with complexities beyond human comprehension that affect the seeds, sadly.

It's not i'm unwilling to admit that science has offered progress in many obvious cases, it truly has. But the notion of killing disease surpasses the notion of raising plants in a way in which they're at their best. Not chemically disbalanced by industrial agricultural practices for starters, as to establish an optimized internal immune system. Sadly there is no money to be made for the industry which is lobbying our governing bodies so incredibly effectively (round up sorry to mention it). So basicly science looks to solve problems it helped create. Starting in a balanced system primed for biodiversity optimum might be the best starting point in my opinion, so it's up to us, dreamers, bumbling amateurs and experimental mad(wo)men to figure out a way out of this self-inflicted mess, mostly unfunded if not outlawed. And we're doing a damn fine job i'd say.

So i'm happy you're here with us to help our hive mind in the right direction if we get too unscientific!

Last year i tried to start seed-fennel from seeds. I managed to start 4 out of a whole balcony tray full of them.
This year while sprouting seeds to add to salads and what have you, i noticed they used small fennelseeds in the mix.
Got me thinking what if i mix those difficult sprouting seed-fennels of last year and have them soaking in sprouting hormone for a week or something.
They did very well and i got a lot more small plants now.
Normally i'm of the type of permie that doesn't like to go to length to 'spoil' seeds, and use diversity in variety to grow only easily growing plants, but for those who don't and for propagation sake i thought to highlight this method. It's not new, but worked for me, so thought to share.

I heard this crazy story about an island of the coast of Africa that had a container full of synthezers fall out of the sky, it led to a unique genre of music on the island of Cab Vierde. This amazing song is an example of the miracle!! It should be in Music of the Moment of coarse.

JOAO CIRILO with the song Po D'Terra

Artist Sierra Ferrell
Video Gladden House Sessions 2019
Music starts at 3 minutes in after little interview

Hi Evie. I'm a man so probs not well postioned to comment, but i migrated as well, so there are some similarities.
I share a lot of seeds with people and plants, started to graft trees with my mate who taught me.And now we've been giving them away and that opens up talk. And they didn't pay so every time they see this tree in future a little thought goes out to this crazy foreigner they got it from.
I've been to my hometown and people are really suffering now. Many people are lonely and feel isolated, just like work, eat, sleep, do some other stuff, but connection seems missing. And everybody chasing dollars.
I think connection is important. Because we lack that. We're tribal animals and it can impact health.
I use permaculture as a means to connect people and get them interested in nature. Say i'm happy they have that late flowering apple tree, because i am , but stuff like even if it's old and dying maybe even, it gives them sense of having something, being important to someone. I'm not like faking that shit, well you Scottish, no bullshitters up there, tell it like it is. But as society is going down, people see prices going up, and worry, so interest in nature returns, they want those trees/shrubs/seeds.

Cherry trees can get very big and shade out a lot of stuff. So take a good look at how the sun moves if it's one of those bigger ones. The frist year is essential to water quite a bit if it gets hot. Usually the evenings are good for that. I like to give a lot in one session so the water runs deeper into the soil where it's less likely to evaporate and the roots dive deeper sooner than like water every day and then the trees get used to that. But it does take some monitoring which usually is not the thing people are busy with when just moving house. Because then making the house really to your taste usually gets priority.
So working with watering cans  can be challenging if you're tired. Ideally one can get these hoses with timers attached. But if there's no money than i would plant in a way that the walk with a watering can isn't too much. Peach trees are hardy where i am. Goji can get big and bushy and even serve as a bit of a wind brake which can be really advantageous.
Sometimes planting north to a shady big tree can work quite nice in hotter climates, cause then you get less scorching drought problems and once the tree is established one can cut down the big tree or prune it back and use it to feed the soil.
So it depends a lot on what you find there! But remember never despair and keep putting pits in the soil and seed local plants that do well. Maybe plan for a pond attached to gutteringsystem.  

Hello Yin. Please do make a simplified drawing of how you do it and maintain it. Is there a time when a tractor comes in and sucks out the composted waste?

I think it's important you tell us all, because you have a long time experience with it. As well many green minded people are not very happy about dry toilet systems and would not dream to install that on their property. Yours is like an in between it seems. Or am i confused and do you not use water to flush waste away?

Bit of a stretch, but for me in the same line of weird perception habits people tend to have about edible crops. Animal fodder.
I'm close to a farming community and my neighbor just laughs about me eating corn. That's for animals he says. Just because it grew so well and they had it in abundance they started to give it to animals and then it creates this like distance. We're not animals, we're better than animals, animals eat the weirdest dirtiest things, they eat waste, so we cannot ever eat whatever they're having.
Ever heard of cow peas? I mean come on. My permaculture friend grew tons of them, he didn't tell me what it was. He just had me snacking on them. I loved the things. Might be me being a bit of an animal, i will not deny.
Hope you get my jist. Same thing for invasive species. Oh it grows really well here. Then human psychology makes it that it must be bad. it cannot possibly be in the grey zone of it has some good, but some bad properties. It's growing! Where i live nothing ever grows, so it must be taking over the world. And then we focus as humans on this thing. Same thing when you get some hip shoes or a moped or an electrical car, then you see them evrywhere. Then this 'invasive' species is suddenly everywhere. It's taking over and we must by all means warn all the humans to kill this. Nothing can ever grow where i live and it must stay that way. That's just how sad we are. Two people cannot be right. No one is wrong and the other is right. And probably the one who we agree with is always right on everything else as well and the other is always wrong and evil while we're at it because he/she lies. Duality.
But back to invasives, they usually just build soil and capture tons of carbon and sometimes even produce lovely produce.
So a lot, lot goes with that question is BIGGER better.