Greening the New Mexican desert

Hello fellow permies,

I just wanted to share some videos of before, during and after ~1 year of my suburban Permaculture project.

(Sorry for the clicking in the videos. The camera is a hand me down that I am recycling)

Before
This is quick series of pictures turned into video of what the backyard looked like before the project started.


Mid year


After ~ 1 year
Part 1


Part 2


I am hoping to set an example of what can be done, and how long it takes. Thus, anyone who becomes interested in the future will be able to give themselves some expectations and hopefully patience when starting their own Permaculture project. I would think the biggest thing I have learned from this project/experiment is how long it takes. My mindset is now realizing the difference between our culture of instant gratification world of easy credit, rapid response from text messaging, rapid feedback from forums and Facebook that nature and Permaculture does not work at that rate of speed.

Thanks for watching and viewing

Brett,

Great job on taking the time to do a video diary.
It is great to see what a fellow New Mexican is up to.

Drop by if you're ever in Roswell.

Brett - keep the videos coming!

I'm starting a rocket mass heater so I will have a video of that soon. I am also working on a biogas digestor and biochar reactor. I'll keep in mind to make videos of those too!

I can't begin to tell you how reassuring it is to see all the things that didn't go among the many things that did. Nice work and thank you.

Near end of winter update video:

Found a mouse in my compost yesterday! I was excited that enough life has returned for a little mammal to make it in my urban backyard that used to be all dirt.

Hello fellow desert dwellers,

Just an update on my greening the NM desert project.

I put this video up in the spring, everything was looking pretty green.



I put this video up just today, after the summer solstice, its been very dry in NM so everything is pretty brown. I am hoping the summer monsoons come and refill my rainbarrels.



I'm still mostly in the soil building stages, I have two large sponges and an abundance of compost to mix into the garden at the end of the season so hopefully next year it be even greener.

Year 2 fall update on my greening the NM desert:



solar dehydrator, garden update, soon to be using RMH and more.

Hi looks like you have lots of projects going. I am curious did you seal the wall the hugel bed is against? If not there goes the moisture, same goes for the concrete pots. Good luck

Hello Brad, welcome to Permies! Thanks for the observations. I had come to the same conclusion about the concrete pots. I never plan to waste my time with them again. The hugelkulture pile, another good observation. Although, I come to my conclusions about the rapid dessication of hugulkulture in the desert is from speaking with other people who've had it not work for them too.

Here is another post where we are discussing hugelkulture in hot arid drylands:
https://permies.com/t/37601/sepp-holzer/Hugles-HOT-Drylands#295142

I define the difference between hugelkulture in the desert VS sponges in the desert

Thanks for the other thread, great info makes much more sense for the arid hot climates to limit surface exposure

Brett Andrzejewski wrote:I had come to the same conclusion about the concrete pots.  I never plan to waste my time with them again.

I have some ideas on pot design for subsurface irrigation and concrete is easy and cheap to prototype with. I'm aware concrete is porous and might need to be sealed. Just how wasteful are such pots? It's only the base that will be concrete whilst the upper part exposed to the air will be an off the shelf plant pot.

I'd rather lose a bit of water than double the complexity by sealing the concrete. After prototyping I'd be more willing to seal or perhaps avoid concrete altogether.