Free online Oregon State University class to teach permaculture in May

This just in my inbox. You can finish the course!

Hello everyone,

Many of you did not have an opportunity to submit your Final Design Map Activity and claim your digital badge before the course closed yesterday. So, we've reopened the course to give everyone just a little more time to finish things up!

The course is open until 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time this evening, June 1! Be sure to complete all badge requirements and claim your badge before that time.

thank you for the heads-up! So glad!

Mike Jay wrote:Good idea Tristan, I'll start.

Can only put 3 attachments per post, so will start with my sector maps - had to do 3 separate to fit everything without overlapping things into oblivion Same deal where triangles come to point following direction of where the force comes into the property. Not sure if the "flooding" map is exactly what they were looking for regarding energy flows, but it depicts the situation pretty well. One of the big problems is that the road is elevated about 12 feet above surrounding ground level, so acts both like a big dam to the natural hydrology, blocking the normal downhill flow patterns, and like a stage in an auditorium, allowing the road noise (logging trucks, weekend motorcycles, etc) to amplify and carry for miles

First: winds and snow drifting - green is warm/wet winds, orange warm/dry winds, blue cold/dry and thin wedge is snow drifting
Second: road noise and flood water catchment - red is road noise from a mile a more in both directions and reaching to the top of the property, blue is the general water catchment area...mostly from a large pine tree plantation to our north that was just harvested again last year
Third: onsite flooding - rough estimate of onsite flooding, which is really just surface saturation and puddling that turns conditions anaerobic. This is from both seasonal snowmelt and heavy rain events - flow is generally north to south

Here's the zone map and design plans. I had a general plan in place before taking the course but I found this a good opportunity to touch up the plan and refine things a bit more.

For the main site plan image, I've simply color coded generalized areas since this is more of a broadacre design (have already planted thousands of trees, shrubs, etc and there's literally tens of thousands more to come!). These are blocks of general "guilds" - really an overarching habitat type in which we're planting practically entire ecologies of flora into our birch/maple/alder/aspen/fir regrowth (site logged with poor practices 8-9 years back). Here are those:

Medium Brown: natural growth woodlands (zone 5)
Dark Green: packed in evergreens (hemlock, blue spruce, cedar, etc) as noise buffer and privacy screening
Light Brown/Tan: annuals production

Dark Brown: Walnut, Black Cherry and Hickory Forest
overstory: Walnut, Hickory, Black Cherry
understory: Hazelnut, Staghorn Sumac, Serviceberry, Eastern Hemlock, Pear, Black Locust, Beech
vines: Grapes, Morning Glory
shrubs: Hibiscus, Bladdernut, Goumi Berry
herbaceous: Pole Beans, Winter Squash, Feverfew, St John's Wort, Echinacea, Mallow, Elderberry
ground: Peppermint, Lambs Ear, Sweet Cicely, Lobelia, Viola, Comfrey
roots: Beets, Carrots and Parsnips, Onions/Garlic, Wild Ginger, Giant Solomon's Seal, Gentian, Daylilies, Jerusalem Artichoke, Hosta, Ginseng
fungus: Oysters and Shittake, Lions Mane, Reishi, Chicken of the Woods

Yellow: Oak, Chestnut and Maple Forest
overstory: White and Red Oaks, American Chestnut, Sugar Maple
understory: Apple & Crabapple, Plum, Beech, Black Locust, White & Yellow Birch
Vines: Grapes, Hardy Kiwi, Wild Yam
shrubs: Raspberries, Blackberries, Autumn Olive, Hazelnut, Witch Hazel
herbaceous: Pole Beans, Bush Beans, Snow and Snap Peas, Squashes, Melons, Sunflower, Lambs Quarters, Elderberry
ground: Roman Chamomile, Peppermint, Oregano, Lambs Ear, Clover, Ramps
roots: Burdock, Jerusalem Artichoke, Wild Ginger
fungus: Oysters and Shittake, Hen of the Woods, Wine Caps, Chicken of the Woods

Orange: Open Canopy "Fruit Savanna"
overstory: Ash, White Oak, Turkish Tree Hazel
understory: Peach, Apricot, Cherry, Plum, Apple, Black Locust, Mountain Ash, Mulberry
vine: Grape, Dog Rose, Groundnut, Honeysuckle, Morning Glory
shrub: Seaberry, Autumn Olive, Siberian Pea Shrub, Hawthorn, Nanking Cherry, Cornelian Cherry, Eastern Hemlock, New England Alder
herbaceous: Asparagus, Millet, Amaranth, Nettle, Milk Weed, Hollyhocks, Pokeweed, Angelica, Yarrow, St John's Wort, Echinacea
ground: Squashes, Melons, Clover, Comfrey, Grass/Grains Mixes, Plantain
roots: Jerusalem Artichokes, Angelica, Dandelion, Chicory, Lambs Quarters, Yellow Dock
fungus: Oysters and Shittake, Wine Caps

Medium Green: Pine Forest
overstory: Siberian Stone Pine, Eastern White Pine
understory: Beech, Black Locust, Eastern Hemlock, Yellow Birch, Sugar Maple
vine: Wild Yam
shrub: Blueberry, Blackberry
herbaceous: Sweet Woodruff, Bracken & Ostrich Fern, Evening Primrose, Bunchberry, Stinging Nettle, Partridge Berry, Snowberry, Hosta
ground: Strawberries (wild and cultivated), Cloudberry, Dewberry, Wintergreen, Viola, Cranberry
roots: Daylilies, Giant Solomon's Seal
fungus: Oyster & Shittake

Light Green: (Silvo) Pasture
overstory: White Oak, Redbud
understory: Aspen, New England Alder, Black Locust, Staghorn Sumac, Eastern Hemlock, Apples & Crabapple
shrub: Siberian Pea Shrub, White & Black Willow, Raspberries/Blackberries, Meadowsweet, Rosa Rugosa, Hawthorn
herbaceous: Lambs Quarters, Sunflower, Buckwheat, Amaranth
ground: Tall & Fine Fescue, Perennial Ryegrass, White & Red Clovers
roots: Turnips, Chicory, Dandelion, Burdock, Jerusalem Artichoke
fungus: Wine Caps

Purple: Willow and Persimmon Wetlands
overstory: Weeping Willow, Persimmon
understory: Pussy & Basket Willow, Cornelian Cherry, White & Yellow Birch
vine: Rose
shrub: Highbush Cranberry, White Willow, Nannyberry, Spicebush, Swamp Rose & Rosa Rugosa, Cramp Bark
herbaceous: Bracken & Ostrich Fern, Boneset, Blue Skullcap, Pickerelweed, Elderberry
ground: Hog Peanut
roots: Wapato, Cattail
fungus: Oyster and Shittake

In and Around Ponds
overstory: White & Weeping Willow
understory: Eastern Hemlock, New England Alder
vine: Grapes, Rose
shrub: Hibiscus, Meadowsweet
herbaceous: Bistort, Cattails, Mallow, Pickerelweed
"ground": Azolla fern, Duckweed
roots: Lotus, Water Lily, Calamus, Wapato

Our current camper-trailer position, is visible as the white block toward the south-west. The brown "winged" shape around the middle-west of the site is the future site of the cabin. The ponds are intended to be stocked with fish at some point and most of the property will be fenced using hedging (willow, hawthorn, hazelnut, rosa rugosa, etc) for rotationally grazed paddocks - goats, sheep and small cattle plus chickens.

I also included the cabin plan I've been working on (site-sourced roundwood timberframe, cobwood, greenroof, offgrid, passive solar / RMH intensive, roughly 1500sq ft total), since zone 0 is just as, if not more important, than the rest of the zones. It's already here on permies if you check things out in my project thread

I'm to the final design map and when I click on 'begin' I get the notice attached below....and I'm using firefox, so I don't get it.
I'll try to post here as far as I got anyway tomorrow......am planning to take the course again in the fall...much to read and learn.

Judith Browning wrote:I'm to the final design map and when I click on 'begin' I get the notice attached below....and I'm using firefox, so I don't get it.

If you type in "about:config" in your firefox browser address bar (as if it's a website), then type in "webgl.disabled" in the search box, it's probably just set to "true" - set it to false and it should turn it on. It should be enabled by default, so odd that it's not. Once you've done that, type in "about:support" into your address bar and scroll down to the "graphics" section - there's a "WebGL Renderer" line in there (or should be). If there's a "blocked" message of any type, it's likely because you need to update your graphics drivers, but good chance you're fine and it will show the graphics driver name that's set up to do the whole WebGL thing (in which case, you should be good to go).

If still a no-go, or your graphics drivers are up to date already, you can override the block by going back to about:config and typing in "webgl.force-enabled" and set that property to "true". That's never the best thing to do, of course, but it can be done. Probably a good idea to only turn it on if you have to and turn that off (set it back to "false") when you're done using the course tools.


Or, like me, you can use an old version of adobe photoshop/illustrator, or the freebie GIMP image editing program, to do your design stuff... I mean, who makes ponds in doughnut shapes anyway?

Mike: I was just looking over the sectors map you put up again and got a laugh when I noticed the "neighbor yelling at dog" sector

Our neighbors have one of those too, I'm afraid to say - yeah, I'm that guy

You've got TONS of zone 4 going on there - that all sugar maple (you mention a sugar shack)? If so, that's some good solid fertility under those canopies. I'd imagine ginseng, ramps and mushroom cultivation might be in order Always nice to mix in some additional diversity, too - have you thought about walnut, butternut, etc? Good sap for syrup from them as well as birches from what I've seen here on permies. Planning to start tapping our trees next spring - not many maples up to the right size but enough to give it a try, plus a few yellow birch mixed in that should produce nicely.

Thanks Tristan, I wondered if anyone would notice that. I tell people that the neighbor's two dogs are named "Get back here" and "Shut up"

Yes, I'm considering my "woods" to be mainly zone 4. There are about 120 tappable maple trees that I pester each spring. Plus I cut wood for heat. Other than that I leave it alone. It's about a foot above the wetland (zone 5) and the woods are very mature. I had a 210 year old hemlock blow down last year and there are others the same size/age back there. It's as shaded as you can get in a maple/birch/pine/hemlock forest. I haven't found any ramps but I didn't look too hard for them either. I would be all over cultivating them. Do you just find some and transplant them? I'm not much into mushrooms but we do have some chaga growing on a couple of the birch trees. I have some butternut seeds but they haven't germinated for me yet. I was going to put them in the field on the NE corner if I got them to grow. I'm not sure how they'd do if I put them in the zone 4 forest. Maybe they'd do just fine... Maybe if I put them where that hemlock fell down...... I have lots and lots of wild hazelnuts around me so I can get tons of those nuts by foraging the countryside.

I looked into birch syrup this spring but decided against it. 100:1 ratio and it sounds a bit more complicated to cook than maple. But if that's all you have, by all means, give it a go. I also heard it is more of a "flavoring" type of syrup, not a pancake syrup. I made maple sugar this year and it is absolutely wonderful. I hope to produce all our own sugar before too long. Chokeberry jelly made with maple sugar. Mmmmmm

Tristan Vitali wrote:

Judith Browning wrote:I'm to the final design map and when I click on 'begin' I get the notice attached below....and I'm using firefox, so I don't get it.

If you type in "about:config" in your firefox browser address bar (as if it's a website), then type in "webgl.disabled" in the search box, it's probably just set to "true" - set it to false and it should turn it on. It should be enabled by default, so odd that it's not. Once you've done that, type in "about:support" into your address bar and scroll down to the "graphics" section - there's a "WebGL Renderer" line in there (or should be). If there's a "blocked" message of any type, it's likely because you need to update your graphics drivers, but good chance you're fine and it will show the graphics driver name that's set up to do the whole WebGL thing (in which case, you should be good to go).

If still a no-go, or your graphics drivers are up to date already, you can override the block by going back to about:config and typing in "webgl.force-enabled" and set that property to "true". That's never the best thing to do, of course, but it can be done. Probably a good idea to only turn it on if you have to and turn that off (set it back to "false") when you're done using the course tools.


Or, like me, you can use an old version of adobe photoshop/illustrator, or the freebie GIMP image editing program, to do your design stuff... I mean, who makes ponds in doughnut shapes anyway?

Thank you Tristan for such a detailed response....It's probably fortunate that I didn't see it until this morning as I'm not very good at delving deeper into my computer Everything else for the class seemed to work like it was supposed to although I wish I could remove all of the dots in the final image of sectors.
I have Gimp and have used it a little off and on......I hadn't thought about finishing up there, that's a great idea...
I've been thinking of starting a project thread with my images as we are just beginning on this bit of property and I could probably use some advice...

Judith Browning wrote:I've been thinking of starting a project thread with my images as we are just beginning on this bit of property and I could probably use some advice...

Definitely do - if nothing else, it's a good way to document everything you're doing, from planning right through to project completion(s) That's the primary reason I have a project thread going for our little mud puddle - the feedback is great but just having that thread to go back over every so often is inspiring, showing where you started and how far things have come. That and all those other people out there that want to do it but are afraid to try get to look and see how us idjits are doing with our attempts

"NEW YORK, Sept. 28, 2016 – The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) released details of 26 grants that will help organic farmers and ranchers improve business operations and bring more organic food to the table.......One of this year’s planning grant recipients, Oregon State University, received $250,000 to develop an online graduate certificate program in organic agriculture......"

https://nifa.usda.gov/press-release/usda-announces-214-million-organic-research-and-extension-programs


Here's hoping some of that funding is used to support, improve, and expand the online PDC.

Did anyone who took the course in May use an iPad? I contacted Oregon St. in the past about their full PDC and was told that a desktop was required, just wondering if that is the case for the freebie as well or if it's tablet friendly.

Bumping this thread because this MOOC is running again! It started last week but you can still sign up until November 18th. There are around 7,000 people currently signed up. Is anyone else here taking it this time around?
I'm hoping it will help me fine-tune the plan for our farm, and I would love to bounce ideas off of anyone else who is currently taking it, or has in the past.