missoula permaculture

I would like to get an idea of all of the permaculture stuff going on in the missoula area.

I have visited sage mountain homestead in corvallis.  They have only been on that land for eight months and already they have some very interesting stuff going on.  I suspect that in a year or two, they will be an incredible permaculture site.

When I was out a sundog, there were a lot of permaculture people there, but I was there in october, so I didn't see a lot of actual permaculture happening.  Perhaps somebody from there can give us an update?

I feel like I am forgetting a lot.  Any other examples of permaculture in the area?

Does Moon Randolph Home Stead do Permiculture?

Dianne Keast wrote:
Does Moon Randolph Home Stead do Permiculture?

Nope.  Not even a little.

MUD seems like the first place I think of when I think permaculture. They have a great site and offer a range of activities and workshops that are community oriented. The site is full of frugal ideas to live more self-sufficiently such as an amazing tool library, truck share program, and so much more.  www.mudproject.org

The UM FLAT project is a University project led by students who are demonstrating sustainable living practices. They are relatively new, but are developing an outreach / education component, recently hosting a Terra Madre event. The site has a mandala shaped permaculture garden, a hot box for extending the season, chickens, a garage renovation that will be used as a community demonstration space, and quite a few other things.  www.umt.edu/umflat

The PEAS farm has been increasingly using permaculture at their site. The barn is straw bale, they have a great root cellar with a living roof, they use a lot of reclaimed materials, their tractor runs on a single-tank vegetable oil system, they are experimenting in the fields a bit with companion planting, herb and veggie spirals, and for the most part, the farm is all student run and they run a great CSA and a lot of their food gets donated to the Poverello Center and the Food Bank. Awesome!
www.gardencityharvest.org/programs/farm.html

Sundog Ecovillage:   Sundog has a world of potential and have made some good progress this past year. They have 40 acres in the Potomac and have been doing a lot of permaculture work. Last spring, they approved their permaculture plan for the core of their site that includes a community center, greenhouse, rocket mass heater, outdoor gathering space, new homes utilizing local materials, an expanded garden, innovative timber management practices, and host of other exciting plans. Check them out at   www.sundogecovillage.org

Sage Mountain Center: is near Butte and they have several exciting building, garden, and appropriate technology features at their site. The have a few buildings that are made of cord wood, with cob, glass bottles, and other natural plasters. They have simple composting toilets, rain water collection, solar panels, passive solar structures, and they offer a yoga and retreat space for the local community.   www.sagemountain.org

Missoula has a great resource for native plants. You can see their demonstration garden near the Kim Williams trail and Higgins Street, though I can't think of who the contact is.


I am sure there are many more, can anybody add to this list.

Of course, Paul Wheaton is offering a permaculture lecture series where the full schedule can be viewed here:  www.permies.com/permaculture/missoula

The first presentation, intro to perm., provided a great overview for what is yet to come.
Thanks to Paul for doing this. He does not charge anything for his courses and would like to see more people learn about the value of permaculture.

And you are already here, but permies.com is much larger than the missoula eco forum. If you check out some of the other threads and discussions, there is a lot to engage with and learn about here.

1,000 New Gardens (1KNG) is an exciting new initiative here in Missoula. If you haven't heard about them yet, you should look them up. They recently won funding from the Clinton Global Initiative and have expanded from their base here in Missoula to start a chapter in Bozeman. The volunteer group started out by creating lasagna gardens out of existing lawns. They got a lot of support from the community that has offered free soil, manure, and other materials. They have since begun working on outreach components with schools and the community.  http://1000newgardens.wordpress.com/

Home Resource represents a lot of things, and with their new location and shop space, Home Resource really is at the forefront of reuse of materials and re-skilling interested folk about being handy with tools and materials, once again. HR is actually the first place I think of when I think of a supply source for materials! The Revamp shop is a great initiative providing community access to tools and training of how to use basic green woodworking tools (I think/hope) and power tools to do all sorts of DIY projects. Furthermore, the shared storefront is a great example of bringing together similar businesses under one roof to sport their practices and products like that of Mark VanderMeer and their sustainably harvested products. All this being said and so for so many other reasons, Home Resource is a leader of in the Missoula permaculture effort.

It looks like Free Cycles and MIST belong on this list of permaculture resources. Bikes rule! and so does green transportation.