Jim Garlits

Talk about coincidence. I just learned to day that the kiddie pool pond I dug in to the back edge of Willow Acre and populated with tadpoles is now a nutrient powerhouse for my garden beds.

Because duckweed.

Yep, the fastest growing flowering plant on planet earth is now doing nicely in my pond. And starting to overwhelm it. I had no idea when I put the canning jar full of duckweed into the pond that it would multiply as quickly as it does.

Completely unintentional. Absolutely function stacking. Because I'm going to be amending my soil with it from now on.

Jim

Here's an oldie but a goody. I was thinking about Paul's quote about apple seeds, because my brain was telling me "apple seeds have to be cold stratified or they won't grow." And then I said to my brain, "nature did just fine stratifying seeds long before human beings invented refrigerators.

That being said, let's talk about what sorts of things might increase the chances of the seeds germinating after we eat an apple and plant the seeds.

Does leaving a bit of the flesh of the apple help, along the lines of just burying the core seeds and all instead of picking the seeds out? Since the seeds need consistent moisture, I think that might help. I'm thinking of half a dozen more, but I want to hear what might have worked for you, or maybe an ingenious new thing that nobody has tried yet!

Jim

It takes some deeper thought to ponder that and pull out examples. Something I noticed is how closely function stacking aligns with what Manfred Max-Neef called synergistic satisfiers in regards to human needs. Stacked functions can in some cases satisfy human needs, like your steps helping people get into and out of the house more easily. The classic example of a synergistic satisfier is a mother breastfeeding a child. It is simultaneously fulfilling the very human needs of nutrition, health promotion, bonding, emotional well being, and many others. I suppose the most obvious example for me of function stacking is when I go hiking in the mountains. Experienced backpackers try to bring items that serve multiple needs, like a simple bandana that can be used for sun protection, as a sweat rag or towel, a potholder, a water pre-filter, an emergency bandage, for neck warmth, as a hat, a washcloth, a smoke/dust mask or even a coffee filter substitute.

Jim

This spring at Willow Acre I’ve started noticing something interesting: some of the most valuable and fascinating things on the property are not necessarily the things I intentionally planted.

Brittlestem (inkcap) mushrooms erupted from last year’s wood chips after rain. The comfrey is feeding bees and building biomass faster than I expected. Even the “weeds” are beginning to tell me things about soil, moisture, and succession.

Permaculture changes the way you look at land. You stop asking:

“How do I control this?”

and start asking:

“What is this place trying to become?”

So I’m curious:

What’s the most unexpectedly useful, beautiful, edible, medicinal, ecological, or otherwise surprising thing growing on your property right now?

WEEDS is a new Substack experiment connected to permies.com and the broader idea that if we want permaculture thinking to spread, we need to bring it into the wider internet ecosystem where people are already spending their time.

One of the guiding ideas behind WEEDS is this: People protect what they love. I want a billion brains to find out about permaculture. But I want all one-billion of them to love what it creates.

One thing you will discover if you click the link to go there, is it will ask for an email address. You can click on "no thanks" and it will still let you into WEEDS.

A lot of modern environmental messaging leads with fear, guilt, doom, collapse, outrage, or abstract statistics. But most people are moved to care for the living world through affection first — through beauty, wonder, usefulness, observation, connection, good memories, good meals, birdsong, gardens, shade trees, ponds, trails, pollinators, fireflies, mushrooms, orchards, and the simple feeling that a place is alive like my little permaculture paradise at Willow Acre.

WEEDS is intended to lean into that, as well as be an easily navigable link to our other online resources.

The goal is to be an outpost that directs people to the depth of knowledge and wisdom contained in the forums and threads. My hope is to help more people discover ideas that may eventually lead them here.

A lot of people out there are quietly exhausted, isolated, burned out, tired of processed foods and screen-heavy living. Many of them don’t even know words like “permaculture,” “appropriate technology,” or “soil building.”

But they *do* know they want something more grounded, more beautiful, more human, and more connected to the living world.

WEEDS is meant to be one small bridge toward that.

Some of the content will be exclusive video hosted directly on Substack, though much will still connect back to permies threads.

One thing I personally like about Substack is that it allows slower, longer-form, less algorithmically frantic communication than many mainstream platforms. It feels a little more like sitting down with a cup of coffee and paging through a homesteading journal than doomscrolling social media.

This is still very much an experiment, and we are figuring it out as we go, and Substack is woefully void of any permaculture presence, so we have an opportunity to be pioneers there.

If you’d like to follow along, offer suggestions, or help spread permaculture ideas beyond the usual circles, here’s the link:

https://permies.substack.com

Reputable e-bikes like aventon. 20 mph top speed. Only use ECO mode, you pedal, it assists. 10-15 mph. Sturdy brakes. Yes, 65-80 lbs but you’re not flying, you’re biking. Non-motorized cyclists respect you. You’re enjoying adaptive cycling. Like anything else, if you’re on the road, you have to be aware of distracted drivers. But on trails, and quiet roads, you’ll be fine. There are a lot of categories of electric two wheeled vehicles that are basically motorcycles. Stay away from them.

Jay Angler wrote:I am seriously considering an e-bike particularly for the range it will give me.

Here are some of my concerns:
1. E-bikes are *much* heavier. If I am in an accident, the weight of the bike alone may increase my injuries.
2. The "carrot" of going "faster", rather than simply "further" is real. An accident at 10 mph is safer than 20 mph is safer than 30 mph. Granted my area has many very serious cyclists who go waaaayyyyy faster than I am capable of going without electric assist, but I'm seeing more people going faster on flats and down grades on electric bikes and am concerned. There have been multiple articles from Emerg Doctors about electric scooters and how dangerous they are.
3. My concern is cubed for people riding with a child on the back such as the picture above. Just because you *can* go fast, doesn't mean that you might not have serious regrets if something goes wrong. I am totally happy with the idea of using electric assist to help me up some of our hills, and to help me go on a 20 km trip when I know my knees are only up to 10 km. Personally though, I'd rather a child be in a bike trailer with it's lower center of gravity, than on the back of a bike as shown above. This, of course, means I need to do some serious upgrades on my old bike trailer before my hoped-for grandchildren become a reality!

For the moment, I an still contemplating the issue. I am *really* happy that Wheaton Labs is doing some serious real life testing for us. One concern is with how long they will last, and which ones are truly repairable. It has gotten to the point with cars, that home repairs are much more difficult if not impossible. I don't want to have to loose my bike to a shop for months because of difficulty getting parts.

Bumping an older thread because it has some good questions. The one I want to address is "who is making quality bike frames"? The answer is fairly simple, but nuanced. Most frames today are great. What brings the star ratings down on some are not the frames themselves, but cheap accessories and the posts on which they are mounted.

Brand names don't especially matter. Not too much, anyhow. Just figure out what you want the bike to do. Have to have fat tires? Make sure the forks have the clearance to support them. Plan on riding primarily off of paved roads? Find out if it supports mountain bike cranksets. On a lot of bikes, you can swap out flat bars for drops and vice versa.

Garages across the world are full of great, unused bikes and bike frames. Check there first. Research how bikes are fitted to riders and what size frame you need to ride comfortably. If there's interest here, I'll post that info soon.

I love bikes. I think they're one of the greatest human inventions ever.

Jim

Another benefit is that now that you've gotten them into the house and enjoyed them for awhile, you can add the edible blooms to your herbal tea.

Jim

I love this topic. As several years have gone by since Wheaton Labs was gifted an eBike, they have gotten progressively more popular and have begun to overlap categories from pedal-assist to full-throttle, some bordering on being electric motorcycles. Trail advocates who oversee non-motorized trail corridors have some problems with them, because the trails are supposed to support active transportation. Walking and running, hiking and biking, skateboarding and rollerblading, pushing strollers and the like. While the bicycle in it's purest form, in my opinion, stands as one of the greatest inventions, I don't have a problem with pedal-assist ebikes on trails, as long as users are obeying the rules on the trail. Speed under 15 mph in busy areas, announcing when you pass, all that. Yesterday I bought my wife an Aventon cargo ebike so she can ride bikes with me in an effort for both of us to be healthier and more active. I've taken a couple of spins on it and can tell you that it made me more of an advocate for at least one demographic: those who want to get out of their vehicle and be out in nature while transporting themselves.

I think we all know the potential downsides these new categories of bikes will have, but in this thread, I'd like to brainstorm the positives. Anyone have any opinions? Pic is an ad for the bike we got to show what it looks like.



Jim