Nancy Reading

Looking through the handmade gifts ideas thread and found this:

Lynne Cim wrote:This year I am making paint by number kits for everyone.

If I exclude the physical bits (paint, paper) that might make a nice gift of a special picture. I think I might need to paint an example to show the colours...or leave it as a surprise?

Interesting about the mint, Cécile!

Cécile Stelzer Johnson wrote:If your sludge idea doesn't work, you might want to grow lettuce for sale in floating rafts... (I tied my rafts together to pull them out more easily)

I'd worry about contamination from the duck poo. How do you manage that possibility?

Su Ba wrote:I just lived through a natural disaster in my area .......
How did the town folks do?  Poorly if they had been entirely on their own. Luckily for them we have three things going for us here —#1- we have a strong culturally based concept of sharing,  #2 we have a Hub system designed to respond to a disaster, and #3 we have local non-profit community oriented groups that immediately leapt into action.  

Su Ba - thanks so much for sharing your experience. The importance of community building before a disaster is evident!
As is the interdependency of modern systems - power outages have so many knock on effects from the obvious lack of utility (electricity) to mains water, fuel, shops and communications.
Good point about eating from the fridge. Cheese would probably last a while, but cooked food like sliced meats would need using up quickly.
I'm a big fan of having some staples in tins ready for emergencies; baked beans, soups, tinned meat and fish are all ready to eat possibilities good to have on hand.

Hi Matt! Do you know anything about natural swimming ponds? I suspect they might be rather popular after the summer you've had down South this year!
I suggest you have a look at https://permies.com/wiki/220727/Concise-Guide-Promoting-Stuff-Permies which will give you some ideas about self promotion.

I used to have a really good seed bank in my old polytunnel; in spring and autumn a lovely growth of self seeding salad leaves arrived of their own accord!

self seeding salad

Kale, winter purslane, chickweed, leaf beet, fat hen... I'm hoping to achieve the same effect in my new tunnel and have sown the whole area with lettuce, other leaf vegetables and amaranth. I've bought some claytonia seed and am hoping that chickweed will spontaniously arrive.

i have two methods of mulching:
- a sort of chop and drop where I use cut green plant material such as weeds and graa clippings around establishing plants and growing crops in summer.
- a heavy mulch of seaweed and dead bracken on my annual garden beds in winter to feed the soil for the following growing season. The covering also protects the soil from rain and winter weather.

I like to leave the beds a bit messy, so that soil dwelling insects have hiding places. I hope too that the plant debris will feed the slugs so that they are less likely to go for my plants!

'with the least care'....

For me getting the plants established is the hardest part, especially with perennials. Once they are groing in their third year I consider it a win! Good King Henry, Scorzonera (I eat the leaves - very tasty) small leaved lime, Turkish rocket (Bunias orientalis) and Erythronium come to mind as easy to establish and useful. Lots more that I'm trying to establish, or trying to learn to harvest or turn into food!

Salsify here seems to prefer the paths than  the soil... but it is pretty!

Conratulations everyone!
Let's carry on making permies the nicest place to hang out! Making the world better one post at a time.