Rachel Lindsay

Someone said "books" again.

Try art books by the Batterberrys!

They are on my shelves waiting for my daughter in middle and high school, and I can't wait.

Nancy Reading wrote:The danger is that you don't know what you don't know. I think I would always fact check anything important before trusting a result. I do use it for auto translations, grammar checks, and amusingly AI text checking!
I generally prefer to ask a real person - hello permies! Or find a book.

We can get gobs and gobs of these computer-generated images and texts now--and all this has really made me appreciative of humans. Humans can make mistakes transmitting information, sure--but humans give me more than merely information when I speak with them. They give me their unique perspectives and their experiences, their sense of humor, their unique appreciation for the topic under discussion, many of their related ideas, and their personal recommendations for me as me.  

The personal is utterly lost with computers. The personal is a thing we may now begin to value most highly--as I have begun to.

Anne Miller wrote:In my opinion not all invasives are bad.

You and I agree on that! Yesterday I had my mind blown by a publisher's monthly newsletter praising 1) kudzu and 2) garlic mustard. Down in the Southeastern USA here, these plants are excoriated. But I now have an all new appreciation for them.  (Kudzu can be used as an alfalfa substitute for livestock feed! Garlic mustard is food and medicine!) If we actually use these plants, as the cultures do in the places where the plants originally came from, we will probably come to love them too. Makes sense to me!

I'm so glad the OP (Timothy) started this thread. It seems there are a lot of us in this boat!

Thoughts:

1. I wish I could grow up my girl on a farm. I am not going to be able to do that. But, she is old enough to join 4-H this year, and we will be able to plug-in to the local farming community in a new meaningful way, and I may then discover (with volunteering, etc.) that I don't need to personally have a farm for her to grow up with farms, you know?

2. I think it's important that we Permies should always learn, innovate and prototype to get the most out of ourselves as well as our land. With a shaded urban lot, I am extremely limited as to what I can ever grow, but there are other ways besides gardening that I take action on my aspirations to make Permaculture more of a normal thing, and live by Localism principles. There is truly always more to try, and lots and lots to learn, which is very exciting.

3. Speaking of which, my biggest opportunity for growth in the Permaculture scenario is learning to do serious foraging, I think. If I put even 5% more potential time and energy into this, I would have an even greater life. Foraging would benefit me in about every conceivable way: getting me out in nature more, teaching me about local seasonal cycles, providing us the most nutritious food that can be found, saving  us money on food, prepping my family with knowledge for emergencies...etc.  

I really like to read why a book did or did not "resonate" with a reviewer. I'm nosy. Stories of what you tried because of what you read, and the results, would be really fun too.

To help people decide if a book is worth their money/time, descriptions of the target audience might be helpful. Following up on that, whether you think the author successfully addressed that audience. Books have disappointed me because I assumed I was a reader the book was aimed at, and I found out I wasn't.

This "be nice" rule has changed how I write any and all messages ever.

Before Permies: I would write what I thought, not considering what the thoughts sound like outside my mind.
After Permies:    I write what I think, then I delete all things that might come across badly, and I add extra context to what is left.

It has been a beautiful thing. I am more sure now of being understood as I meant to be, since I am not expecting anyone to read my mind. I feel more satisfied with my communications of all kinds--text messages, e-mails, blog comments, posts...and I expect I will get better as I keep practicing!

Douglas Alpenstock wrote:Obviously I'm not doing this in the full heat of summer. I'm waiting for cool rainy days.

Right here just north of the Alabama border I am wondering what "the full heat of summer" means where you are.

Welcome to Permies!

It sounds like you started the first steps of a "lasagna garden". You may want to learn more about that technique and further enrich your soil.

You also might build a hugelkultur bed there too.  We have done both and they both worked, but the hugelkultur has needed less manure/fertilizer etc.

Best wishes!

Interesting! You must have such a different climate compared to mine. Here in Tennessee in March it is NOT a good time to do that, since our Spring has already begun.

That resource looks very helpful--I liked this illustration:


Happy pruning and best wishes for your next gardening season!