July 2013 Blog Posts (8)

Reblogged from my Integral Permaculture blog...

I know, it sounds like a subject best left to professional planners, politicians, and policy wonks. But it turns out to be a really important piece that is shaping the character and landscape of Whatcom County. Perhaps more importantly it plays a role in our ability to become more resilient by preserving fertile farmland for the purpose of feeding our…

Reblogged from my Integral Permaculture blog...

A couple of months ago there was a piece in the National Journal that put a spotlight on our humble county, and caught some local attention:…

Planning the 2nd Annual Whatcom SkillShare Faire- a really fabulous TRANSITION WHATCOM event!  We are now recruiting people with skills to share, and volunteers to help make this big event happen...held this year on September 21-22 at Hovander Park in Ferndale. It is great fun, all kinds of cool skillshares, food, amazing music, camping, and more- for the whole family.  Go to www.whatcomskillsharefaire.org to sign up! 

It's been about 2-1/2 weeks since we finished the swale installation at our place.

Since then I have continued to shape the swale ditches, spillways and berms. And planted grass seed in the ditches. I've made the angle of the ditch walls wider so it will be easier to scythe the grass that grows on it later.

A deer got in and ate most of the leaves off the little apple tree that David planted. I hope it can recover.

For one of the spillways I carved a shallow serpentine…

Catechism for a Witch’s Child

When they ask to see your gods

your book of prayers

show them lines

drawn delicately with veins

on the underside of a bird’s wing

tell them you believe

in giant sycamores mottled

and stark against a winter sky

and in nights so frozen

stars crack open spilling

streams of molten ice to earth

and tell them how you drink

a holy wine of honeysuckle

on a…

Cue Johnny Mathis, singing "It's that most wonderful time of the year!"

I'm not talking about Christmas, however.  I'm talking about that time of year when the fresh, local fruits collide.  When you're getting the last of the Strawberries, the first of the Blueberries, and the peak of the raspberries!  I love how nature spaces out the fruit season so wonderfully!

These were picked minutes ago from our small but growing berry plants, including the above, plus red and black…

Initially there was a "problem"...too much water in the landscape. And I wanted to get rid of some of this water so we could expand our growing season on better drained soil. Through this process of designing and creating swales I've changed my perspective and don't see the water as a "problem" to be exported. Brian has taught that it's more a matter of working with the resource in a way that maximizes it's many attributes through gently…

Yesterday we finished constructing the swales. The morning's project included moving gravel, filling and finishing off the sink holes with soil so they were level with the rest of the swale ditch. We got an early start as we knew it would be a hot day. We were joined by Jerry Schuster, Laura Sellens and Keith Marteny. Thanks you guys for lending your strength and lively spirits to the work.  Here's how the morning went:

First Brian and David made "socks" out of landscape fabric to…