Portugal - Quinta Serrinha

I wish you could smell the air here! This is the olival at the top of Janet and Clive's quinta in the footlills of the Serra da Estrela. It's right on the edge of wilderness and is just one of the most peaceful places you could hope to find. The scent in the air changes everyday, a mixture of wild lavender, pines, eucalyptus etc etc. The trees here haven't been pruned for many years as you can see and it is a wonderful experience spending time with them, slowing down to tree-speed, cutting away the dead wood, clearing their centres to let in air and sunlight and choosing the best shoots to leave. The trees love the attention and its all in a very pleasant 15 degrees or so in January...

This is a very un-developed part of Portugal and all the better for it. You might hear a petrol engine a couple of times a day, mostly you hear the wind in the trees, or bird song. Rush hour is when a flock of sheep goes by with their bells clanking. Above, the farmhouse nestles in the hillside. In the distance you can just see Monsanto and again below more clearly with the benefit of telephoto in the gorgeous morning light.

It's all hugely restful and healing after all the emotional and physical upheaval of splitting up with Debi and it's lovely to be working outside in a t-shirt in the sun after such a cold, wet winter back in the UK. Much more soon!

Some Permaculture courses coming up:

If you can get to one of these courses it will probably be some of the most useful time you will spend in your life! A chance to study with Steve: see my earlier posts about his work and link to Chickenshack, the co-operative small holding he set up. It's all part of a possible future.

!! ALSO !! ... if you can venture further afield, Steve and Caryn have a Permaculture course coming up at Quinta Cabeça do Mato in the beautiful backwoods of Portugal, another wonderful opportunity to live and learn.

Wouldn't it be nice to have a peaceful little farm in the wilds of Portugal?

If this thought ever crosses your mind just you go and have a few stiff drinks and then sit in a nice warm bath or something until the thought uncrosses your mind...


...this must be just one of the most beautiful, peaceful places to be anywhere - but getting set up out here is not for the faint-hearted. The tangled bureaucracy is infuriating even if, like Janet and Clive, you speak Portuguese fluently. Clive has written much in his own blogging about the ups and downs of having anything built out here - click here for Clive's Quinta Blog. Then there are many other little flies in the ointment like the "hunters" who have the right to roam freely through the area firing off their blunderbusses at wildlife however small, right down to thrushes. (Clive and I reckon it would be a much better sport if the birds had guns too). It's not a good idea to confront these guys though as the Rambo-clad warriors may also be the local police or other worthies...


...it is bloomin gorgeous out here though all the same! Janet and Clive 35 acres here and are still exploring their land after three years, finding olive and other trees that they didn't even know were there. There's a huge variety of growing areas, parts are strewn with giant boulders, there are thousands of trees and a family of wild boar haunt the upper areas. Their hard work and persistence is paying off already though and the vineyards and olivals are beginning to look really good.

Portugal - part two

Janet speaks Portuguese like a native and Clive isn't far behind. I'm sure it's helped them to make local contacts enormously - the Portuguese are surprised and very appreciative. The lovely lady above with Janet and Clive lives near the well and is tremendously friendly - she cooked us a delicious stew one Sunday lunchtime and poured us many a glass of excellent local wine. I won't give away her age but she walks miles everyday, looks after a small holding, prunes trees and looks about fifteen or twenty years younger than she really is - a sort of Portuguese Super-Gran.


Clive and I were a wee bit tentative with our pruning to begin with, agonizing over every twiglet. Then we saw a local pruning in the neighbouring quinta and Janet asked him if he would be kind enough to pop over and give us a little advice. He gave us a demonstration of a sort of Lightning Prune that had two thirds of the tree on the ground in minutes and we got a bit bolder after that.

Olive trees are a real pleasure to work with and you can feel that they love all the attention. Clive and I soon tuned in to their shape and what could go and what could stay. Every now and then there was a loud thump as a larger branch hit the ground.

Polytunnel, bio-dynamics, companion planting

POLYTUNNEL

We're really pleased with what we've achieved in the veg garden so far. There's been plenty of failures and difficulties but plenty of successes too, a good first year. Things that didn't do well were tatties, peas, mange tout, swiss chard and spinach amongst other things. Other UK growers we chat too have mostly found it a difficult year with the endless damp and we've had problems with eel worm or wire worm and also with rats and mice. The successes have been peppers, chile peppers, tomatoes, herbs, strawberries, onions, celery, leeks, courgettes, beans and sweetcorn. It's nice to remember that many of the plants started off life on Ruth's windowsill back down in College Road. Well done us! 

Ruth's window-ledge nursery back in College Road

Ruth's tomato-polyculture: companion planting of toms with basil and flowers mulched with straw - great idea, easy to maintain and very productive

Chile peppers galore

GOLDEN RULE No. 99 - GET YOUR INFRA-STRUCTURE RIGHT

Volunteers Ian and Alan working on the final, middle row of beds in the tunnel with Wes and I "helping"

If you plan and set up a good system of paths, gates, fences, raised beds, composting bins, polytunnels etc etc right from the start you will make life so much easier and more enjoyable for yourself. That goes for a hundred acre farm just as much as a back garden plot.

And if you're at all inclined to try growing some stuff yourself but haven't started yet just do it! I look back on all the mistakes I made back on my allotment and realise now that it was all a great way to learn, your garden soon teaches you if you're prepared to look and listen and it's really easy to research stuff via the internet now - above all, the greatest journey begins with a single step...

BIO-DYNAMICS

Some of it might seem pretty wacky at first sight but the more you look into it the more it makes sense. The cow horn procedure boosts all-important bacterial soil activity

This is one of the most interesting avenues we've been exploring in the garden here. It's about timing your gardening according to the phases of the Moon and the position of the planets, and much more. I know some people (who could well be a bit more open-minded for their own good) who dismiss the whole thing as superstitious nonsense but just think of the effect of the Moon on the oceans. Every drop of water on the Earth is being pulled and released in the tides so surely it follows that this will be true for water in plants and the ground just as much as the seas. I wonder if it's partly how water is drawn up into trees as I think I've read that this can't be fully explained by capillary attraction. My friends Steve and Caryn at Quinta Cabeca de Mata in Portugal have been working with Bio-Dynamics for years with such interesting results that they now do more and more in this way, even harvesting wood for buildings. We're going to need all the help and deeper and understanding we can get as we power-down from the Oil Age so lets check out everything that comes our way with open hearts and minds - maybe that's the biggest possible first step.

A bit more about the Portuguese outback...

We are in the Beira Interior Sul region of Portugal not far from the Spanish border and its verry verrrry quiet. You can carry on a conversation quite easily with someone a hundred yards away and hear the neighbouring farmer's wife shouting at her flock of goats and sheep very clearly.
Sadly you don't see many children in the village, the younger families have gone to the cities like Lisbon or have gone to work in France.

Here's a couple of shots from a walk I took up in the hills behind Janet and Clive's quinta, lots of rocks, boulders and scrubby vegetation with a random olival scattered here and there.

I love the way we humans have made very little impact on the landscape around here - in the picture above you can just see the nearest village tucked away to the right. None of the houses are over two floors high and rather than gardens they tend to have little micro-holdings of olives, vines and vegetables.
Here's my walking chum Harry coming down the road at top speed...

...and here's Clive after a haircut in Fundao at a barbers shop straight out of the Fifties - good haircut though!

Chickenshack May 2008

I'm not long back from a wonderful week at CHICKENSHACK and send a big thank you to Steve and Mike for all their friendly hospitality. For those who haven't heard of the place check out their website:

http://www.chickenshack.co.uk/

Steve and his friends have been bringing back a Welsh small holding from "Green Desert" mono-culture to beautiful, diverse permaculture. Instead of fields and fields of just one crop there are scores of different plants growing together. Forest Gardening and Permaculture build up systems which don't need so much water, don't need tons of fertilisers, build up living soil, are more resistant to pests, give high yields of nutritious crops .... Its a return to sane food production - see the links to earlier articles below for more information.

Steve is running a Permaculture course this week and next. I lent a hand building the Composting Toilet block - and good fun it was too! It was great working together with everyone using whatever was at hand from tree limbs to reclaimed boards and barrels. The result was pretty amazing ... see below...

Peak Oil
While I was there I borrowed Steve's copy of "The Party's Over" by Richard Heinberg. It's a fascinating read and shows how so much of our activity is built on a source of cheap, abundant energy. Now that source seems to have peaked and we are already seeing rising fuel and food prices ... It would all be a bit grim if there wasn't a ray of sunshine in the form of Steve and friends in Wales, the people on the course, and many others like them all over the world cooperating towards a sustainable future. For more in that vein check out

http://peakoil.blogspot.com/

it includes a link to "The Party's Over"

COMING SOON
I'm off to another small holding cooperative in Fife soon - all about that when I get back.
Also, I have some great memories and photos to put on from my stay with Janet and Clive on their farm in the back hills of Portugal.

Portugal - part three

On the left: Rush Hour! Twice a day the peace was disturbed a bit when this shepherd travelled across the quinta with his flock of sheep, goats, clanking bells and a lot of dogs - usually stopping for a bit of a chat or at least giving a huge long-distance wave.
On the right: Boulders - well how did those get there? Fans of Velikovsky will find much to muse on strolling amongst the giant boulders strewn mostly about the higher areas of the quinta.











On the left: the late afternoon view from an olive tree looking up to the farmhouse and giving an idea of the size of the quinta.
On the right: a beautiful sunrise over the misty valley seen from the top of the quinta on my last day there. You'll have to imagine the scent of the air though - ccol, fresh, moist, filled with wild lavender - gorgeous!
Big big thanks for a wonderful experience to Janet and Clive, all the best, lots of love and hope to see you soon.

Quinta Serrinha - Portugal, Feb 2008 - Part One

I spent a wonderful couple of weeks earlier this year with Janet and Clive lending a hand in bringing their hill farm back to life. The place had been pretty much abandoned for several years and there were vines to de-bramble and lots of olive trees to prune. The farmhouse had no electricity and no running water but that lent an extra magic and simplicity to place. We chatted on about plants, healing work (Janet practises EFT) and everything else by the light of candles and the open fire.
It's a beautiful place - a little hill farm in one of the least developed parts of Europe. Farming is going on there pretty much as it has done for a couple of thousand years or longer. Its pretty much organic, largely self-sufficient - Permaculture without realising it? I hope it can trundle along on for many more thousands of years.
All the water we used came from the hand-cranked well in the village, for drinking, cooking, washing and also for the loo. I hear from Clive that the farm is on mains power and water now though.

On the Eco Edge...

POSTERS & PICTURES
We have been working on Permaculture publicity and produced some posters - have a look and please print out and put up any that resonate with you. I can't get my images to upload to blogger at the moment so have put the posters and some photos on facebook for now:

link to Facebook for posters and photos

TWO MONTHS SINCE PERTH...
I can't believe it's two months since I set off from Perth with the Bike and Grand Piano Combo! What an amazing time its been since then, seeing old friends and making new ones and exploring this bit of Wales, new to me. My original plan was to cycle through Wales and then maybe on through France to Portugal but as John Lennon said, "Life's what happens when you're making other plans"...

WORK IN PROGRESS
When I arrived at Llanfyllin to help my old friend Steve Jones for a while I found I've  come at a time when a lot of his projects are coming to the boil. I've always liked working with Steve and am full of admiration for all he has done over the years on projects such as CAT and Chickenshack as well as his Permaculture teaching and TV work. My odd mix of experience and skills fits in well so we had the idea to moved into our brilliant flat in Llanrhaeadr-Ym-Mochnant, in Powys. We're mainly working on:

Sector39: running courses on Permaculture and skills for Sustainability. and projects such as Cwm Harry, the community garden project. As well as all that we are planning a co-operatively owned permaculture small holding, low-impact development and research institute for developing and teaching skills for sustainability on a 23 acre plot near the village at Pen Y Garnedd. This is the big project and just the sort of thing I have been hoping to get involved with for a long time. I'm absolutely delighted that after all these years of eco-wandering I've found myself working on really crucial, long term stuff and with a bunch of like minded folk with an extraordinary range of skills between them. It's nice that all the skills and experience I've picked up over the years are useful in the eco-world: woodwork, gardening, tree-care, building work, scale drawing, graphics and photos, writing and of course therapy/healing work... I like plenty of variety in my working life so it all suits me just FIIIIINE!

"AND DON'T FORGET TO BOOGIE!" (as Bob Hite of Canned Heat used to say)
And it's a lot of fun here too, not least because Steve is a fellow Blues & Boogie enthusiast. The Chickenshack name was appropriate for many reasons but one is that there is a sixties'  blues band of the same name, (featuring Stan Webb on guitar - he's still going strong by the way). I remember arriving at Chickenshack for the first time a few years ago and noticing that there were an awful lot of guitars in the kitchen... and a Fender Rhodes electric piano... not many kitchens are equipped with one of those. I had a funny feeling that it all boded well and I was right.

(Just as a wee side note, I actually saw Canned Heat way back in the seventies with my great chum Stone at the Raith Ballroom in Kirkcaldy, Fife of all places. They were EPIC! The Bear and Henry Vestine in the line up - one of the best gigs I ever went to.)

MINIMAL ME
I'm still mainly using just the stuff I brought down with me on the bike: four changes of clothes, a laptop, sleeping bag, camping mattress and assorted bits and pieces. Steve has a good collection of cooking stuff and has kindly loaned me a gent's wardrobe but it's nice to have basically minimal stuff and clutter. How much do you really need anyway?


Finally, many thanks to Ralph Arbus for letting us use a couple of his orangutan photos - check out his work here.


Bye for now, ian xx

*** COURSES *** COURSES *** COURSES ***

Lots of good courses coming up at Brighton Permaculture Trust including:
Permaculture Design (Intro and Full courses)
Pruning Old Fruit Trees
Forest Gardening
Green Architecture
and much more
I've done several of courses with the Trust and they've all been really good. The Pruning Old Fruit Trees course turned out to be brilliant experience that helped Clive and me to get to grips with all those olives in Portugal. Great bunch of people at the Trust too - check out dates etc. here: Brighton Permaculture Trust Courses.

And in Wales:

I'm planning to do the longer Permaculture course, 16th - 30th May, with Steve Jones at the Llanfyllin Workhouse project down in Wales, partly because a two week residential course suits me better than a 12 weekend day format and also because Steve is ace! He's very inspiring, motivating, lots of fun and has an excellent team working with him including Chris Dixon with whom I spent a very wet few days last year. See you there I hope, full details here:

Steve's Permaculture Course - 16th to 30th May 2009 - Llanfyllin

More about the extraordinary Workhouse project at: Llanfyllin Workhouse. and more about Steve's work at Sector39 and on his Channel 4 blog.

A Breath of Welsh Air

It turns out that I've arrived at Llanfyllin just at a time when there is lots of change in the air. Steve is moving on from the Workhouse project and working on plans for several new projects through the Permanent Housing Coop. The core of this is to buy land for a permaculture site with all the features I've wanted to help to develop for years: organic market gardening, forest gardening, a forest garden nursery, a tree nursery, teaching facilities, therapy/retreat facilities and even ponds for trout. It's all really really exciting - what a great time to have turned up. Then I heard the news that the Welsh Assembly has extended the Low Impact regulations that have helped Lammas to set up their project in Pembrokeshire to the whole of Wales. It feels as if the tide has finally turned - in Wales at least.

Land hunting - another field

Powys is a lovely part of the world, a multitude of interconnecting, lush, steep sided valleys with old trees and beautiful views everywhere. It's a patchwork of small fields, a bit like a very wet, colder version of Portugal and is the second least populated part of the UK after Sutherland. I cycled over to work with Steve at Llanrhaedr the other day and came back to sleep at the Workhouse through the dusk - nice to have very little traffic but still hard work with the steep hills.

In need of modernisation - untouched since the 1930's

PERMACULTURE
I helped Steve on a Permaculture Introduction weekend course which was good fun and very informative even though I've already done the course with the Brighton Permaculture Trust. Steve is inspirational, a storehouse of information, has a wealth of practical experience and boundless energy and enthusiasm - a great teacher.

Steve in full inspirational flow

Chicks at the edge of the forest garden already established at our venue, Farm2Grow

An unusal seedling to see - a baby Monkey Puzzle Tree. It bears delicious nuts after 60 years, but you need a male and a female and you can't tell them apart until they're 40 years old...patience...

It reminded me a lot of helping John and Carol with the Upledger CranioSacral Courses - lots of fun and learning all the time. If you've not studied Permaculture already sign up for a course straight away wherever you can. It gives you a framework to help you respond to change and design versatile, resilient systems at any level. I believe that we are entering a phase when Peak Oil, Climate Change and many other challenges will force a period of unprecedented upheaval on us. Permaculture will help us to adapt and get prepared as best we can. Check out: Permaculture with Steve Jones at Sector 39 and Brighton Permaculture Trust.

Cwm Harry
this is an excellent project that Steve is managing in Newtown. It's an old industrial site which is now being used to make compost from food and garden waste and has an organic garden on site as well. Many volunteers help on the site including young offenders and it's produce goes into a local veg box scheme. After just three years it shows how much good stuff can be done on a vacant lot like this.

Organic Gardening Course

I joined the Workhouse Organic Gardening course for a day. It's only 19 weeks old but is already producing lots of food from raised beds.

The insect hotel - more about this eye-opener soon. You need the aphids as well as the ladybirds.

Steve with one weeks's produce from the small plot

Polyculture

This system of mixing many kinds of seeds together has been helping villagers in Nepal to gain a succession of crops from the same plot. Pioneered by another Permaculturist, Chris Evans, a network of hundreds of villages now use it successfully.

Coops
I'll be writing more about this - they can be set up to help people gain access to land as well as housing, with capital and without capital.

FOREST GARDENING - part three

The second day of the course was held up at Stanmer Park, just on the edge of Brighton. We used the amazing off-grid earthship as a base - it uses passive solar heating via a huge thermal mass of rammed earth partly contained in old car tyres on its North side. Those are empty bottles in the wall outside.



There's LOTS going on at the park - everytime I go there it looks more and more interesting and obviously more and more people are getting involved in different projects - a wealth of practical experience.



This is inside the willow dome at Stanmer - a beautiful natural structure which glows inside with a gentle green light.

These are two pictures from the orchard - note the nettle layer beneath the apple trees. It has been left there on purpose as its a very nutritious food. I know its not difficult to grow...

That's me below posing with a tree which I helped to prune earlier in the year on the Fruit Tree Renovation and Pruning Course. I'm proud to say that the tree has not only survived but is looking very healthy. The course was extremely useful and skills I picked up helped a lot when Clive and I were pruning olive trees in Portugal - see posts below.




Bryn explaining about different ways of propagating apple trees. Strong, resilient, productive trees can be grown on their own roots rather than grafted on to more vigorous root stocks - this is just the stuff I believe we should be researching more and putting into practise. Instead a lot of research in this area has just been dumped...hmmmm... I wonder why. Surely, the more resilient we can be in the near future the better.

This apple tree has had a lot of its roots used as cuttings to generate more trees. Now it has been pruned well back to help it into balanced regrowth. I would have thought that it was almost a bit cruel a few years ago but having done some pruning recently my feeling is now quite different. I would say the trees love the attention, as if they have been given a thorough grooming and they are delighted to work in partnership with us given half a chance.

HOW TO MAKE A BED WITHOUT DIGGING:

Fork into the surface a bit to loosen up the grass roots and stuff...
...stick plenty of good thick cardboard on top...
...have a rest and learn a bit more from Bryn (and keep the cardboard from blowing away)...
...stick lots of compost on top of the cardboard...
...then stick woodchips on top of that. Done! There's a wee bit more to it than that but it's easy and it works.

I've put these and a few more photos from the course into a set on flickr - if any of my course chums or anyone else is interested click here and you will go straight to them by internet magic.