Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Some Notes from the August Meeting of the East Bay Permaculture Guild


Some Notes from the August Meeting of the East Bay Permaculture Guild
August 12th 7pm @ PLACE for Sustainable Living in Oakland, CA

BOOKS
-Vegetable Gardener's Guide to Permaculture 
--Christopher Shein 

PROJECTS
-PLACE for Sustainable Living in North Oakland is facilitating a place making project on the intersection where PLACE is located.  Look for their block party coming up on September 28th.  There will be a street mural painting and place building projects!
-In the Basque Country near Spain, visitor Ortzi Akizu Gardoki is co-creating a EcoPark called Ekogunea Ecopark.  Find more at ekogunea.net
-East Bay Co-Housing facilitator Raines Cohen just got back from 5 weeks touring European eco-villages; report backs and pictures to come
-Brennan will be facilitating earth bench and other natural building projects in San Francisco and needs volunteers; get in touch with him through www.earthbench.org to learn and volunteer on upcoming cobb, clay, straw, and plaster work projects 

EVENTS
-September? 6th, 7th, and 8th - ranch and farm-scale water development including springs, floating island, wetlands, etc. through David Cody
-Roberto Perez permaculture talks 
-Eric Toensmeir workshop coming up by Living Mandala
-Toby Hemenway teaching a course with Daly Acts in Petaluma 
--scholarships and work trades available 
---Toby Hemenway author of Gaia's Garden


NOTES ON PRESENTATION - REPORT BACK FROM ERIC TOENSMEIR WORKSHOP
-presenter has been working with Daly Acts 
--Daly Acts installed food forests at Petaluma City Hall; installed perennial polyculture; will be harvesting first Kiwi vines this year
-transforming problems into solutions
--lawns into gardens
---lawns waste water, resources (soil, space) 
---gardens create food, connections, diversity 
-mentioned Trathen's greywater system 
-MORE FOOD FORESTS INTO OUR URBAN SYSTEMS
--Occidental Arts and Ecology Center is far away 
---27 people took food forest workshop there 
---feeling of being grounded and safer there 
-a food forest is a garden modeled after a forest ecology 
-AGROFORESTRY 
--Eric Toensmeir is working with a corporation who is sequestering carbon, growing chestnuts, and coppicing them 
--Land Institute pioneering perennial food crops in Kansas 
-(lawns are the largest irrigated crop in the US!, second is corn)
--Sunflowers
--Wheat Germ
--Wheat Grass 
--Sorghum 
---perennializing these four crops
--we need nuts, fats, oils for a balanced diet 
-Eric Olson's permaculture skills center 
--sunflowers from Chevron action came from here
---organized by Urban Tilth 
COPPICING
-Black Locust is coppiced on a 6 year cycle
-looking for the diameter of pole you need for your use
--such as for tool handles, structure poles, etc. 
-indigenous practice (Tending the Wild?) 

WEBSITES
-Perennial Solutions: perennialsolutions.org 
--Eric Toensmeir has a website of plant guilds 
--"All Nitrogen Fixers are not Created Equal": article by Eric Toensmeir 
-Apios Institute: ApiosInstitute.org
-Plants For A Future: pfaf.org 

PLACE MAKING 
-BAY AREA PLACE MAKING WEBSITE is in the works!
-Placemaking Facilitation
--Ask the people in the neighborhood:
---What's the issue?
---What's the root problem of that issue?
---What's the basic solutions?
---How is that solution developed/embodied?
---What are the effects of solving that issue?

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