Beads and Roman Sandals Won’t Be Seen

...herb spiral which is essentially a mound. In the permaculture version the water hungry plants are placed at the bottom of the mound and the dry plants at the top, the idea being that the water collects towards the bottom of the mound shaped spiral. We didn’t do the mound thing out of laziness and a lack of materials, and because the herbs we planted don’t require much water anyways. As for the spiral shape itself, we’d like to think that it’s our...

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Rainwater Harvesting with Joe Linton

...” urban permaculture and includes: An overview presentation on Los Angeles water issues, including local multi-benefit watershed management efforts. A tour of Los Angeles Eco-Village stormwater harvesting landscape features, including the Bimini Slough Nature Park. A hands-on workshop to build terraced swales to detain and infiltrate storm water This workshop focuses on building earthworks that gather and infiltrate rainwater in the landscape. It...

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A Self-Watering Container in a Pot

...owers. You fill SWCs up via a pipe and they can go at least a week between waterings. It is, in our opinion, the only way to grow water-needy vegetables reliably in a container. We have used them to successfully grow eggplants, tomatoes, collard greens and blueberries (note to the DEA: no cash crops at the Homegrown Revolution compound!). With our backyard looking fairly ugly this summer we’ve backpedaled on our earlier strident post about how we...

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Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands

...l observation and some work with a shovel. He suggests that harvesting rainwater begins with considering the flow of water from the highest point (which for most people will be the roof) to the lowest point in your yard and then simply figuring out simple ways to get that water to percolate into the ground to nourish your plants. We’re especially fond of his method of hijacking street gutter runoff and directing it with a small improvised check da...

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Essential System #7 – Repair Kit and Tools

...er glove – for gathering or distilling water or for one-handed first aid 8 water purification tables (in straw) – see our earlier post on water 6 safety pins – for, among other uses, creating a sling with a shirt for a broken arm 2 medicated Bandaid strips 1 package first aid cream 6 aspirin 1 baling wire 4 fish hooks (snelled #2/#8) – for fishing! 4 split shot sinkers – also for fishing 1 snap swivel (#10) 1 filament (10 meters) Beyond having eno...

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