Eco-Sense

What’s the definition of whirlwind?  When life picks up, spins, spits crap out, and leaves things looking like “Gord’s been there” –  looking like a yard sale.  That has been the past two weeks.  What causes a whirlwind at Eco-Sense?

When Calamity meets technology:

We’ve always been strong supporters of “appropriate” technology, that which fully meets the purposes it is intended for, with no unforeseen consequences, is repairable, and has limited ecological impacts.

In-appropraite technology:  Dead computer and first cell phone (in over a decade):  Computers and cell phones, and really any other electronic gadget that uses rare earth resources like coltan, are products that wreak injustices on the areas of the planet where they are mined and leave in their path unspeakable atrocities and most often to women.    (more on that below…sorry this update is so scattered…kind of like our life right now…kind of like the trip to emergency last night to get some microscopic bit removed from Gord’s eye – all is good now)

Thankful:  We are thankful that the weather has FINALLY turned from frickin cold to fricken hot, not thankful for the Melnor irrigation timers that virtually all have had to be replaced under warranty.   Thankful for computerized accounting that allows us to run a set of books that has different aspects of our Eco-Sense business life like tours, farm/nursery, construction, consulting, each with different taxation implications… unthankful for Ann’s computer’s death.   (Can you say Law of Diminishing Returns?) Thankful for living a life that does not require such requirements of constant need for a cell phone, unthankful for our camera that died that we were going to be taking on our first holiday (backpacking) in 4 years… meaning it was cheaper to get a cellphone with a good camera than another  camera… meaning that we are redesigning all of our communications and adding a cell phone and at the same time reducing our overall monthly fees.    Now when our old farm truck dies on the Malahat, we can call for help rather than stand on the side of the road waving… and potentially meeting interesting people and having a memorable experience.  Now we can be more efficiently unsustainable.

Technology wastes human capital.  Every new rendition of a device or operating system brings with it a task to discard all that was learned and learn something new.  Added to this was the collapse of our backed up files in the cloud, and the learning process of retrieval, and deciding to dump Telus and learn about such foreign things as dry loops, wet loops, VOIP, SIMs.   Learning and knowledge is a precious resource and to waste it so frivolously mirrors our disposable culture.   We invest a great deal to learn something new… and boom, tomorrow all that knowledge is now useless.  Perhaps this is why we like plants… and homesteading… and political systems – nothing much changes.     Sure we can speak to the benefits of always learning and engaging our brains, but evolutionarily speaking, knowledge was learned, passed on, and provided a cultural construct for valuing those “in the know”.  Now, like a cellphone, computer or irrigation timer, we can just dispose of the old.  Its called progress.  (Sorry Dad).

Cob/concrete oven… and Gord trying to escape technology.

What else has the past two weeks included?  Well plant sales have died off dramatically so with the flexibility of our lifestyle, we’ll be shutting the nursery sales down in two more weeks.  LAST TWO SATURDAYS to come and check out the plant nursery and walk the beautiful gardens will be May 27th & June 3rd.  10am-2pm 3295 Compton Road.

The nursery coming to life

Living Roof on the Workshop

Living Roof on the Root cellar

Howie’s Apricot Azalea

Tayler and Ann discussing beer… and shade

Finally some leaves

Apples have set fruit

Plums have set fruit

Autumn olives LOADED!

Gooseberries

Mixed within all of this is the fun stuff, from wiring up a solar system for a chicken coop, to making a cob oven at the neighbours, presenting to the Mill Bay Garden Club, council and CRD duties, researching and designing a clients farm plan, installing a living roof, planting out the season’s seeds and starts (and hoping they don’t fry), cleaning up the dead and dying Chicken Dinners (read more on this below), and hosting a 4 hour public tour… complete with homesteading snacks.    Oh… the Chicken Dinners dying, that is not the fun part (wrong paragraph).  I should clarify that we DID not serve chicken dinners to our tour guests.

The spread for the Eco-Sense/Hatchet & Seed Tour

Chicken Dinners:  The meat birds we collectively (and lovingly) call (not cull) the Chicken Dinners.  We had began wondering if these, like the other new technology, was pre-programmed to fail.  Perhaps a terminator gene in these Cornish Giants?  Perhaps the design is all about efficiency where they die on their own and thus saves you the step, so all that is required is a good clean and power wash.    Solara is researching a plant in the run to see if it may be poisoning them… a plant that has seemingly been avoided by the “real” chickens.

BIG SALE in The Nursery:  So, back to the plants…what a scattered update this is.  Ha.  Anyways we are going to offer 10% off EVERYTHING in stock for the final two Saturdays.  The more we sell the less we have to look after all summer.  So now that it has FINALY warmed up it is time to plant your sweet potatoes.  We also have some other plants to sell:

• Skirret:  FREE (we were way too successful starting them).  They are a perennial root veggie…very good
• Sweet potato:  $3 Grow under a hoop cover.  very productive.
• Stevia:  grow your own natural sweetener.  2 gal pot $8.  (only 2)
• Cinnamon yam:  grow in a big pot to climb up a trellis.  very yummy tuber great for hormone issues. $8 (only 2)
• OCA: our favourite tuber.  beautiful. $3
• Globe artichokes ($5).  only 3
• Heritage tomato plants:  $3
• Small Desert King Figs ($5)
• Small Grapes (Himrod, Stuben, Fredonia, Sovereign Coronation) ($5)

There you have it,  it’s Friday evening and we have lots to do.

Gord and Ann

We promise…no ranting or edgy political commentary this week…but wow, what an election here in BC.  We can’t wait to see how this one turns out…so many potential great things could come from this shake up.  Congratulations to the three Greens elected here on Souther Vancouver Island.

Now on to the yummy food and plants with lots of photos.  We hope to inspire people to come on out to Eco-Sense on Saturday May 13th to wander around the lush gardens, take a selfie with Dug (the duck), and watch Nina race around the pond.

The Eco-Sense perennial edible plant nursery will be open from 10am-2pm.  We are well stocked with lots of food producing perennials.  Plant list here:    All plant prices INCLUDE the GST.  3295 Compton Road in the East Highlands.

Hosta greens – our new favourite perennial vegetable.  They grow in the shade AND they taste very similar to asparagus.  Easy to grow!!!

Autumn Olive is an attractive shrub that produces lots of yummy nutritious berries.  This plant feed us, feeds the soil, AND the humming birds love it.  Copious quantities of beautiful flowers.

Concrete curvy beds make excellent microclimates helping us to be more resilient with unpredictable weather.  This was a hard winter, but the lemons, rosemarie, kale, chards, and even some asian greens came through the extreme freeze thaw cycles.  The solar dryer is FULL of nettles for tea and winter soups.

Two new arrivals at the nursery:  Russian Almond (it was stunning when it was in bloom a couple weeks ago – hoping for our first almonds this year).  Yellowhorn – very beautiful foliage on this draught tolerant seed producing small tree.  Seeds are very high in oils.

These are very attractive climbing kiwis producing small no fuzz fruits that taste very similar to fuzzy kiwi’s.  Need male and female and these plants grow well in shady spots.

We also have Hops, OCA (Andean potatoes), Dwarf Cherries (ours is flowering), Sea Berries, blight resistant hazelnuts, pawpaws, plums, pears, etc for sale.  Lots of sweet potato starts are IN STOCK.  $4 each.

Finally eating some salad after a long winter.  Looking forward to peas.

Spectacular year for wild flowers.  Camas, shooting stars, sea blush, and white faun lilies have been abundant.  We are also raising 12 little chicken dinners this year.  They are having a very good short life.  Sweet little beings.  A peak into my cheese cave shows some washed rind cheese, various waxed cheeses, and brie (in the bottom).  I also make feta.

View from the upper living roof looking down the solar panels to the lower living roof with all the sea blush, sedums, and mosses and then looking onto some of the Eco-Sense gardens.

That’s it for now.  Hope you enjoyed all the photos.

Ann and Gord

After last week’s post we seemed to have stirred the pot.  Do we dare have some fun and do it again?  We are still recovering from a host of comments so we best just keep it to the fun stuff… new plants… and then we’ll finish by giving that big old pot another stir to end a very brief update.

(Late Addition… AAAck… upcoming events has a hiccup – we are open every Saturday 10am – 2pm for plant sales)

New Additions

Our Yellowhorns have arrived (aka, Chinese macadamia or Chinese flowering chestnut).  Neither a chestnut nor a macadamia, but beautiful showy edible small seed tree great for places that are dry and can accept a tree that matures to 12-20 feet tall.   Deciduous, leafy bush or small in habit,  bearing reddish-brown branches.  It grows well on rocky slopes on hillsides, and is drought tolerant.   It prefers acidic dry soil and does not do well in wet locations.

Also the Russian almonds (Prunus tenella) are back.  A small shrub, very showy with bitter almonds, though supposedly this stock has been bred to be less so.   We can only confirm the claims of edibility as this year our own plants will be fruiting for the first time.   We’ll let you know.   Soaking and roasted will neutralize the cyanic acid content.

The Buartnuts and Heartnuts have arrived… 2-3 feet tall and a couple years old.   These are walnuts that are blight resistant, have good oil content and are easier to shell than black walnuts.

One last Veteran Peach and Mission Almond and only a couple Apricots left.     Surprisingly once again the plum trees have been vanishing, despite having stock that was meant to cover a couple years of inventory… yikes.

Paw paws are doing great, showing their leaf buds.

Greening Up

Oh so late for everything but so exciting to see things green up.   Perhaps even our provincial Legislative Assembly will green up too.

Despite the greening of the season, we are getting really tired of so many people supporting a political party as if it was some religion.  It’s not.  A political party is at it’s core a collection of policies guided by principles to address different problems of civilization (local and global).  These policies make up the party platform.
Ann sure wishes everyone would discuss policies rather than political parties.  As individuals we can agree with some policies and disagree with other policies from the same party.  (See a great response to this at the end by KM)

What issues are important to you and what are the party platforms on those issues? Then we could all have an intelligent discussion on the pros and cons of different policies.   Ann finds this NDP vs Green vs Liberal thing very superficial and actually quite disturbing… it just leads to fighting and no rational debate on some really important topics.

And the fear thing… strategic voting is fear based, it is about voting against something rather than for something, and it is usually spawned by polls.  Those same polls that have failed to predict what occurred in Alberta, or the last BC election or even that fiasco across the border.  People are taking actions, called “strategic” using hugely invalid data to guide their choices.   We scratch our head.  Emotional rather than rational.

So for those in BC, do something different for a change… see which party has principles that align with yours… whose policies you agree with… and vote for them… or vote for the representative that works hard for your area.   To vote strategically (with poor info) is to be a follower – to vote for what you want is to be a leader.

So that just about stirs the pot… we end with a comment by KM who posted on Ann’s FB page… an intelligent and thoughtful response.

Do not look at policy, it is flimsy and follows the whim of the leader and changes to garner support and power. Most parties are quick to change their policy once elected to suit their needs and to follow the money of corporations. I have recently become a passionate Green supporter based on Principles. The Green Party principles are based on Ecological Wisdom, Sustainability, Non-violence, Social Justice, Participatory Democracy and Respect of Diversity. These are not just the principles of the BC Greens or the even the Federal Greens, these are the principles of every Green party in over 90 countries around the world. The Green party in Chile is fighting to gain a foothold to bring Participatory Democracy to their country. The Rwandan green party is striving to bring Non-violence to their country. The Austrian an Dutch Greens are striving for Sustainability. It is the Principles that set all policy for any party to create and follow. Their policy will never stray outside of those bounds. That is why they were created, that is what they are trying to promote. It is an honourable and just way to conduct your party in politics. The Green party in BC and Federally have demonstrated time and again, that they are trying to improve the very nature of politics. Whether it be Elizabeth May with her immediate transparency on all her spending or Andrew Weaver turning down two large corporate donations from big energy companies and then declaring there will be no donations either corporate or union.  I see the Greens as trying to make politics better, not popular policy. No other party is based on Principles, they will all just make popular policy to get the votes. Until we vote for a better system, we will keep going around on this policy merry go round. Respectfully, yours (KM)

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Cheers,
Gord and Ann

We have never taken a course in permaculture, in electronics or electricity, engineering, construction, cabinetry, waste water, horticulture, cheese making, etc… the list goes on.  One of the main beefs we have with the whole concept of “permaculture” is the assumption that the teaching and learning leads one to a place of competence.  It doesn’t.   In  reality the principles learned are just the start and gives folks coming out the other end the basic tools, ideas, and incentives to change their life and the world.  There is no doubt that completing a permaculture design class is a great first step and it can be life changing for many, but it is only the beginning of the learning…life long learning.

I (we) don’t classify ourselves as “permaculturalists”, nor specialists or experts.  We hold the view that any action we take has to increase the value of the 5 capitals (natural, social, human, manufactured, and financial).   We also apply the rationale that we as human animals are not that different than our ancestors 100,000 years ago, nor are we any more or less special than any other organism.    We also don’t see permaculture as a “new” way of living in the world, but as the way of living that all organisms  “must exist” whether by integrated conscious design or unconsciously as designed through evolution.

First Nations:  We recently attended a local function where Dr. Nancy Turner spoke of the First Nations in and around BC.  Her specialty is Ethnoecology, which is the study of multiple integrated disciplines and how they interconnect to support a community and culture.  This includes archaeology, botany, physics, anthropology, economics, psychology… you get the picture.  This was a beautiful presentation in that stories were used to explain the interconnected systems the First Nations employed to survive and flourish sustainably.

These systems were explained through stories such as of the clam beds, made and tended over generations, how the beds were tilled to enhance aeration, re-seeding was done, and engineering to retain and enhance beds.  First nations improved personal food yields and the ecological integrity of diverse ecosystems. The same was done with camas, rice root, soap berry, etc.  Select plants were interplanted with others to enhance production, like the soapberry, which is a nitrogen fixing Elaeagnus species related to goumi and autumn olive.  Fish guts and clam shells were transported over great distance to feed prime berry bushes.  The understanding that certain seaweeds were to be harvested when nettles were a certain height was only known because observations that these two grew at the same rate.  All this knowledge was passed down for generations through story telling.  Cultural evolution.   Ultimately what was so apparent, was that the First Nations had been practicing what we call now “permaculture” because it was the only way to sustainably exist in the natural world.  (As opposed to our unnatural dying unsustainable human created fossil fuel word).  Through the entire talk, the word “Permaculture” was never mentioned, but it was clear to us that first nations were practicing permaculture as we now define it.

Our past four blog posts were a demonstration, through story, of just some of the twelve  “permaculture” principles :

• A Little Edgy, Very Marginal – (Principle –  Use edges and value the marginal)
• Regulatory Feedback – (Principle – Apply self regulation and accept feedback)
• Observations & Connection – (Principle – Observe and interact )
• A Blast from the Past – (Principle – Creatively use and respond to change)

It struck us after Dr. Turner’s presentation, that survival of current and future generations depended on close observation, causing marginal mid level disturbance, self regulating harvest, learning from one’s actions, and always responding to change.  When First Nations harvested huckleberry, they observed how bears always left some on the ground, so they did too.  When streams dried up and showed distress or had to be repopulated with salmon, they knew how to transplant salmon eggs from another place.

It strikes me time and again that because we do not have to live directly connected to the natural ecosystem, that no amount of “permaculture” teaching and training is going actually teach one how to be one with the natural world…to re-integrate into our place in nature.  The only way to learn these skills (and ways of being), is to be fully immersed with the land and with a culture of similar people.  We are just starting to learn this ourselves.  Sadly, the information is easily lost within a single generation, and for the First Nations, residential schools is where that disconnection was created…what an enormous loss.  With Western Culture, that disconnect has been multiplied over generations spurred by technological advances for 100’s of year.  What a global mess we now have.

The style of learning within First Nations was critical in actually teaching this most important skill.   To learn, you had to watch and observe and not ask questions until you had fully thought about something.  Only after observing could you ask questions.   This style in and of itself taught people how to closely observe and pay attention to the subtleties of their environment, and to be in the moment… a tool/skill that we see as rare in our busy culture.

This brings us to the next “Permaculture” principle.  Integrate not separate.

Solar real estate on the Eco-Sense roof: Growing food, producing electricity, making hot water, and harvesting rain water. Nice View too!

What stories can we pull from our experience with modern day permaculture that can demonstrate this?  The first may be the story of the living roof which integrates multiple functions other than just beauty or habitat replacement, but also pre-filtration for rain water harvesting, reducing the heat island effect, sound insulating, slowing storm water flows thus reducing infrastructure to address storm flows, cooler temperatures resulting in increased efficiency of our solar panels, food growing opportunity away from voles and rabbits, and aided fire resistance.  Did we know all these integrated benefits before we started, NO, but we have observed them over the years.

Angela drawing beautiful creatures on our cob home during one of her visits

A cougar

a Great Blue Heron

A Dragonfly – at the oldest insect

A Tree Frog – a sensitive amphibian

Another story would be that of Angela Evans, who we spoke of in our last blog.  Angela was a planner with the municipality of Saanich.  She introduced us to the concept of toxic building materials, and the Living Building Challenge program.  Angela spent some time here at Eco-Sense leading the very first tours on our home while it was under construction and also conducting workshops on composting toilets here.  Sadly , Angela passed away a few years back… cancer.  We are so grateful for all that Angela shared with us especially her knowledge of toxic materials and chemicals.  On one of Angela’s visits 10 years ago, she also created beautiful images on our cob home.

Displaying our Living Building Challenge Award

That same blog post (A Blast from the Past ) lead to introductions with John Horgan (an NDP MLA), who is now the leader of the provincial NDP.  John read about our event called the “Celebrity Flush” 10 years ago and simply had to come and meet us.  After that, John went on to speak about us in the Legislature, and to advocate for us with regards to BC Hydro, and he even organized a couple tours here with other MLA’s (from other parties).  John’s a good guy and we really like him, but we do have very different political leanings.  Our values are much more Green leaning, but we sure do hope that John will be the next premier of BC…with a minority government and with the Greens holding the balance of power.

John Horgan (MLA and leader of the BC NDP), Gord, Ann, Liberal Minister Naomi Yamamoto (Building Code Renewal and Reform)

For us, the Green party represents policy based on science and facts and not on ideologies.  However this is not so popular these days in global and local politics as science and facts are in a direct conflict with our cultural ideology.  Especially around the climate and the economy while sticking band-aids on all the social suffering and inequality rather than getting to the core of the underlying problem.  Drastic changes are happening with regards to human civilization and ultimately facts matter regardless of what we want or what political party we align with.
Here’s a couple of links:  FACTS on CO2:     FACTS on Achieving Paris Agreement Targets to maintain a livable planet.   These are not political links; these are links to facts.

Permaculture is NOT new:  So it may sound like we are separating ourselves from “Permies” and thus not integrating them.  The take away point is that folks who learn permaculture need to not treat it like the holy grail, not treat it as an epiphany, but rather be humble that it is about moving back to ecological and social principals that first Nations have been practising for countless generations.  And with moving back to critical thinking and an integrated way of being, we think it is imperative to slow down, learn to deeply observe, then learn from what nature is teaching us, and realize that if we are lucky, perhaps the next generation or two will learn the tools grounded in natures reality to have a new culture and knowledge base that begins to emulate the amazing skills and values of the First Nations.  Ironically we’d argue the only person/culture that deserves and has earned the title of permaculturalist is the one that is accomplished (proven over time), and humble, and thus has no need for EGO, or for use of the term permaculture in the first place.  Permaculture needs to be a fully integrated concept in absolutely everything to the point that it is an intuitive way of being.

Taking Responsibility.

Permaculture in essence is the skills, values and ways of thinking required to take responsibility for your food, water, energy, health, waste, shelter and lifestyle.  Our society is an outsourced society, where we don’t take responsibility for those things – we hire out electricians, plumbers, doctors, farmers etc.  This does not mean we do not need these folks, but we shouldn’t immediately default to the assumption “I Can’t Do This”.  When it comes to homesteading it is not a question of “I Can’t” but instead “Oh Shit… I Have Too” or even sometimes, “I shouldn’t”.  Modern day homesteaders are generalists on a limited budget.

This means that we have to invest the energy to learn not just about plants and soils, but   basic electricity, water systems, heating systems, nutrition and food preservation, construction, ecology, psychology, and so on, (all those things that make up the study of ethnoecology).  If a homestead has solar power, one of the most basic skills for example is to learn to use a multi-meter.    Everyone on the homestead needs to have the some basic skills, to more or lesser degree to enable and trouble shoot basic problems…stuff breaks…we have to deal with it.

Learning as we go along, here is a screenshot of Gord’s Energy Analysis links

Learning to wire the solar dump for the eco-hut

One of Gord’s first manuals

Dealing with battery replacement

Learning water supply for fire protection

That 10% that nobody could figure out for the heating system… read many times

Screen shot of Gord’d plumbing resources

Example:  The day Gord was on the Gulf Islands and Ann was at home alone and friends were staying in the Eco-Hut, we had a water issue – water supply to the Eco-Hut shut down.  Ann’s response, isolate and diagnose problem, use the multi-meter to check power, find instruction booklet for the pressure switch, and fix it…in the dark with a headlamp.  Did Ann have anxiety… of course… did Ann think logically about where water comes from and what makes it go… absolutely.

Thanks to Peter Ronald for this photo from last week

Standard (outsourced) Systems vs A Permaculture Homestead

Water Systems – Rely on city water or a well pump OR take responsibility and build in resiliency and redundancy, use cistern/pond, collect rain water, and use water consciously.  Skills needed – conservation methods, learn about pumps, irrigation systems, flow rates, pressure switches, valves, etc.

Energy Systems – Rely on the grid OR take responsibility and build in resilience and redundancy, collect and store energy.  Skills needed – conservation methods, understanding of your energy budget, basic electrical knowledge (AC/DC), understanding of batteries and inverters and how to program them.

Food Systems – Buy food from the industrial food system OR Want to dabble in food seasonally, interested in wild meat or livestock, dairy, or take on food provisioning year round?  Skills needed – understanding of your personal time limits, effective cheap and healthy processing methods, meal planning with available food, nutrition, crop planning, annual foods, perennial foods, soil building, wild foods, animal husbandry, food safe skills, etc.

Seasonal lunch

Health – Choose to rely on the proffessional health care system (sickness treatment system) OR take responsibility for more of your day to day health needs.  Skills Needed – basic first aid, natural remedies, understanding of nutrition and the gut micro-biome, the importance mental health,  taking responsibility for maintaining your body and knowing your physical and mental limits.

Waste – Send it to the dump OR take responsibility for it and decrease the waste stream where possible and divert everything that can be a resource.  Skills Needed – reduce waste generation, Is relying on recycling sustainable, awareness of what is waste and what is a resource, basic knowledge of toxins and pathogens and their biological and chemical degradation pathways, learn resource recovery methods, and learn to simplify your life.

Tour group learning about grey water

Pressing the Caleb Pike Heritage Park Apples

Ann’s new ensuite. I love it! Thanks Gord!

Chickens LOVE salad

Lifestyle – Go with the flow of our culture OR take control of the direction of your life.  Skills needed – Honesty and time to create a life plan to know what your values and passions are and how to take the steps to create what you truly want and need (holistic life management).  What do you enjoy, what don’t you enjoy, recognize when your life is more in alignment with your values, skills and aptitudes … and know hard work is OK and not drudgery.

Trying to live a simpler and more resilient lifestyle,

Ann and Gord

Hi, we are working on a blog post but it’s not quite ready.  It will just have to wait until next week.  In the meantime, here’s a couple quick items:

Yes, we have a dog (Nina) who gives us the toothy grin when she’s happy or when she knows she’s done something wrong.  hehe

Perennial Edible Plants Sales on Saturday from 10am – 2pm. Come on out and walk the gardens, say HI to Dug the duck, Nina the dog, and Gord and Ann the crazy people.  Come to buy plants or just to talk about crazy stuff…no shortage of crazy topics out there.  Some weeks the nursery is super busy, some it’s very slow, but overall this has been by far our busiest spring season yet.  It seems that people are waking up to the benefits of local perennial food systems for fun, beauty and food security.   3295 Compton Road. Lots of new stuff to see and the leaves are FINALY coming out.

• We have sweet potato slips, Oca, Eggs, cover crop (soup peas) and lots of the regular hard to find perennial food plants.  See photos below for how we get sweet potato slips started.

Grey Water Workshop on April 27th:  FULL

Special public tour on May 28th: FULL

Introduction to Composting Toilets on July 22:  Still have spots.  Here’s the link:

Here’s a bunch of new photos this year.