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  • From: "logank@mail.wind.co.jp" <logank@mail.wind.co.jp>
  • To: <permaculture@listserv.unc.edu>, <permaculture@envirolink.org>
  • Subject: Urban Permaculture (In Japan)
  • Date: Mon, 26 Jan 98 17:24:49 +0900

Hello,

This is our first post to this list, though we've been lurking for a while,
so first a little background on our situation: We are Ken and Lisa Logan,
and we are expatriates living in Japan. We've been here for a few years, and
dicovered permaculture about a year ago. As a recent post said, our chances
for learning permaculture in Japan are almost nil, though I was happy to hear
that Bill Mollison will be coming here soon. I doubt we can make it to Tokyo
to see him, however. :(

Nevertheless, we'd like to grow some of our own food, using and learning as
many permaculture techniques as we can. We've read several intro books, and
I am devouring the Designer's Manual at the moment. One problem I can't find
many answers to in the books is that of urban situations. I can find
references to it, but not a lot of concrete informations or examples.

You see, we rent a little 'house' on a piece of land almost the exact size of
the house, so we have nowhere to make a garden. We do have a nice
south-facing patio area, and were thinking of growing some plants in buckets,
planters, tires, or whatever we can find. We'll be leaving Japan in a year
or two (three??), so we don't want to invest in a lot of equipment, long-term
plants, etc. We were hoping that we could tap the imagination and experience
of the people on this list to help us.

Does anyone have any experience with this sort of situation?

We'd especially like to know about guilds, combinations of plants, and/or
suggested plants in general for our situation. We're thinking of a bunch of
herbs (herb spiral??), squash and/or melons, bell peppers, some beans,
tomatoes, etc. -- we'd like to have some success at this, so the easier to
grow, the better. :)

We'd really like to try some of the plants we see a lot in the permaculture
books like Jerusalem Artichokes but we don't know where to get these more
exotic (for Japan anyway) seeds, or even if they'll do alright here (if they
aren't local varieties). Any ideas?

The patio itself is fairly narrow but long east to west. It's a little over 1
meter wide and 4 to 5 meters long (4' x 15' or so), with a translucent
white-ish corrugated plastic 'roof' over it. We have a little space (about a
meter square -- could get a little more here & there) that isn't covered, on
the east side of the patio. We are going to need some kind of windbreak on
the west side -- that is where the strong winds come from, and there is a
'konnyaku' (a Japanese root vegetable) field there that gets sprayed several
times a year with pesticide. We *really* don't want that stuff on our
plants! If anyone wants, we can take a picture and e-mail it to them.

I apologize for this being a little long. We welcome any and all comments
and suggestions. Thanks a lot.

Sincerely,

Ken & Lisa Logan


--------------------------------------------------------------------------

The philosopher Diogenes was eating bread and lentils for supper.
He was seen by the philosopher Aristippus, who lived comfortably by
flattering the king.

Said Aristippus, "If you would learn to be subservient to the king you would
not have to live on lentils."

Said Diogenes, "Learn to live on lentils and you will not have to be
subservient to the king."

‹-The Song of the Bird by Anthony de Mello





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