Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

permaculture - Re: permaculture digest: June 17, 2000

permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: permaculture

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: rick valley <bamboogrove@cmug.com>
  • To: "permaculture" <permaculture@franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: permaculture digest: June 17, 2000
  • Date: Sun, 18 Jun 00 13:55:56 -0700


>How many people on this list actually use keyhole beds? And how do you like
>them? Would you design them in again next time? Any advice appreciated.
I love them for small gardens; in fact, I just this AM planted my first
garden at my new estancia, a sheet-mulched keyhole thing. As LL explains, the
measurement for layout is your reach; if you're walking on the beds, you
built 'em too big. When I'm working fast I just put my arm out straight while
holding my hay fork and stick it in the bed- go over to the other side and
grab it, and I'm standing in the path.
I save water with the mulch and time of day for watering. If water was a
limiting factor for me, I'd plan the plantings around ollas or bamboo tubes
(ADVERTISEMENT)- which could have drip emitters stuck in 'em. But for these
small gardens, hand watering is usually pretty easy.
Sometimes I do have spots I can't reach- I plop a stepping stone in the right
spot in such case.

Herb Spirals: I agree with Toby- a usually very poorly executed idea! Nasty,
weedy heaps studded with obstacles. Never seen one big enough to have the
touted microclimates, or even the paths. But Kevin Burkhart built (carved?) a
nice negative spiral into his glacial till bank in N. Seattle. Very nice! I
tried to sell some folks on Galliano Is. on a big negative spiral in their
drained bog- I pictured the duck herd waddling down to the bottom every day
for their bath... In their soils the banks would prob. have to be shored up
w/live willow or osier dogwood stakes. I *could* build a fine herb spiral,
but I'd want a couple truckloads of earth, sand, three quarter-minus rock,
compost or peat, and some fine building stone. And ten times as many plants
as ever get used. And as long as we're raising a Shiva-esque ziggurat, I'd
plumb a water line in to the top, and put clay under the path, so you just
turn it on, it shoots up, runs down the spiral and waters it all... Brings to
mind the old joke about the Martha Washington Monument.

> referring to snails:
>>they are illegal in Oregon...
Well- any nursery stock coming here from CA or WA has to be certified
snail-free; (isn't always' in spite of that rule) And if you started a snail
ranch, the man would come and take them away (call animal rights!)

>Never have more than one piece
>of equipment working at once! It was too hard to keep track of what
>everyone was doing, and a bulldozer can do lots of damage in just a couple
>minutes or so. While the Cat was working under a big oak by the house, I
>used a long-handled pitch fork to lift some low-growing branches out of the
>way each time it drove under. I even verbally emphasized being really
>careful around the trees. Then when I went off doing something else, the
>driver smacked the machine's tracks into the trunk, tearing off a big chunk
>of bark.
Cat-scratch fever! That wide yellow "Beware! Nuclear Waste Dump!" tape is
real good for keeping them away. And bamboo poles (ADVERTISEMENT) tied near
the tops in pairs can lift branches temporarily real nicely! 10 ft. is too
close to a tree for a Cat. Hang streamers off the branches- whatever! I don't
want a machine under the drip line of any tree I like. You can write it in
the contract- every time they hit a tree it costs them "X" But it's sobering
to try and run the machine yourself... Oops! Did I do that???

>The Cat operator was really good, but not at all familiar with this kind of
>work....The problem was that he just couldn't
>visualize what it was that I wanted. That's how the best operators work:
>they get a picture of the finished product in their head and dig away
>everything else. He just couldn't read my mind, and I just couldn't draw
>him a clear enough picture.

Try modeling the project in sand; 3-D conceptual skills are by no means
linked with verbal abilities.
Pegging the contours out ahead of time, drawing, surveying, are all useful
but take longer.

-Rick


Rick Valley Northern Groves
PO Box 1236, Philomath, OR 97370
Mobile-(541)602-1315, hm.& msg. (541)929-7152 Bamboo catalog $3 or at
<http://www.teleport.com/~dbrooks/bamboo.html>
"Useful Bamboos and other plants‹ Permaculture education‹ Ecological design &
consultation centering on water,landform and horticultural systems"






Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page