permaculture

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <lflondon@mindspring.com>]

On Tue, 2 Jan 01 10:44:00 -0700, rick valley <bamboogrove@cmug.com>
wrote:

>Now I know we all blithely talk about all the possible useful things that can
>be done with the stuff growing in our designs...
>I'm currently planning out extensive swales/wet terraces/greywater marshes at
>my homestead; in some cases I won't be looking for food crops to fill them.
>Anyone out there actually using plants growing in such situations for
>non-food purposes? Any stories to share? Mistakes to avoid? Guild
>interactions?

What about cotton? You coud always harvest the bolls for use in
Japanese woodworking ink pots for marking lines or dipping bamboo
marking pens in. 
grow the bamboo to make the pens
the cotton for the inkpots
harvest some other site-grown wood to carve the ink pots out of

what about growing Port Orford Cedar and other fine softwoods
used in joinery (spruce, redwood, cedars or many varieties, fir).
Maybe you could grow bald cypress there.

there must be thousands of uses for bamboo, especially for making
kitchen implements and garden accessories, trellises, irrigation
conduits.

>Currently the (probably ravaged) wetland flora here is mainly sedges, water
>parsnip, mints, cattails, and canary reed grass. The least-common might be
>manna grass.
>A few of the target species I'll be adding are wapato (sagittaria) osier
>dogwood, basket and floral willows, elk clover (Aralia), Petasites and water
>iris (other than I. pseudacorus)

Field-grown comfrey would be worth gold in quantity for use in compost
making.

>An interesting point is that all of this is on slope, mild to steep, the
>water is from springs. We are at the cutting head of the Yaquinna, on its way

How about grapes (on the slopes), at the least, for vinegar.


lflondon@mindspring.com  london@ibiblio.org  ICQ#27930345 
save our land/soil/water/air/wildlife <|> Lawrence London 
www.ibiblio.org/ecolandtech  www.ibiblio.org/permaculture  
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