permaculture

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <venaurafarm@bellsouth.net>]

Reposted from another list

1. Rhisiart Gwilym Says:

Gene, I just saw your item on 'Crazy Ideas For Crazy Garden
Farmers'. I was trying to post this comment on that page, but the
server won't let me, so I'm putting it here. Hope it's useful anyway:

In the1960s I was a member of the Henry Doubleday Research
Association, which originated in Britain, but had members by then
in many countries. The legendary Lawrence Hills's baby, it was a
charitable association of smallholders and backyard gardeners
which gave away expert knowledge and interesting,
practically-proven new ideas to do with food husbandry of all kinds.

One of our members at that time had a fascinating practise in his
garden in Cymru Dwyrain (East Wales), which he called 'Sward
Gardening'.

He would mow down close the grass of his paddocks, then hand
scatter White Clover seed, then rake over the clippings to hide
the small seeds a little.

After the clover was established as a substantial part of the
sward, he would then mow again, very short, and plant seedlings
directly into the sward, by dibbing conical holes in it, filling
these with various rich soils which he made to order, mounded up
in the hole till it stood a little proud of the sward surface,
then placing the seedling in the middle.

He reckoned that as he mowed back the clover foliage, there was a
corresponding die-back of its root system, which released
significant amounts of the nitrate made by its symbiotic
soil-bacteria and accumulated by them in their root-nodules; that
process which is famously part of the life of legumes. This
release was part of the programme of natural fertilisation which
he promoted in his method of food-growing.

As well as compost for his supply of high fertility planting soil,
he had several other promising innovations. For example, he would
lay down many opaque sheet materials in odd corners, for eathworms
to surface beneath to do their casts. These sheets were turned
over from time to time, and casts collected, to make a sort of
dilute worm-cast soup, which proved to be an extraordinarily
potent plant food, even when watered on in extreme dilutions: a
little went a long way, and fed many plants.

He used two main tools for his management. Since his was a strict
no-till method, there were no earth-disturbing tools. Instead he
developed a range of long-handled, counter-weighted clippers,
which allowed him to clip sward-plants accurately and swiftly from
a comfortable standing position.

Subsequently, I made a copy pair of these clippers myself, and
they are indeed comfortable, swift and very accurate in clipping
back unwanted volunteer plants, even those growing closely around
the food plants. Because of the counterweights, which keeps the
whole tool balanced, there's no strain on the wrists from
continually lifting the blades, and no need for any bending;
everything is done from a comfortable standing posture. With care,
you can avoid the food plants surely, whilst giving everything
else a short haircut. All clippings are left where they lie, and
are pulled down and digested into the soil rapidly by the high
population of earthworms, etc. This simple hand tool can cut a
large amount of sward in a comfortably short time, with minimum
effort.

The other tool developed by my colleague was even faster and
easier in its clipping prowess: a very narrow hand-pushed
lawnmower, just six inches wide in its cut, which he made himself.
With this he could run down and across the rows of food plants,
cutting back the great majority of the sward plants very rapidly,
and with minimum effort. Then the clippers would follow to finish
the close tidying.

In the height of Summer, even wet ones, he reckoned clips were
only needed every ten days to two weeks. No other husbandry work
much was needed to keep the sward down low and the food plants
thriving; no weeding, no hoeing, no digging, forking, raking,
etc., and much less watering (the sward and its cuttings held soil
moisture very well; there was, of course, never any bare earth).

I still do a version of this method myself, all these years later,
though now combined with copious mulch applications, after the
methods of Ruth Stout, Emilia Hazelip, et al. I still have my
home-made, counter-balanced clippers, and still use them regularly
after all this time. Even before the release of the new perennial
grain varieties, I quit tillage of any kind long ago. Far less
work. I'd never go back.

July 7th, 2010 at 5:08 pm
<http://organictobe.org/2010/07/07/gene-logsdon-pancakes-from-perennial-wheatgrass-grain/#comment-7527>