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  • From: Georg Parlow <g.parlow@gmx.at>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] Is anyone still reading this list?
  • Date: Sun, 15 Aug 2021 21:48:19 -0500

I am still keeping up with this list.

And I am aboout to break -for me personally- new ground permaculturally.

I arrived in Peru a few days ago, with the intention to move into a
particular area in the cloudforest andean foothills on the East side of the
Andes. Several things are attractive as well as challenging there:

a) the climate - it is truly tropical with -due to elevation mas o menos 800m
above sea level- relatively cool nights and frequent temperature swings.

b) the setting - there is secondary growth forest for sale, with plenty of
slopes and water and high dynamic fertility. It is as far in the sticks as
you can get in Peru - hardware stores or nurseries are VERY few and nothing
in between, many of the plots do not even have access roads - it is basically
bush. And I am well aware of the PC priciple "stay out of the bush - it is
already in good order". At the same time this is exactly part of my
motivation to go there, because

c) I know of at least 3 different groups of people who either already have or
want to buy lands there (the one group that already has has 280ha) - AND as
far as I have been gathering from afar even though they cherish the priciples
of PC, they seem to have ideas about agriculture and food, that is not truly
forest compatible. This brings me to

d) I want first for myself -as I want to live a life really close to nature-
and a few similarly crazy friends to develop a style of village, agriculture
und subsistence that is as truly forest compatible as the life of small
indigenous tribes in the cloudforest has been for millenia. And second I want
to nudge as well as practically support those mentioned communities to do
likewise - e.g. to adjust their lifestyle to the landscape rather than
adjusting the landscape to their (alien) lifestyle.

e) what I can forsee by now, is that apart from a forest plot as big as
possible (I would not mind it to be several square kilometers, as everything
apart from the corner I intend to carve out a forest compatible life in will
be a provate rexerve anyways), and the plots of the other communities, it
will be a transitional necessity to buy one of the existing and more or less
degraded farms, that do exist alongside the few roads that lead through the
bush. On this farm we (all of the groups intending to start a really new life
as in "new civilization" there) can grow our food until 1) the food trees,
shrubs, vines and other perennials that will be planted interspersed the
existing forest in close proximity of the village(s) are sufficiently matured
to provide -together with a few square meters of annual gardens right next to
the huts- all the needed sustenance, and 2) we are adjusted in our food and
lifestyle habits to this. Also we can have the nursery that is going to
produce all these food trees, shrubs, vines and other perennials as well as a
shared workshop, maybe guest rooms etc.

All and any ideas, hints, ressources etc. welcome!

A REQUEST: I used to posess a spanish-english, english-spanish field guide
for all things permaculturally and botanical, I believe it was by a man named
Duke. Can anyone point me to the website I can order it from? I had it for
years and never used it, and just months before this lifechanging project
arose I gave it away.

---

> I hope all of you have survived the pandemic and will continue to be
> healthy as it slowly winds down.

Lawrence, I honor you for your optimism. I would be surprised if it will EVER
go away, just like the terrorists are still with us on every flight since
9/11, I am afraid the authorities in power are too fond of the way fearful
people can be governed, to let this thing recede. And I hope I am wrong!

Hugs!
Georg





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