if i look back, i am lost
NASA
Show & Tell
let's talk about Bridgerton tea, my ask is open
Color Me Curious
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KIROKAZE
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EXPECTATIONS
gracie abrams
romaâ
RMH
Noah Kahan
Cookie Run:Kingdom Official!
Cosmic Funnies
đ©” avery cochrane đ©”
Monterey Bay Aquarium
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@but-the-earth-refused
BTW, the belief that you have to leave where you are and go somewhere in order to connect with nature is part of the problem. You can literally connect with nature anywhere; yes, even in an urban environment. You have birds, bugs, plants, weather, seasons, etc. A lot of people need to stop thinking of nature as something out there and start recognizing that it's something that's already right here.
how dare you question the amazing method of farming that gives us so much food by simply killing the soil and leaving lands barren without maintaining the resources that make it work in the first place.
last year i got 1800 bushels of corn by killing the soil, as opposed to before when i only got 1200 by not killing the soil. surely i can simply keep killing more soil
wym there's only so much soil. that's an externality and therefore none of my concern
Generating three centimeters of top soil takes 1,000 years, and if current rates of degradation continue all of the world's top soil could b
well here's the thing, under normal circumstances without human intervention soil recovery can take a long long time. with human intervention, such as mulching, cover crops (that you then turn into mulch), seeding with beneficial fungi, etc, soil buildup can be massively boosted. we can be a positive force instead of a negative one. we just have to start doing that
We literally already pulled off a 10-year turnaround by getting a company to dump a lot of orange peels in an area.
Good point! here it is:
Princeton researchers explore how discarded orange peels revived a Costa Rican forest.
people always blast right past the "if we continue with current practices" and go straight to "this is inevitable"
Stop idolizing the grind and start idolizing HĂŒgelkultur
got another one
The Permaculture Spiral Garden - A Great Starting Point
There is probably no other structure as popular for illustrating Permaculture in practice as the Herb Spiral. Okay, I guess I could mention the lasagna sheetmulching method or also the cob oven that tends to be the first hands-on project at a typical Permie intro session. But when it comes to showing how landscape design, zones and sectors, stacking functions, and efficient use of space and water come together in one unique structure, the Spiral Garden is unbeatable.
Turning Theory into Practice
In typical Permaculture Designer Certificate courses, but even in brief intro weekends to Permaculture, there tends to be a lot of theoretical discussions. Since the numerous design principles can be applied to any climatic region, from the tropical to the subarctic, and on any scale from the humongous to the tiny, the practical aspects of the ideas can easily get lost. That's where a good hands-on application comes, where the participants get to move around rocks and dirt, while realizing how much it ties in to the concepts they've just discussed. This way the apparent "main purpose" of "building something to grow all your kitchen herbs on", becomes a neat side feature.
Adjust Your Landscape!
The first thing to realize that landscape is welcome to be modified and adjusted to bring out the best in it. Clearly, while it is important to work with what's there already, it doesn't hurt think about mounds and valleys. And before you bring out the excavators for your large-scale farm, it makes sense to start small⊠say on a circle of 2-5 meters (6-16 feet) diameter. In other words, the Spiral Garden is a hill with a spiral shaped surface, leading down to ground level, or further down into a water hole. It can be made out of rocks, bricks, concrete debris, or anything else you have lying around that can hold your soil.
Design According to Your Scale
Looking around for existing Herb Spirals it's easy to get confused. Some are so big you can actually climb on them (that is, you have to in order to reach what's growing on top). Others are so tiny that you may not even want to step on them. The question is: which size is the right one for you? Since this is something you will have to decide almost daily in Permaculture, it doesn't hurt starting out with this important question.
Organizing Your Spiral Garden
While there are seemingly endless types of Spiral Gardens, there are a few things they all have in common: They all start out with a region on the top, where water is bound to run off right away, leaving the soil relatively dry. This area is also the most exposed to the wind. Keep this in mind when choosing the plants that are going to live here. Ideally, the spiral should start sloping toward the East from here. Delicate plants that benefit greatly from the morning sun will appreciate this region. As the slope continues toward the South and West, it becomes more suitable for sun loving species. Finally, as the spiral reaches the ground level in the shady Northern part, it will be perfect for herbs that prefer less sun, more shade and more water, since the soil tends to be wetter here. (Note: This is for the Northern Hemisphere. In the Southern Hemisphere North and South are reversed.) To make full use of the runoff water, many people add a small pond at the base of the spiral, where additional aquatic plants, such as watercress, can be grown.
The given illustration offers a good number of herbs for a nicely diverse kitchen. Depending on what else you want in your Herb Spiral, you can add it in the most suitable region. Mint and lemon balm love the cooler, shady part with more water. Lemongrass is great in the sunny area, and tarragon and estragon prefer the dry top of the spiral. Of course, the idea is not limited to kitchen herbs. For maximalists, the same theory can work with a mountain you might want to terraform into a spiral farm. But right now I'd prefer to stay small scale.
Plenty of Benefits (That's Why It's Permaculture)
As explained above, the main purpose of the Spiral Garden is not only to increase your gardening area by making use of the vertical, but also to create diverse climatic conditions, which do make a difference on the smallest scale. But as Permaculture tends to be, there are many other benefits to it. The structure itself offers great habitat for numerous animals, such as frogs, salamanders, lizards, but also pollinating insects, and of course others that may not directly benefit us, but by feeding on others they all add to the stability of our ecosystem. The structure itself will suppress weeds and make use of material that you're not likely to use elsewhere. Finally, depending on the size and location, it will be an ideal place to grow all your kitchen herbs right where you can access them most easily.
Some Things to Keep in Mind
When building the structure, make sure it will contain the soil in a nice trough, slanting slightly inward. That way bits and pieces that fall off will roll towards the center, until contained by the main mound.
Make sure the slope is always nice and gradual, avoiding sudden drops where the water can rush down quickly, eroding the soil.
If you're going to walk on your spiral, include a separate walkway that won't compress good soil. Most importantly, it should be sturdy enough to provide stability and make access safe.
Don't forget that while the structure is important to keep the soil in place, it is the soil that you'll be growing plants in. So it should have a good depth of 20-50 cm (8-20 inches) throughout the entire spiral. This can be the trickiest part!
Apply your own observation to which plants do better in which parts of the spiral. Also, with time you will find many other plants growing in it that you didn't plant. Before removing them, consider how much they actually bother your herbs, and whether their benefits may not outweigh their drawbacks.
Go Out and Build Your Own!
I hope this brief overview got you inspired to go out and try building an Herb Spiral yourself! I would love to hear your experiences with it!
Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4
Two Illustrations I made for Solarpunk Italia website
https://solarpunk.it/
Redbubble | DeviantartÂ
The Exhale Chandelier harnesses the power of photosynthesis to remove CO2 from the air and produce oxygen.
This is hanging in the middle of my imaginary restaurant.
Thatâs like Art Nouveau ecopunk right there.
SOLARPUNK
sick of environmental and climate-friendly movements/fads throwing disabled and chronically ill people under the bus and even outright blaming us for the state of our world. âusing albuterol inhalants is poisoning the atmosphereâ âpeople who use non-reusable dishes and plasticware are responsible for landfillsâ âdonât use plastic straws or straws in generalâ âwalk places or ride a bike or use the bus instead of driving everywhereâ âdonât use same-day delivery from amazonâ how about âdonât dump tons of oil in the ocean or burn a hole in the ozone or pollute the air with fossil fuels to make a quick buckâ? how about âcelebrities stop using private jets to fly to your vacation home every weekend so you donât have to see the poors in commercialâ?
like yeah, okay if you can walk or ride a bike or elect to not use straws, by all means, do that. but stop acting like people who DO need to use straws, or drive everywhere, or use inhalers, or eat with disposable dishes etc are the leading cause of global warming because weâre not. corporations and people with way too much money are. stop judging us for existing our disabled, ill lives because we donât have the same options you do. itâs exhausting.
When I say I am not waiting for revolution, I mean Im planting things secretly at bus stops, and shoveling snow out of the way of crosswalks. I mean it in a way where neighbors are stocking community fridges and harvesting in community gardens. Little libraries and strangers giving you shoes bc they couldnt return them. I mean ppl swapping stuff or loaning it out to neighbors theyve just met. I mean it in a way where a friend who can sew asks me to mend something and a week late brings me cookies as thanks. I mean it in the way a friend makes a playlist for you and it truly brighten your day. These tiny acts of defiance against cruelty and profit are their own revolutions. And they catch like kindling, small going at first you might not even know that flames there. Than suddenly all at once catching, burning in the darkness of the night.
Image description: photo of a brown sign with white text that reads: "You can't save everything cute, eat everything that tastes good, and kill everything you're afraid of and expect a working ecosystem to come out of it." -- Flip Nicklin, wildlife photographer
Image source: photograph by op
Oregon's Fender's Blue butterfly is soon to be only the second-ever insect downlisted from Endangered to Threatened on the ESA.
âIn the Willamette Valley of Oregon, the long study of a butterfly once thought extinct has led to a chain reaction of conservation in a long-cultivated region.
The conservation work, along with helping other species, has been so successful that the Fenderâs blue butterfly is slated to be downlisted from Endangered to Threatened on the Endangered Species Listâonly the second time an insect has made such a recovery.
To live out its nectar-drinking existence in the upland prairie ecosystem in northwest Oregon, Fenderâs blue relies on the help of other species, including humans, but also ants, and a particular species of lupine.
After Fenderâs blue was rediscovered in the 1980s, 50 years after being declared extinct, scientists realized that the net had to be cast wide to ensure its continued survival; work which is now restoring these upland ecosystems to their pre-colonial state, welcoming indigenous knowledge back onto the land, and spreading the Kincaid lupine around the Willamette Valley.â
âŠ
âNow the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde are being welcomed back onto these prairie landscapes to apply their burning of ages past, after the FWS discovered that actively managing the grasslands by removing invasive species and keeping the grass short allowed the lupines to flourish.
By restoring the lupines with sweat and fire, the butterflies have returned. There are now more than 10,000 found on the buttes of the Willamette Valley.â
This is HUGE. The Willamette Valley Level III Ecoregion is easily the most ecologically damaged ecoregion in Oregon. It used to be primarily oak savannas consisting of a wide variety of native grasses, wildflowers, and other low-growing plants, with scattered patches of Garry oak (Quercus garryana). The Willamette Valley, which runs from the Vancouver, WA area down to a little south of Eugene, OR, once you start running into the foothills of the Klamath Mountains. And itâs bounded by mountains on both the west side (Coast Range) and the east (West Cascades).
Less than one tenth of one percent of the original oak savanna remains there, because when all the settlers showed up to colonize Oregon Territory, the Willamette Valley was super popular because the soil is so incredibly fertile there thanks to all the topsoil, silt, and other material dropped there during the Missoula Floods ~13,000 years ago. And since it was primarily grassland there were fewer trees to chop down before the land got ripped up into farmland with plows, livestock, etc. and then later became the site of I-5 and the majority of the population centers in Oregon.
So the Willamette Valley has a LOT of species of endangered/threatened plants that reliant on the last fragments of oak savanna, some of which occur nowhere else. And of course their insect partners, some of which specialize in only one or a few plants, are also in trouble. The fact that they could get the populations of both the Fenderâs blue AND the Kincaid lupineâboth species only found in the Willamette Valley ecoregionâto a healthier point is an incredible piece of recovery. It doesnât equal the restoration of entire ecosystems, but itâs an excellent proof-of-concept that shows that species restoration can be done, and that contributes to overall habitat restoration efforts.
I really do think an important component of activism is to make sure your motivation is based on a desire to help/improve things for the people being harmed by a system, and not hatred for the ones doing the harm. both for mental health reasons, and because either way you're training your neural pathways and it's gonna turn out a lot better for literally everyone if the question on everyone's mind after achieving a goal is "how/which people can we help next, what's the next step for improving things" and not "who do we need to attack next."
I'm not saying don't be angry, there are a lot of good reasons to be angry right now and it makes for an excellent kick in the pants, just don't define yourself by it or it's gonna poison you and potentially do collateral damage.
I went to Norway to see an EV paradise, but I found so much more
We often hear about how Norway is an electric car utopia, an example of a country that went all in...
The Wildlife Benefits of Acorns and Oaks
We all know that from tiny acorns mighty oak trees grow, but we should add that from tiny acorns also grow deer, gray squirrels, red squirrels, chipmunks, wild turkeys, crows, flying squirrels, rabbits, opossums, blue jays, quail,  raccoons, wood ducksâmore than 100 U.S. vertebrate species eat acorns. In autumn and winter, the acorn is the cheeseburger of the forest ecosystemâfairly easy to find and nicely packaged. They are one of the most valuable food resources available for wildlifeâŠ
Read more:Â
https://blog.nwf.org/2013/10/the-wildlife-benefits-of-acorns-and-oaks
image via:Â Pollinator Friendly Yards
Unironically, vegans need to be advocating for more and better sheep, llama, and alpaca farms. Wool is one of the best fabrics we have in terms of versatility, longevity and most importantly, insulation. Even wet, it retains 80% of it's insulation potential.
AND IT DOESN'T SHED MICROPLASTICS
Like, there's literally nothing you can do to a sheep that's as morally reprehensible as dumping plastic down the gullet of literally every other living thing. You wanna talk about animal welfare? Talk about reducing the amount of microplastics produced by nylon, polyester, and spandex.
Free Pattern Resources
This pattern library is a non-exhaustive catalog of Zero Waste Patterns you can download, make and learn from.
Low on inspo? Desperately in need of something new? Take a look at our free sewing patterns! Thatâs right, Mood made sewing patterns, totall
100+ Free Tote Bag Patterns Rounded Up in one place. All patterns and projects are free with step by step instructions. Includes minis, over
I'm trying to gather free sewing patern resources. These are the ones i have so far please feel free to add your own. hoping to turn this into a masterpost sometime soon.
