Pittsburgh Permaculture

I had the chance to attend the PASA conference last week. The schedule was pretty diverse and there were a lot of workshops on topics related to permaculture and backyard farming on property sized less than one acre. It was pretty cool to include small scale and urban ag at a farming conference. It was a great forum to share and learn about small scale agriculture projects happening in almost every kind of community. There are so many levels at which growing food is important, including small-scale. The cross pollination between ‘real’ farmers and folks who work with farmers or food in a professional way, but probably won’t ever hold title to 100 acres was really exciting.

One particular workshop stood out as a fabulous resource. It was conducted by Dr. Tonia Slawecki and Dr. Gene Basan who co-founded Neo-Terra, an organization through which they carry out their ‘Experiments in Healthy Living’. They presented the results of 13 years worth of work in backyard farming on their suburban yard of less than 1 acre. There are so many ways to garden and foster a micro-ecosystem that it can be overwhelming to identify a strategy, but that is what makes everyone’s results so interesting to share.

The owners of Neo – Terra have taken three very powerful schools of thought and married them into one beautiful and productive backyard, where 90% of their veggies for the entire year are grown. The first inspiration comes from John Jeavons’ bio-intensive mini farming method. Jeavons’ classic book, ‘How to grow more vegetables:…than you ever thought possible on less land than you can imagine’ has inspired a couple of generations of organic gardeners.

Eliot Coleman is famous for ‘farming the backside of the calendar’, growing cold hardy plants, harvesting, eating and selling vegetables from fall through spring. He has perfected a system of overwintering greens with hoop houses and row covers to allow for winter harvest, all on the Maine coast. Fascinating!

The third school of thought is that of Bill Mollison and the principles of permaculture.

These are three of my heroes, and to see the vision they have brought forth over time was hugely inspirational. In the spirit of sharing the experience, they have made available the presentation on their website. It includes loads of ideas for everything from design to cover cropping, favorite tools and forms for record keeping. If you are looking for ideas of your own or just want to see an amazing example of what is possible, check out the links for yourself.

Click here for Part 1

Click here for Part 2

-Heather