You can watch the episode by clicking the picture below, or listen to the audio version here.

The post Being the Change with Geoff Ebbs appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

Thank you and Merry Christmas to everyone who’s responded so positively to the writings and films I’ve been posting on Our Permaculture Life – on this Blog, on Youtube and Facebook,

After decades of ‘just doing it’, I was encouraged a year ago to start writing about our permaculture way of life and have received such amazing feedback both in person and online. It is so uplifting to know so many people are interested in living a simple &natural way of life.

I so enjoy receiving the comments you write, and participating in discussions about the various topics. I’d love your suggestions too (please fill in the v.quick survey below).

The ripple effect of our actions, our words, our thoughts – our work and the way we choose to live – is profound. It’s so important to be thinking about change – exploring the possibilities and taking positive, practical steps.

16 POPULAR POSTS FROM ‘OUR PERMACULTURE LIFE’

1. My Permaculture Garden – a 30 minute tour of my award-winning garden, plus list of species.
2. Morag’s Simple and Successful No Dig Garden Method – a step by step guide (film coming soon)
3. How to Make Comfrey Tea – a super easy natural homemade fertiliser
4. Worm Towers – a quick and easy way to turn food waste into garden fertiliser – without digging or turning. and Worm Tower Film Clip – a superbly simple way to put your foodsraps back in the soil
5. 7 Ways to Use All of Your Pumpkin Plant – simple abundance
6. City as Farm: City Dwellers Love to Grow Food – weaving food growing into the cities
7. Ingeniously Simple Idea to Harvest Compost Worms By 8 Year Old Boy – innovative thinking from my young home educated son.
8. Temporary permaculture for renters – 11 ideas for growing abundant food without owning land
9. Live simply: 14 Ways to Save Money and Avoid Debt – practical and common-sense advice
10. Save over $23,000 a Year and De-stress with a Few Simple Living Strategies
11. Five Easy Steps to Make Cheap Beeswax Wraps & Reduce Cling Wrap Use – make your own beeswax cloths in minutes for less than a dollar.
12. Five Simple Ways to Improve Your Soil – having great soil is the basis of healthy plants and food.
13. Did you know our clothes are poisoning us? More Reasons to Choose Simple Natural Fashion for Earth Care and People Care – it’s good to know the backstory to where many of our ‘things’ come from
14. 27,000 Trees A Day to Wipe Bottoms – What’s Your Wipe of Choice? – taking a closer look at a  very common household consumable
15. Why I Let My Young Children Leave School To Learn At Home… an introduction to the way I home educate my children
16. 9 Ways to Simply Use Chia: an easy ‘superfood’ to grow at home – great ways to grow and use chia, and some yummy recipes too.

PLEASE SEND YOUR SUGGESTIONS AND FEEDBACK

I’d love to get your feedback and suggestions about the topics you enjoy most and those you’d like me to write and film more about. Either leave a comment at the bottom of this post or click on this survey monkey link – it should take less than a minute to complete.

The post 16 Best Posts on Our Permaculture Life : Practical Simplicity for Everyday Life appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

27,000 trees a day to wipe bottoms.

Worldwide, around 270,000 trees are either flushed or dumped in landfills every day. About 10 percent of this is toilet paper.  Also the production of each toilet paper roll uses about 140 litres of water.

Only 5% recycled toilet paper used.

Most toilet paper is made from virgin paper. In Australia, only 5% of our toilet paper comes from recycled paper. 

• 13 trees
• 2.5 barrels of oil (average car would use this in 2-3 months)
• 4100 kilowatts of electricity (average household use per year)
• four cubic metres of landfill
• 31,380 litres of water  (roughly a household’s annual water use)

That’s significant.

But if you are choosing recycled loo paper, be sure to pick one that doesn’t use chlorine bleach. Before being pulped and processed, recycled paper is de-inked. Chlorine can be used for this. Chlorine-based chemicals however can react with paper fibres and create toxic compounds such as dioxin and organochlorines.

What toilet paper should I use then?

More and more sources of eco-loo paper are becoming available. New small ethical subscriber-based companies are starting up supplying homes with bulk orders of toilet paper made from non-chlorine bleached recycled paper or bamboo and sugarcane paper (the softer option for sensitive bottoms). Bamboo grows so much faster than trees!

There’s also people exploring fibre crops, such as hemp, and abundant agricultural and industrial byproducts ranging from wheat straw to garment scraps, sunflower stalks, and rags – all logical sources of tree-free pulp. 

How many trees are there in the world?

Here’s some of the sites I visited while writing this tonight.

• http://www.nature.com/news/global-count-reaches-3-trillion-trees-1.18287
• http://www.1millionwomen.com.au/blog/just-how-sustainable-is-your-toilet-paper/
• http://planetark.org/
• http://www.worldwatch.org/node/6403
• https://au.whogivesacrap.org
• https://pureplanet.com.au/

The post 27,000 Trees A Day to Wipe Bottoms – What’s Your Wipe of Choice? appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

1. Feed soil life.
2. Protect soil life and structure.

As you know healthy soil = healthy plants = nourishing food = good health.  Plants in sterile soil perform poorly. Unhealthy plants are more prone to pest and disease problems, just as unhealthy food leaves us more prone to disease and malnourishment.

So what are superb soils? They feel crumbly and moist. They smell earthy. Their structure is open allowing movement of air, water and nutrients to plant roots. They are full of diverse and abundant life.

You may have read the previous soil post about soils in June: 5 Simple Ways to Improve Your Soil and Grow Better Food http://our-permaculture-life.blogspot.com.au/2016/06/5-simple-ways-to-improve-your-soil-and.html. In that post I recommended to:

1. Open the Soil
2. Feed the Soil
3. Add Organic Matter to the Soil
4. Mulch the Soil
5. Water Deeply

This is exactly what we need to be doing. I wanted to add some extra information here about why.

Did you know most plants have root extenders …..?!

Plants in real soil – superb alive soils – are supported by the web of life in the soil, in particular, fungus. Did you know that 90% of plants rely on fungus to access most of the nutrients and moisture they need – the fungal filaments are like root extensions. They go finer, further and deeper than roots could ever go.  So plants and fungus live in symbiosis – a mutually supportive relationship – and plants in this relationship are stronger and more resilient.

Why gardening in the ground is so important…

This plant-fungus relationship is why I recommend, wherever possible, to grow food in the ground and work to improve the aliveness of soils. (Understandably this not as easily achieved in balcony gardens and areas of soil contamination). The importance of connecting with soil life also explains why raised garden beds that are disconnected from actual soil can limit the vitality of your garden soils and plants.

How to create soil aliveness?

The base of the soil food web is organic matter.  More organic matter = more soil life. The two main things that support beneficial bacterial and fungal growth in the soil are: organic matter and protection from the elements, this also supports the flourishing of the entire soil food web.

What damages good soil?

• tillage damages the fungi – it severs the fungal threads
• fungicides and pesticides kill the good fungus, bacterias and bugs
• lack of organic matter – no food for soil life
• no soil protection – over-exposure to sun, rain and wind kills soil life

5 Simple Strategies to Feed and Protect Soils

Here are some natural and simple ways to feed soil life, protect soil structure and tend the soil:

1. Activate your soil with compost. 
I have a range of compost systems on the go, but I really love the simplicity and portability of the movable compost bins. I take them to an area that need a real boost, compost there for a while, attracting a zone of soil aliveness, then moving the bin on to another spot, but leaving the compost there to spread out, mulch over and make a new garden. There are also a number of herbs you can add into a compost to activate it. Read about these here: http://our-permaculture-life.blogspot.com.au/2016/01/improve-your-soil-with-herbs.html

Movable compost bin and worm tower – creating soil life hot spots.

2. Add compost worms to your garden ecosystem.
One way to do this is by installing simple worm towers throughout your garden, taking the benefits of worms and worm castings directly into your garden soil. It creates nutrient rich zones, and zones of soil aliveness. Visit my previous post about worm towers:
http://our-permaculture-life.blogspot.com.au/2016/01/a-quick-and-super-easy-way-to-turn-food.html and another which links to  the 7 minute film showing you how to do it.
http://our-permaculture-life.blogspot.com.au/2016/07/film-5-how-to-make-worm-tower.html

3. Add organic matter, compost and leafy greens to garden beds – in a no-till way.
Making no-dig gardens feeds and protects soils and creates a great environment for your soil life to thrive. This helps so much to support a thriving vegetable garden. By using the no-dig garden method rather than digging it into the soil protects the soil structure. Visit my previous post to see how to make a no-dig garden:
http://our-permaculture-life.blogspot.com.au/2016/01/morags-simple-successful-no-dig-garden.html

4. Plant deep rooted plants
I plant comfrey around the edge of the garden and beside the compost. The thick penetrating roots accumulate nutrients from deep in the soil and bring them to the surface. You can then use comfrey leaves as an excellent compost activator, to make a potent homemade comfrey fertiliser (http://our-permaculture-life.blogspot.com.au/2016/07/film-3-how-to-make-comfrey-tea-with.html), to add organic matter and nutrients into the soil layer while making a no-dig garden, or just to chop and drop. Also fruit trees with comfrey nearby seem to do better.

Comfrey

5. Regularly chop and drop organic matter.
I am often wandering around the garden, chopping back surplus growth and tossing it around trees and garden beds to feed and protect soil life. It’s amazing how quickly it breaks down and gets taken into the soil. Because having enough organic matter is so vital, I actually grow plants especially for this purpose such as the comfrey, Queensland arrowroot, lemongrass and pigeon pea – but many other plants can be used too, such as the abundant mulberry or pumpkin leaves.

Old pumpkin vines as chop and drop mulch.

In and around the veggie garden I mostly use mulch – a seedfree grass hay that is easy to work with around the little plants.

Thick layers of mulch get drawn rapidly into our soils.

I also recommend using cover crops (living mulch) to cover bare soils, open soils, add organic matter and renew areas.

DEFINITIONS: 

Bacteria – single celled organisms that are the most abundant microbes in the soil. 

Fungal filaments – the fine white threads called mycelium you can see in healthy soil. We need this mycorrhizal fungi (symbiotic relationship between the plant and fungus) – 90% of plants rely on it. It increases plant strength, increases water uptake, absorbs minerals & nutrients and in addition stores 1/3 of soil carbon.

(Interestingly, mycorrhizal fungi does not form relationships with the Cruciferae family (eg mustard, broccoli), Chenopodiaceae (eg spinach, beets) and Proteaceae (banksia, macadamia). Fungal numbers drop in the soil with these plants, same as when the soil is left bare and exposed.)

Protozoa – single cell organisms that eat bacterias and release nitrogen to plants. 

Nematodes – microscopic wormlike creatures, that are the most numerous multi-celled things on Earth and an essential part of healthy soil ecosystems. They are found in every conceivable habitat from the deepest ocean to the highest mountain. They feed on bacteria, fungi, algae, small invertebrates and other nematodes. Gardeners immediately think of root knot nematodes, and cringe in fear when they hear their name mentioned. Having root knot nematodes are an indicator that your soil ecology is out of balance – adding more organic matter, compost and moisture can usually help regain the balance, as well as planting a crop of brassicas that are more resistant to the root knot nematodes – particularly the mustard varieties.

The post The 2 Best Things You Can Do To Simply Create Superb Soils for Superbly Healthy Food appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

I hooked up by phone with a remarkable collective of women. Together we decided on the winning submission and I’m excited to be going to the Award’s ceremony on November 30 where the winner will be announced. All the finalists will also be part of a TED talk in Sydney before the ceremony.

We had 3 finalists to chose from and there was a rigourous debate across the states about who was most deserving of the award this year. I am happy with our decision and can’t wait to share it.

The post Being a Banksia Awards Judge appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

Living simply can help make a difference. If global warming, pollution, silting are some of the key things to blame, we need to ..

• reduce energy use
• reduce consumption
• reduce waste – compost, cut back on plastics, recycle
• eat local sustainably produced food
• educate as many as possible about the issue and ways to live more simply

Global coral bleaching events are an alarming new phenomenon caused by ocean warming (more than 90% of climate change heat is absorbed by the ocean). Corals cannot withstand prolonged peaks in temperature.

Diver checking the bleached coral at Heron Island on the Great Barrier Reef  – image from XL Catlin Seaview Survey.

Over one quarter of the Great Barrier Reef has been severely damaged and overall 93% of the reef has been impacted by coral bleaching this year. This is disastrous for the diversity of life which depends on the reef.

Coral bleaching at Lizard Island, Great Barrier Reef: Image: May 2016 from XL Catlin Seaview Survey.

The Great Barrier Reef is Earth’s most extensive coral reef – a World Heritage Site that we have committed to protecting. Healthy coral reefs are the most ecologically diverse habitats on earth and they also protect coasts from storms and waves.  Although reefs are less than 0.1% of the world’s ocean floor, they help support around 25% of all marine species.

Please take a look at what’s happening. Dr Tim Flannery says that this is a result of what we are doing to the climate, and that we need to wean ourselves off coal very rapidly.

Read More: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-20/great-barrier-reef-coral-bleaching-dead-damaged-survey-finds/7859544

What can we do to help:
http://www.reefteach.com.au/about-the-reef/what-can-i-do-to-help-the-reef/
http://www.coolaustralia.org/challenges-and-solutions-for-the-great-barrier-reef/

The post Did You Know That Large Parts of the Great Barrier Reef Died This Year? appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

Image: National Film and Sound Archive

The post Raising Earthcarers #1 appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

Watch this 5 minute film to see how to simply and cheaply make your own natural beeswax wraps – to wrap veggies and fruit, leftover bowls, cheese, sandwiches, jar tops, bread loaves, lunchbox snacks and so much more.

Yes, it’s a small step, but many small steps, and a sense of commitment to want to make a difference, is more powerful than you may think.  When you take positive steps forward, there’s a ripple effect of positive change.

For the method shown in the film, all you need is to make your own beeswax wraps is:

• a piece of natural cotton cloth (choose the size you need for your particular use – I find 20cm x 20cm is a useful bowl-top size)
• natural beeswax (about 5-10 grams is all you need for 20cm x 20cm cloth)
• 1/4 teaspoon coconut oil
• flat sandwich hotplate

5 easy steps  to make beeswax cloths:

To wash – simply wipe, rinse off or use warm soapy water – not hot.

The post Five Easy Steps to Make Cheap Beeswax Wraps & Reduce Cling Wrap Use. Film #10 with Morag Gamble (5 mins) appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

Watch this 5 minute film to see how to simply and cheaply make your own natural beeswax wraps – to wrap veggies and fruit, leftover bowls, cheese, sandwiches, jar tops, bread loaves, lunchbox snacks and so much more.

Yes, it’s a small step, but many small steps, and a sense of commitment to want to make a difference, is more powerful than you may think.  When you take positive steps forward, there’s a ripple effect of positive change.

For the method shown in the film, all you need is to make your own beeswax wraps is:

• a piece of natural cotton cloth (choose the size you need for your particular use – I find 20cm x 20cm is a useful bowl-top size)
• natural beeswax (about 5-10 grams is all you need for 20cm x 20cm cloth)
• 1/4 teaspoon coconut oil
• flat sandwich hotplate

5 easy steps  to make beeswax cloths:

To wash – simply wipe, rinse off or use warm soapy water – not hot.

The post Five Easy Steps to Make Cheap Beeswax Wraps & Reduce Cling Wrap Use. Film #10 with Morag Gamble (5 mins) appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

Today, Earth Overshoot Day 2016 has come 5 days earlier than last year. According to the Global Footprint Network that means that if every person in the world lived like an Australian, there would need to be more than 5 Earths – but we only have one!

To get more details and find out about more countries get the full report at www.overshootday.org

The first Earth Overshoot Day was December 19, 1987. Now it has come back into August and heading toward July!

2014 – August 19

The post We Only Have One Earth – A Call For Voluntary Simplicity appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.