Permaculture Basics:

In the twenty-four years since its conception, permaculture has demonstrated that it is a successful approach to designing sustainable systems and can be utilized in every climatic and cultural zone.

Balanced and Fair, Proactive Care

Shared ethics of 'earth care', 'people care', and 'fair shares' (which is shorthand for limits to populations and consumption, and the fair distribution of resources to further the work of earth care and people care). Permaculture also stresses the importance of taking personal responsibility for one's actions.

Sustainable and Interconnected Ecology

Ecological principles derived by the observation of natural systems, by ecologists such as Birch and Odum.

High Yield, Minimum Input Design of Argiculture

Design tools and processes that allow an individual or group to assemble conceptual, material, and strategic components into a 'pattern' or 'plan of action' that can be implemented and maintained with minimal resources.

Origins

In the mid 1970s two Australian ecologists, Dr. Bill Mollison and David Holmgren, started to develop ideas that they hoped could be used to create stable agricultural systems. This was in response to the rapidly growing use of destructive post-war industrial agricultural methods that were poisoning the land and water, reducing biodiversity, and removing billions of tonnes of soil from previously fertile landscapes. A design approach called 'permaculture' was the result and was first made public with the publication of Permaculture One in 1978.

After the publication of Permaculture One, Mollison and Holmgren further refined and developed their ideas, with both originators designing hundreds of 'permaculture plots' and writing further books. Mollison lectured in over eighty countries and the two-week Design Course was taught to many hundreds of students. By the early 1980s the concept had moved on from being predominantly about the design of agricultural systems towards being a more fully holistic design process for creating sustainable human habitats.

By the mid 1980s many of the students had become successful practitioners and began teaching and in a short period of time permaculture groups, projects, associations, and institutes were established in over one hundred countries.

Around the World

Permaculture is now well-established across the world and there are many inspiring examples of its use. Zimbabwe has sixty schools designed using permaculture, with a national team working within the schools' curriculum development unit. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has produced a report on using permaculture in refugee situations after successful use in camps in Southern Africa and Macedonia. A tribe in Peru has moved from a growing dependency on state support to self-reliance and support for other tribes. A military base in the USA is being transformed into an eco-business park and wildlife haven.

Security Is Diversity

True food security comes from a wealth of healthy food, having access to good food and enabling a diverse diet of complete nutrients. Only recently, are North Americans waking up to the notion that this bounty of food is ideally produced locally. As such, it has become part of the initiative of reseed.ca to bridge a knowledge gap in how to grow organic food and do so in an urban environment.

The idea is simple. Food security will grow out of neighbourhoods across Canada and around the world. We want to create a model whereby transforming urban space into food-bearing land is an act that ensures abundance for the generations to come.

These ideas contrast conventional ideas on food security

Conventional View of Food Security

Conventionally, food security refers to the availability of food and one's access to it. A household is considered food secure when its occupants do not live in hunger or fear of starvation.

The Hitch

In order to compensate for the increasing demands of an ever-growing world population, the post-Industrial revolution era brought factory-style production to our food supply. This advent also brought mono-crop agriculture and factory-style animal husbandry that continually optimized production for throughput at the grave expense of quality.

The Grim Results

According to the World Resources Institute, global per capita food production has been increasing substantially for the past several decades. As of 2006, the number of people who are overweight has surpassed the number who are undernourished - the world had more than one billion people who were overweight, and an estimated 800 million who were undernourished.

The Solution: YES in my backyard!

Taking control of food security at the community level requires simple and elegant action; Communities of friends and neighbours can come together, shape their collective environment and grow food.

Our Initiatives

Everything we do in the garden, we document so as to pass on this knowledge to anyone interested. In time, this site, reseed.ca, will grow to become a tool for others to create and plan community projects, organize initiatives with groups and add to a collective wiki of plant information, soil creation & management techniques and other wisdom we gather through experience.

In 2010, we are:

• creating an online seed exchange forum
• growing seeds and perennial plants for exchange in coming seasons
• creating the soil/seed/plant/food knowledge-base with Semantic MediaWiki

All of this is an effort to create a system of knowledge, both formal and informal, on how we as people can feed ourselves with a strong variety of healthy alternatives to low-nutrient factory food and GMO-terminated seed supplies.

The Opportunity

Kensington Market in Toronto, ON, CA is an eccentric mix of business and residential buildings, often alternating across a block. Located in the middle of Toronto, its restaurants and suppliers offer a mix of local cuisine and access to products from all over the world.

As such, the opportunity for diverting organic waste to create soil is profound; Diverting local usable yard waste and compost from municipal garbage pick-ups reduces system costs and redirects organic matter back into earth.  

The Benefits

Composting of green waste through a neighbourhood-level initiative produces a nitrogen-rich compost base.  Rapid decomposition of curb-side waste into biochar through a process called pyrolysis (low oxygen, controlled burn), produces an organic product, 95% Carbon, that will:
-    Add nutrients to the soil
-    Promote the growth of desirable microbes in soils
-    Aid in water retention
-    Create and maintain less-compact, more arable soil and
-    Increase crop yield
In creating this community-driven system, we will be able to produce metrics, in kilograms and tones, of waste diverted from landfill and carbon sequestered from the atmosphere and into our local soil.

This is the opportunity for innovation. We want to integrate community and small-scale technology to generate soil, divert waste and sequester carbon. Not only do biochar-enriched soils contain more carbon, 150gC/kg compared to 20-30gC/kg in surrounding soils, but the humus layer of biochar-enriched soils are, on average, more than twice as deep as surrounding soils. Therefore, the total carbon stored in these soils can be one order of magnitude higher than adjacent soils.  [Biochar and Bioenergy Production for Climate Change Mitigation, Winsley, Peter, 64 New Zealand Sci. Review. 5, 5 (2007)]

By redirecting compost matter away from the curb and into our own backyards, we can create a nutrient rich fertilizer and build valuable humus, a key component to healthy vegetation.  In this way, the redirection of waste, soil restoration and water retention fit together, resulting in larger, healthier and more productive local ecosystems.

The Berkeley Composting Method

see: http://vric.ucdavis.edu/pdf/compost_rapidcompost.pdf

Compost in 14 days: Making Fast Compost with the Berkeley Method

Not everyone feels compelled to make compost in 14 days. It just seems like too much work for some of us. However, many people are certainly interested in making the compost process faster.

By learning about the key factors in making fast compost we can begin making our own compost piles more efficient, regardless of whether our compost is finished in 2 weeks or in 2 months.

A popular method of composting, known as the Indore Method, involves piling carbon rich and nitrogen rich materials in alternating layers and letting them stand for a year, after which they are ready to use. Many composters use a modified version of this method, by turning their pile every few weeks or months in order to speed up the process. These methods produce good quality compost with minimal effort. Some disadvantages are that nutrients are lost to leaching due to rainfall, some weeds and weed seeds are not killed because the pile may not get hot enough, and the process can take up to a year to produce finished compost.

A faster method of composting was introduced by Robert D Raabe, a professor of plant pathology at the University of California, Berkeley. Commonly known as the "Berkeley method" or "fast composting", this method produces finished compost in as little as 14 to 21 days.

Let's look at some advantages and disadvantages of fast composting.
Advantages of fast composting:

    * Finished compost in a few weeks
    * Higher nutrient content due to less leaching of nutrients
    * Fewer viable weeds and weed seeds

Disadvantages of fast composting:

    * Additional effort required
    * Large amounts of materials are required at one time

Shred the Compost Materials

If there is one secret to making fast compost, it is finely shredding the carbon rich ingredients such as fallen leaves, hay, straw, paper and cardboard. Shredding increases the surface area that the compost microbes have to work on and provides a more even distribution of air and moisture among the materials. The type of chipper or shreddder used is not important, provided it can handle the materials. Rotary lawn mowers can also be used by for shredding leaves by running the mower back and forth over a pile a few times although this method is not quite as good as using a shredder.

Nitrogen rich green materials such as manure, vegetable wastes and green plant prunings can also be shredded. Soft succulent materials do not need to be shredded because they break down very quickly in the compost pile.

If you don't have a chipper or shredder you can chop your materials into ½" to 1½" pieces with pruning shears. It takes a fair amount of effort but the results will be worthwhile.

Get the Balance Right for Really Fast Compost

It's important to have the right balance of materials in our fast compost so that it breaks down as quickly and efficiently as possible. The bacteria in our compost need both carbon and nitrogen to function; carbon for energy and nitrogen for protein synthesis. For every one unit of nitrogen used by the bacteria they also consume about 30 units of carbon. Therefore, in order to keep the bacteria working efficiently we need to create a compost pile that is about 30 parts carbon to 1 part nitrogen.

Since most compost materials don't have a carbon to nitrogen (C:N) ratio of 30:1 we need to combine our materials so that the total mixture will be as close as possible to 30:1.

For more information on obtaining the right carbon to nitrogen ratio see making a compost pile. For the more technically minded a compost mix calculator is helpful for more precise carbon to nitrogen ratios

Making a Fast Compost Pile

The original Berkeley method involved the layering of carbon and nitrogen materials but today, many composters mix all the materials together into one large fast compost pile.

The jury is out on which of these options helps the pile to heat up faster. Choose whichever option you feel most comfortable with. For the purposes of this article we will mix all of the material together. If you choose to layer your materials the making a compost pile section of the site will be helpful.

Once your compost materials are shredded, mix everything together into one pile. If the pile feels dry add moisture and mix thoroughly and evenly. If you are unsure of how moist your fast compost pile should be check out the measuring compost moisture area of the site.

The minimum size of your pile should three feet wide and three feet high. For best results, try to make your pile 4 or 5 feet on each dimension. Place a piece of carpet or plastic over the top of the pile to help trap the heat produced by the pile. If the fast compost pile was made correctly the internal temperature should rise within the first 24 hours. Dig into the pile and remove a handful of material from the centre. The material should be warmer and darker than the material at the outer edges of the pile.

Within two days the compost pile should be ready to be turned for the first time. Compost bacteria need plenty of air to survive so it's best to turn more rather than less frequently. Move the material from the outer edges of the pile into the middle. The pile should be ready for a second turning after another day or so. At this stage the material should start to look like a bit like finished compost.

At the two week mark if everything went as planned the fast compost should be nearly ready for use.
It may not be entirely finished heating but it should be nearly finished. It should be safe to use once the temperature has fallen below 100° F.

Biochar Basics

Our experiments with Biochar are an effort to reducve waste, create a neighbourhood-level carbon sequestration program and suppliment our composting program with carbon-rich matter than allows healthy microbes to flourish in the soil.

As part of an overall system of soil restoration through composting, waste reduction & carbon sequestration, we are implementing a small-scale biochar production system that uses curbside yardwaste as raw material for developing nutrient-rich soild. By capturing yard waste in the neighbourhood, we reduce the strain of city landfills instead diverting viable organic compost directly into local soil. In order to save transportation and waste management costs, we locally create biochar for use in our composting, creating the foundation of healthy food production with carbon-negative agriculture.

Why Biochar? Why Now?

Inspired by the challenge of creating a concrete, collective approach to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, we began researching biochar production and how it can benefit our neighbourhood and city. There are many people examining how to recapitalize organic waste, and for vastly different reasons; home heating, cooking, developing biofuels, producing syngas and soil enrichment with biochar.

The real opportunity is to create a neighbourhood-level initiative to divert yard waste to biochar production and convert that biochar into locally generated soil. With a very low start-up cost ($5000), we can develop a community system that enables a neighbourhood to manage its own waste by:

A Big Picture that includes Small-Scale Biochar Production

Biochar production is a single piece of a larger of initiative, including composting and waste diversion, aimed at soil restoration. In turn, our efforts to restore soil and develop local horticulture resources compliment our pursuits of land reclamation and remediation. Nonetheless, biochar production presents a key opportunity to push the envelope of innovation further./p>

Reseed.ca will create grassroots biochar solutions with our volunteers that build economies around carbon sequestration, foster long-term behavioural change with lasting effects and produce tangible reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

The Innovation is Economy

In Kensington Market, local restaurants and residents are eager to supply us with nitrogen-rich organic waste, otherwise headed to municipal treatment facilities. We collect curbside yard waste and produce biochar. Combining the two creates rich soil and sequesters carbon.

The product is soil for carbon-negative agriculture: 400 kg of carbon was sequestered in the making of this garden.

Water Catchment and Conservation

There are strategies to help a garden survive both drought and periods of too-wet soil.  We need our garden to rely on more than one method of watering in order to embody the permaculture principle that each function be supported by several elements.  It is unlikely that all of our watering systems will fail at once, therefore the occurrence of drought is also unlikely.

The 100 Rain Barrell Initiative

In order to maximize the free resources endowed to us by our surroundings, we have developed a simple proposition: Over the course of this summer, we will hold several workshops to create rain barrels, 100 in total. We will distribute the barrels at a low cost of $35 per barrel, provided you assemble the barrel with us. If we receive funding from the Live Green Toronto fund, the full $35 will be refunded to all participants.

Either way, if this initiative bears fruit, each rainfall will see 5500 Gallons or more that 25000 L of water saved from running into municipal sewers for use in both reseed.ca initiatives and private gardening pursuits.

Rainwater Catchment

There are excellent resources online and right in your city to help you build a rain barrel of your own.  In the city you can often find food safe drums for free if you check with your local restaurants and businesses.  We will be building rain barrels this season and documenting the whole process right on this website.  For more information email us at info@reseed.ca or check back for the workshop schedule and documented process.

Think About Water First

It is easy to harvest rain and doing so greatly reduces our dependence on energy-consuming water sources.

1.  The cheapest place to store water is in the soil.  

The key to the soil's ability to hold water is in the organic matter.  Soil with as little as 2 percent organic matter can reduce the irrigation needed by 75 percent.  In order to achieve a lake-in-the-ground effect we must first build up the organic matter in the soil.  The best way to build healthy soil is to not disturb it in the first place.  Tilling the soil is the fastest way to bring all of the valuable nutrients to the surface and by doing that we release it into the atmosphere where it is unusable by the plants.  We can also add organic matter to the soil in the form of compost.  This addition will improve soil structure and provide food for earthworms, soil insects and beneficial microorganisms.

Having high organic matter content in our soils holds moisture, adds fertility, stores nutrients, boosts soil life, fluffs soil and sequesters carbon.

2.  Shaping Land to Maximize Water Use

3.  Energy Needs shape planting patterns

4. Plant your gardens densely to reduce the occurrence of drought.  

Dense plantings shades soil, smothers weeds, increases biodiversity and increases yield.

5.  Mulching slows evaporation

Mulch that is at least two to four inches will prevent moisture loss by slowing evaporation and keep the plant roots cool, reducing transpiration.  Other important benefits of organic mulch is that it will soak up rainwater and reduce run off, as it breaks down it adds valuable humus to the soil increasing the soils ability to hold water and mulch also prevents soil erosion,  soil structure and softens the effects of temperature fluctuations.

Some mulch materials include straw, alfalfa, seedless hay, wood shavings, bark, leaves, corncobs and husks, shredded cornstalks, seaweed etc.  You can even use rocks, they pick up morning dew and dribble it into the soil.  During the day the shaded rocks are cooler than the air, the hot air drifts into the cool dark spaces, moisture condenses out of the warm air and trickles into the ground.  In the spring rock mulches hold the heat from the sun and keep the young plants warm on cooler nights.  Rock mulches can extend the growing season and help grow hot weather plants in cool regions.

Deep mulching slows evaporation, cools the soil, adds fertility to the soil, boost the soil life, smoothers weeds and creates a habitat for arthropods and microbes.