Well the inverse permablitz was a great day with large numbers of plants, bags of compost, and piles of bio-mass flying off to enrich the edible gardens of others. The sadness of seeing the Thomas St Garden beginning its morph back into green cancer (lawn) was displaced by the happiness of seeing car, van and ute-loads of plants driving off to new homes. The day started with a semolina dish and potato curry from Sri Lankan Saku then a garden taro-stem, silverbeet and pumpkin using fish soup from Cambodian Naron. Thanks to all who made it (especially the cooks!) and we wish you happy growing and eating with your new plants.

Check out this great picture of Di's absolutely amazing new garden in Boxhill. Di's been planning her Woodrow-style mandala garden for a while, now has a chook dome, and by the end of next week will have chooks! (We're donating an araucana to get the egg rolling). Di is planning to host a permablitz on July 30 - stay tuned for details and let us know if you'd like to be on the permablitz mailing list.

Well, life's been a bit of a hurricane lately but things have calmed down for the moment so why not get up some pix of the latest Thomas Street goings-on. Last Sunday we permablitzed Willie's place. We had fun ripping up plenty of roses, planted a pile of veggies, herbs, green manures, a kiwifruit and a hazelnut with extensive mulching. Then this Italian guy from round the corner came over with homemade wine so that was most of the South Americans gone ;-). Check out pix here.

Meantime Dan and friends have now run a couple of Sustainable Kitchen Skiils workshops, both of which have been such great fun that we're planning more (register your interest here). It's been wonderful to discover just how much interest there is in the Melbourne community for learning to make healthier, cheaper versions of what most of us otherwise buy weekly from the supermarkets. Here's a few pictures of action that included learning how to make sourdough bread, nut butters, wheatgrass, sprouts, cheese, yoghurt, kefir, viili, and sauerkraut!

An 'inverse' permablitz you are wondering - what in heck is that? Well, as some of you know our edible garden here at Thomas Street is fated to become unproductive, purely cosmetic, energy gobbling lawn once again. May seem a sad thing, but read on to see how you can make it a happy thing.

Usually, a permablitz is about converting lawn into edible garden (as well as learning skills, building community, and having fun). On Sunday July 9, we are inviting our friends to come and help to do the reverse: convert edible garden into lawn. The happy bit is in the bigger picture. For if you come and help yourself to as many plants and as much compost as you can carry home, the very process of losing our edible garden will hopefully contribute to the creation and addition to more area of edible garden elsewhere. In other words, we're aiming for a net gain in the amount of Melbourne that is edible.

We have literally thousands of plants and hundreds of different species, including food plants, herbs, medicinal plants, and otherwise useful permaculture plants. This Sunday, it is all up for grabs. Here is a chance for you to create an instant garden out of nothing or to add to the diversity of your existing garden. The day will start at 12 noon, and for the first hour or so the focus will be on letting people see the garden, have a cup of tea, a chat and maybe a few final tours. Then from 1pm folks are free to start gently massaging the plants they want out of the ground, taking care to disturb as few earth worms and chickens as possible. We'd also appreciate if you could rake over or otherwise make level any ground you dig up. Make our job easier when it comes to sowing, gulp, grass seed.

On the day we will also have plenty of food-related excitement, based around turning typically neglected garden produce into delicious dishes. Saku from Sri Lanka will be cooking up a brocolli-leaf stir-fry and a potato curry. Naron from Cambodia will show us how to turn our taro stems into delicious vegetarian soup. We can't promise anything, but Vilma from El Salvador may well be bringing on the pupusas and filling them up with garden goodness. And of course Dan and fellow bread-freaks will have the oven spitting bread in all directions. A bit of the old permasalsa is also far from out of the question.

So, we invite all our friends to come and join us for an afternoon not only to say goodbye to Thomas Street (and to hear about our exciting plans for for the future), but to take a piece of it home with you such that it may live on and continue to nourish you as it has us.

Date: Sunday July 9th
Time: 12 noon onwards
Address: 16 Thomas St, Clayton
Bring: Pots/bags/containers, maybe a trowel/spade/large spoon, a snack to share.

Best,
Dan, Cat, Adrian, Associated Ponds and Mulch Supply

ps. We also have a few trailer-loads of biomass (pumpkin stems and the like) that would make great ingredients for a slow winter compost pile that anyone is welcome to take off our hands.

---
http://www.permaculturesolutions.com.au/
http://www.eatthesuburbs.com/
http://www.codemo.org/
And soon to be launched: http://www.permablitz.net/

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"When the earth beneath our feet is less like a dead concrete slab and more like a dark moist living sponge, then we know we are on the right track" (David Holmgren)

Hey fellow permablitz junkies!

What's happening on that front you must be wondering and my word don't we have some exciting news for you:

This Sunday June 25 CODEMO is heading to Buncle St Community Garden, North Melbourne (details from Peta 0411 899 618, Dan 9029 2550 or Nelson 0433559928). Starting at 12 noon we will meet with a group of Spanish-speaking gardeners with whom we'll enjoy garden tours and talks, pupusas, permasalsa and sharing what we've learned about permaculture with our North Melbourne neighbours. We're taking a minibus from the Springvale/Clayton area leaving at 11am so let us know if you'd like a ride. Buncle St Garden is located on the corner of Mark Street and Buncle St North Melbourne, outside the Moonee Valley Health Centre and near the Boundary Road overpass. Melways ref 2AE4.

Then, on Sunday July 2nd, we hit the garden of Willie from Chile in North Clayton. As you may know, 76-year-old Willie is the undisputed king of permasalsa so this is not a day to miss. Willie has been doing a fine job of applying what he's learned at previous permablitzes, and in addition to adding a new sheet-mulch and wood-chip path vegetable bed we'll be mulching up a storm, learning how to graft (bring your fig, nectarine, peach, and lemon cuttings or rootstock), meeting the neighbours, enjoying Willie's amazing pumpkin and butter bean soup, baking bread from grain we'll mill with Willie's grain mill, and much, much more. If you can only make one permablitz this year, this here is the one to be at.

Following up on Sunday July 30 is a big-time permablitz at Di's place in Box Hill which will most likely see another chook tractor launched and some fruit tree planting madness.

Then we have plans for the gardens of Ana and Pato with small spaces they're all set to convert from lawn to food production and there are also plans afoot to visit Linda in Eaglemont (where her friend and permaculture person Pam will tell us about organic gardening in Cuba). If you have either a space you'd like to see more food growing in and would like to be permablitzed, or if you are keen to help facilitate a permablitz day in future, get in touch and let's make it happen! Contact Nelson on 85026300/0433559928 or Dan on 90292550/0422448933.

Best,
Dan
---
http://www.codemo.org.au/
http://www.permaculturesolutions.com.au/thomasstreet

ps. Dan's running some 6-hour sustainable kitchen skills workshops (learn how to make sourdough bread, yogurt, kefir, sprouts, cheese, wheatgrass juice, and nut butter - that's more than one thing an hour!). They're on Saturdays and cost $40 which includes all the ingredients, lunch and probably quite a few laughs. 0422448933 for more details or email me back if you want a flier. The first workshop is Saturday July 1st at Springvale Community Centre and the second is Saturday July 8 in North Melbourne.

Here's the house from across the road - what a peaceful scene!


The North-side broadbean patch - slowly creeping up.


The Mexican sage is still probably the prettiest plant in the garden (sorry marigolds, but you ain't got nothing on these guys...)


Look at the size of that Chilacoyote!! The hills hoist is completely submerged - periscope and all!!

And here's one of the fruits - we're saving this one for seed. Hey Adrian and Cat - did you see where it's grown over the fence and is producing another huge squash on the peach tree of ouyr Greek neighbours?


A cauli head emerging in the front brassica patch.

Our most mature broad beans in Dan's quadrant of the keyhole bed. Still a ways off though.

The above mentioned front brassica patch - yes - these photos are all mixed up in order!


Random back garden photo.

One happy Meyer lemon tree!

The circular brassica forest.


The ducks enjoying a morning bath.

Last week Dan and Cat attended a retreat in which the giant pumpkin featured quite prominently. As well as a conversation piece around which the story of Thomas Street was shared with the group, the pumpkin was then turned by kitchen goddess Pauline into a number of delicious meals, with the giant seeds being dried and then distributed amongst the retreat participants. So the pumpkin's story will continue...

Eat the Suburbs - a new Melbourne-based initiative to get Energy Descent Action Plans up and running as peak oil makes its entrance.

Vasili's Garden - a fun Melbourne gardening show that is just starting to ease into a little permaculture!

An interesting article on lawn

Yeah those of you in Melbourne should tune in to Vasili's garden show tomorrow at 7:30pm on Community TV station Channel 31 - we've heard a rumour it should be a good one...

Our Thomas Street blog, previously at thomasstreet.info has moved to it's new home at permaculturesolutions.com.au/thomasstreet/ and soon will no longer be available at it's old address. please update your bookmarks!

Yesterday we held the 4th CODEMO "Permablitz" at Maria and Sergio's house in Endeavour Hills. Amidst the compulsory eating and dancing, we designed and built two no-dig veggie and herb gardens close to the house, and also planted a winter green manure crop of broad beans to prepare the soil for Maria's long-awaited watermelons come summer... Matt talked to us about swales with the help of a speedily knocked up A-frame by Sergio, Adam and Cat spent a lot of time pondering the soil, and Keith's young son created a very rare "mixed ball" tree! A couple of new faces appeared, as well as planty of familiar ones.

After five long hours of mediation with our landlord’s agent yesterday, we have reached an agreement which everyone is happy with! (hooray!)

We will take this agreement to VCAT tomorrow to be made into a VCAT order.

Put simply, we have agreed to begin returning the property to it’s original condition over the next four months. By the end of September we will have relocated our plants, our poultry and ourselves to suitable homes and restored the lawn.

Thanks for all the support, advice and help, it’s been greatly appreciated, and it does seem that we have together created a positive outcome. We need to sit quietly and breathe for just a minute now…

I've just spoken to the good folks at the Dispute Resolution Centre and a mediation session has been arranged for Monday the 29th (just two days before the scheduled VCAT hearing.)

Unfortunately our landlords have declined the Dispute Resolution Centre's invitation to resolve this issue with us in person, but our real estate agent has accepted the invitation and has the landlords authority to negotiate with us on their behalf.

We are excited by this opportunity to communicate and negotiate in a mediated environment and we remain confident that a simple and mutually beneficial arrangement will be reached.

I just picked this email from Dan off the permaculture-oceania mailing list and figured it belongs here too....


Dear all,

I have been meaning to acknowledge and thank you all for the supportive
and helpful emails in response to my earlier post about our situation
here at Thomas Street in South-East Melbourne. I've also been meaning
to let you all know how things have progressed since then.

To recap, we've developed a food garden over the last two years in our
rented quarter-acre suburban property. Little by little, the garden
has grown beyond the dimensions we originally gained consent for, and a
fair bit of lawn has been replaced with edible and medicinal plants
(with much help from our chickens and ducks and their tractor). About
a month ago, our landlords sent us a breach of duty notice demanding
that we had 14 days to either restore our food garden to lawn or pay
them $2100 compensation for "the loss or damage" we caused by
converting a good chunk of the lawn into "intensive permaculture with
associated ponds and mulch supply."

Though we understood their concerns, we found their terms a bit
unreasonable. So a few days later we responded to the notice with a
letter in which we stated our hope to work together to come to some
alternative resolution satisfactory to us all. We acknowledged we had
added to the property without their consent, and we acknowledged that,
if necessary, we intended to honour our previous verbal agreement that
we would revert the garden to lawn when we left. As another proposal,
however, we also suggested the possibility that we work together to
take the garden forwards to something that is still productive but at
the same time is not perceived by the landlords as a disincentive to
future tenants wanting to move in. We asked if they could get back to
us within a week, hoping that we might be able to announce and
celebrate a friendly resolution on the open day we planned shortly
after receiving the initial notice.

Though we didn't receive a response within that timeframe, we did
receive a call from the real estate agent. We arranged a day and time
to meet, and the tone of the conversation left us feeling quite
positive about figuring the whole thing out (and reaching "a happy
medium" in her words).

We then held our open day with garden tours, a permaculture documentary
screening (Global Gardener: Cool Climates), two introductory talks
about peak oil by EnergyBulletin.net's Adam Fenderson, a workshop on
"The Living Soil: Making the Invisible Visible" by Megan Floris, South
American food stalls by Codemo (http://www.codemo.org.au/), poetry
readings, and some live music. We had a novelty auction for a giant
home-grown pumpkin ($70 it went for!), a mini six-herb garden in a box,
and a photo of a flower taken in our garden. A sizable crowd attended
despite the patchy weather, and several guests left inspired to go home
and start food gardens, with questions about what to plant first this
time of year (broad beans!), whether we could help get some compost
going, and so on. Neighbors brought along plates of home-made cookies
and Cambodian sticky rice cake. It was a really neat day, a culturally
diverse community celebration of suburban food gardening, and $832 was
raised towards resolving our situation (which will go toward a
community garden project if a non-financial resolution is reached).
Thanks to Kerry for her prior advice and her attendance (and photos!)
on the day. Thanks to Fern of Permaculture Melbourne for her statement
of support. Thanks also to Peter of the South Australian Permaculture
Association, who traveled a long way to give us his support and
solidarity.

There has been some coverage of our situation by local media. That
initial email got forwarded far and wide and various media outlets
received it and got in touch. Prior to our open day we had three
interviews on Melbourne's community radio station 3CR, one of which
began with David Holmgren setting the big picture about peak oil, food
security and permaculture before we were interviewed about our specific
situation within the context of this bigger picture (we are also
grateful to David for his letter about our situation which is available
on our blog:
http://thomasstreet.info/2006/05/letter-from-david-holmgren.html). The
day after the open day a front page article came out in one of our
local newspapers. A week later a page three follow-up article
described our open day and the community support it generated. Both
articles are on the blog, so see what you think - we thought they came
off reasonably well in terms of us coming across as reasonable human
beings as opposed to lawn-destroying misfits - the word permaculture
making a minor appearance in both articles. It was exciting to think
that through all this various people are being exposed to the question
of whether there is something to be said for growing your own food
where you live. Articles are being written about our garden in ECOS
and ARENA - more scholarly and big-picture focused magazines. A show
on Melbourne community TV station channel 31 is planning to come out
and do something about our place. It's by this greek guy Vasili who
apparently has a sort of cult following in the Greek community here
(http://www.vasilisgarden.com/).

Meantime, the agent's visit towards reaching "a happy medium" never
happened. When we didn't hear from her our calls to the agency were
met with "she's not available right now but will be contacting you
shortly." Then on Friday May 12 we received another package by
registered post. It was another official notice, this time an
application to VCAT, the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal.
On May 31 a magistrate will review the evidence and decide on the fate
of our garden.

If the garden has to go (which means we have to go as we'd get hungry
otherwise), we will probably make another community event out of
exporting what we can't eat to other gardens and re-sowing lawn. Since
receiving the notice, we've sent another letter proposing a third
option of setting aside the funds we've raised in a dedicated
third-party account we would use towards removing the garden when we
leave. We have also approached Consumer Affairs Victoria, (Actually it was the Department of Justice, Victoria's Dispute Settlement Centre -Ad.) who are
sending an official request for mediation to the landlords. Various
commentators have pointed out that the landlords will not look that
good at the tribunal should they continue to ignore all the
opportunities to get together to work this out. It is apparently
possible the magistrate will force the matter into mediation anyways.
We will see.

Although things are still very much up in the air, we've been surprised
and delighted with all the positives that have come from this affair,
things like:

- Public awareness about the issue has been generated, with community
support and ongoing interest (and visits from plant, advice, and
compost seekers!)
- Around 150-200 people have seen our garden as one example of what
growing a decent quantity of your own food looks like.
- We have compiled a list of about 30 renters who have signed a
petition saying they would find an edible garden like ours an incentive
to move into a place as a tool for negotiation by ourselves and people
in similar situations in future.
- We have had around 8 offers and invitations from landowners in
various contexts expressing interest in having us (and presumably
edible-garden friendly folks like us) to come and be their tenants, or
in some cases to come and live on their land for free while developing
its sustainable food producing capacity with the possibility of
long-term arrangements. An interesting sign of the changing times, to
say the least.
- There has been a surge of interest in the 'Permablitz' (Permaculture
Backyard Blitz) series that we've been getting going down here, where
groups meet to learn about permaculture together in the context of
setting up food-producing systems in the houses of local residents.

Anyways, that's where things stand right now - for the moment we are
collating letters of support and seeking legal representation for the
31st. I'll plan another update after the hearing when a whole bunch of
uncertainty will have evaporated.

Best and thanks again,
Dan Palmer
http://thomasstreet.info/

A personal reflection from Dan.

Something interesting is happening here and I wanted to write it down. I think maybe it is a sign of the times and potentially a very promising one for folks concerned about the state of the planet and wanting to take serious steps towards doing something about it.

Like so many others who have realised just how seriously we (as participants in industrial civilization and agriculture) have wounded and are continuing to wound the living planet we are part of, I have long pondered the whole issue of land.

So many people have told me that yes they are just itching to grow more of their own food, to establish serious food gardens, to plant trees, and so on. To reconnect and put down roots, to deinstitutionalise, to find their tribe and become indigenous to some place.

Yet in situations where the land they live on is not theirs, it is hard to get around the idea of pouring energy into a place only to have to leave it behind when the land owner decides they want to do something else with the land (in our case revert it to lawn).

While I believe it is worth doing it anyway, for the skills you learn, the community you build, and many other reasons, I know that this is a serious impediment for many of us.

After pondering possible loopholes in the system for a year or two many of us reconcile ourselves with not only the idea of owning a bit of land but of working in some job to make the money required to buy it. Then, we figure, we can put down roots with the peace of mind we're after. Knowing that the trees we plant will be there to feed our grandchildren.

Given that the planet is in a state of severe crisis it is hard to get one's head around working in the city (or where ever) for ten years (or whatever), but unless a mystery relative happens to leave us a whole bunch of money it seems there is just no other way. Many folks consider joining or forming intentional communities but of course these usually require money also, and many people seem to have hesitations about the risks of communal situations not working out in the long term. Some of us seriously consider just roaming, doing what we can wherever we are and not being attached to any particular future. But I suspect most of us probably yearn for a piece of this planet to connect with, to be part of, to form a long term relationship with.

For a little while I've been wondering if there isn't another way of living on some land with security. This whole Thomas Street situation has brought me to the conclusion that there is. We have now had something like eight serious offers from land owners, in a variety of both city and country locations. Some of the people know us, others don't. Half of the invitations are from people interested in having us as tenants, with others offering to have us live and develop permaculture gardens on their land rent free. This includes possibilities such as living somewhere for 5 years and then signing a 99-year lease. Though we hope to remain at Thomas Street for a while yet, Cat and Adrian are serious about pursuing one of these opportunities. I am considering another.

These offers haven't come as a result of any unique attributes we have. They have come because we are people with an genuine interest in caring for the earth, growing our own food where we live, building community and so on. There are many thousands of people like us!

This situation has reinforced my feeling that we are fast moving towards a culture in which there will be an increasing number of landowners, usually older, sometimes without the skills or capacity to develop the land themselves, yet who want help doing something productive with their land. A large contributor to them wanting this will be peak oil and the associated rise in the costs and fragility of relying on industrial agriculture for food. Another contributor will be the raising awareness of how unhealthy industrially produced food is, for people and planet. People in this situation will increasingly consider the option of entering into some long term agreement with folks, usually younger, in the category of people without land, but with the skills, capacity, and motivation to develop it. Various informal and formal arrangements will be made. Quite possibly new terms and legal arrangements will evolve or become better known.

The upshot, for me, has been that I am slowly stopping worrying about how I'm going to fund my bit of land. I am increasingly pouring my time and energy into communities of like-minded others acquiring skills together. Skills like food gardening, weeds as food and medicine, sourdough bread making, sprouting, raising chickens and so on. Skills of connection, engagement, empowerment. These skills will serve me so much better than money will, and in acquiring such skills, it is so much easier to engage with reality - to orient myself to what's going on and what is coming without freaking out too much. In doing so I am learning more about being part of healthy, happy and mutually beneficial relationships with communities of like-minded others. I am finding my tribe.

So, if anyone was to ask me for my two cents worth, I'd say phase out of an existence where your time is based around earning dollars. Transition into a space and a place where you are learning skills in a community context. You'll not regret it.