Djanbung Permaculture Gardens

SO ... good news?  our house in sydney settles in January!  that means we will be able to start saving and working towards buying land to do our bit for a sustainable world.  but the question remains ....

what do we buy?

it's ever so much fun looking ... but the issue of size keeps coming up.  do we get something bigger (e.g. over 15 acres) which would allow animal husbandry, forest regeneration and be a wonderful way to reclaim some good earth .... or could/should JustEarth be something on a smaller scale?  sometimes the idea of 5 or 6 acres seems so, well ..... small.  and yet, we hear many people say 5 acres is heaps!  you can do a lot with that.

so .... in order to see if this truly is so .... we went out to Djanbung Permaculture Gardens in Nimbin.  They have a no dig garden, a food forest, chooks, ducks, pigs and a food forest too boot.  all on 5 acres!  with some great dams and waterways!  we had to see if something so LARGE scale could be done in limited space.  well ... we were not disappointed!  we learned so much .... and the bamboo!  well ... let's just say once i've had a chance to digest the new year .... there will be a whole blog post on the benefits of bamboo because of what we saw there!

so .... rather than just spouting on endlessly ... here is a pictorial journey of our few hours at Djanbung!

ok .... let's start with me and the kids
in the middle of one of the gardens 

i reckon my kitchen garden could look
a lot like this!

little ponds everywhere to capture water and
provide habitat and protection for small
critters

one of the veg gardens .... good companion planting
going on here!

this is going into an upper part of one of their
gardens ... the slope provides drainage
and the varying plants are creating a
luscious micro climate.

one of the chook pens (with a turkey!) these are all
just on point of lay and will go into the main chook run soon.
notice the mulch.  it is the leaves that have dried and fallen
from the bamboo.

speaking of bamboo!  it was
everywhere!  and HUGE!

just a cool shot of the sunflowers .... there were
cool shots everywhere!

beans growing up a bamboo pole.
the key here is that spikes where the leaves
come off have been left on ... allowing for
additional "perch-age" for the
beans.

the must have propagation area .... along side the
humanure toilet!  

hubby and kids standing deep in the
food forest!  

the fire pit!  no good permaculture
farm can be without one!  this is
u-beaut!

the pigs!  these are for manure only and not for eating.
so they have a pretty good life!  

at the end of the day what we learned was that yes .... we could do a heap of a lot with five acres if that was all we got.  so now ... we just have to wait and fall in love with whatever dirt and soil is destined to become JustEarth.