Plant it, grow it, use it, eat it! Here's our favourite resources on growing all types of good things – from microgreens to oak trees.
See below for planting guides, how-to's, books and resources, as well as interviews with amazing growers to get you inspired…
If you’re looking to grow some good quality storage crops for winter soups and stews, beans are a great choice. But which ones, and why? We talked to Jodi Roebuck about his top 3 beans to grow in a biointensive system. Jodi is a biointensive homesteader + grazier near Taranaki in New Zealand, and he knows his beans. His…
Raising slow food kids can be done in simple everyday ways – it’s not about cooking a hand-made feast three times a day! Just get them involved, take the time and watch your family grow, in more ways than one. Introduce kids to the wonderful world of slow food from the very beginning and you’ll…
Popes produce is a small urban market garden in Woonoona, providing fresh veg and fruit to it’s surrounding community. Bordered by lines of units, this little piece of urban farming paradise is sharing the goodness all around. Popes Produce is Sarah + Ben Anderson, with assistance from their kids. Together they farm a long thin…
Wondering what Milkwood’s all about, and why we do what we do? Here’s the 60 second version… Although, of course, if you read this blog, you’re probably fairly familiar with what we do. But please do watch the video anyway – it’s been quite a few years coming. It’s got natural building, chickens, bees, Joel Salatin,…
This place, Melliodora. A world renowned permaculture homestead, full of nut, fruit and forage trees, geese, goats, berries, vegetables, mudbrick homes and lives worth living. If you have studied, read or participated in any Permaculture-type doings and learnings in Australia, then you’ll be aware of the stellar home-scale permaculture demonstration site that is Melliodora, in…
There’s a big range of ways you can start your seedlings off to get them to grow well, both at their seedling stage and later on, when you plant them out. Previously, we’ve worked with seeding into seedling trays, with soil blocks, and more recently, with biointensive seedling flats. Each of these techniques have their…
What do you get when you mix two determined farmer girls with an acre of good land? Rad Growers, that’s what. Erin O’Callaghan + Belinda Joy Sheekey are two fine people that we first met as students during two of our Permaculture Design Certificate courses. Since then, they’ve teamed up to farm seasonal vegetables on an acre of…
This Spring we went from bare ground to surplus organic veggies at our rental home – thanks to biointensive gardening techniques, strong seedlings and a few free workouts. I’m not here to tell you a story about obtaining magically abundant harvests with just a few minutes work, although that can happen, sometimes, depending on the context of the growing…
Making grain spawn is a stage of mushroom cultivation the whole family can get into – there’s a job for everyone. This stage of the mushroom cultivation process comes before you use your grain spawn to inoculate your final bulk substrate, but after you’ve made (or purchased) your pure culture. The process of making grain spawn is…
Microgreens are a great way to get fast growing, nutritious, home-grown green things into your diet. They can be grown in trays or in a garden bed, depending on what space you have. They are tasty, always. We’ve written before about growing microgreens in trays – they don’t take up much space, and make sense…
Next to my primary school, down by the railway track, there is a mulberry tree. It’s been there since before I started kindergarten. I think it was self-seeded, but it’s difficult to say – the street verge just there has since been planted with all manner of trees by the nearby residents – grevillas, loquats, lilies,…
A Crop and Swap is an informal get-together of folks who have backyard harvest to spare, or are looking for new ideas for what to grow next. Recently we went to the very first crop and swap held at Kiama Community Garden, with our home-grown offerings of greens, herbs and a few oyster mushrooms. It…
So you’ve got your bag/jar of spawn, and you’re ready to turn it into many bags (or buckets) of mushrooms. Here’s a simple + effective way to go about that process. Firstly, take your bag or jar of spawn that you’ve either cultivated yourself, or bought from a mushroom supplier. Break up the spawn (easier to…