How have you been applying fukuokian and permaculture approaches to your life?
I began by approaching my dull, compacted and nutritionally depleted back yard by laying down large mats of hay (surplus grown for horses is dirt cheap, if not free, best if rotted) combined with whatever other organic material you can find - leaves, straw, grass clippings, rotten logs, dinner scraps that would normally get thrown in the compost or garbage (avoid using (or even eating) meat – because of course it stinks, and harvesting animals for the gratification of eating them creates an enormous amount of labor and is thus stupid)
After 1 year, the hay has begun to merge into the soil via decomposition. If you put your finger through the hay you can feel the soil is much looser and moist.
The greater moister level is established simply because matted and decomposing organic material retains moisture very well. That, and there is also a higher number of worms and microorganisms summoned by the surplus of organic material.
(the excrement of worms produce 6times the beneficial bacteria that they consume)
The burrowing and excrement of worms and microorganisms (whose intricate colonies and borrowing becomes otherwise destroyed by the idiocy of plowing) vastly improves soil and moisture retention.
In areas that I do not makes gardens covered with hay, I grow hay (about 70%) and white and red clover (30%). The clover gives back to soil what the hay takes (nitrogen mainly).
And the hay is continuously used to add to and strengthen the garden.
When the hay gets too long, I will cut it with a Scythe and use it by putting it into/onto the gardens.
Big seeds like squash, peas, beans, radishes, the flower nastrinium, sunflowers, potatoes, and corn all have symbiotic relationships with each other and thus will support each others growth, so they should be grown together - in a disorganized, chaotic, natural fashion. They also can be, and might as well be sown underneath the hay and will break through on their own accord.
Assuming you live in a climate that recieves rain on a fairly balanced basis, no watering is necessary if you have about a 6inch layer of material always decomposing (eventually, when your soil is advanced enough, the only material that needs to be above the soil, is weeds, grass, and the vegetables themselves.)
The amount of excess vegetable matter that results from your vegetables contains and puts back more nutrients into the soil than was taken out. Weeds stay in check because the density of vegetable foliage that results from your first crop, will function to partly supresses the weeds interfering with the next crop. Weeds should be supressed, not torn out because the roots of all-vegetation are designed to slough off and feed micro-organisms which improve your soil and thus your vegetables. The goal is not to supress all weeds, just however many you can with the ammount of surplus material that is allotted to you.
So eventually, as your soil becomes more rich with energy, the layer of material sitting atop the soil should be allowed to become fairly thin.
But when you first start, it is wise to put the extra hard work into establishing about a 6-inch layer of organic material. But who knows what you could get away with.
Planting fruit and nut trees is something that I will be doing this week.
Oh yeah, I live with my parents and am using their backyard to do this. It’s amazing how opposed they were to my interest in this.
Their reaction to me using their property for gardening was much like their reaction to my interest in philosophy. It gives them the impression that I have no ambition for getting myself a woman and making money.
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Can you put what Fukuoka means in words? I think I could understand it. I just don't like it when things seemingly can't be communicated. I think anything that exists can be communicated in one way or another. Sometimes it takes some creativity.
Well, aside from what I communicated above, and aside from what you read from the Bill Mollison interview, here are some selected excerpts from Fukuoka’s most renown book - ‘The One-Straw Revolution’:
“I could see that all the concepts to which I had been clinging, the very notion of existence itself, were empty fabrications. My spirit became light and clear. I was dancing wildly for joy. I could hear the small birds chirping in the trees, and see the distant waves glistening in the rising sun. The leaves danced green and sparkling. I felt that this was truly heaven on earth. Everything that had possessed me, all the agonies, disappeared like dreams and illusions, and something one might call ‘true nature’ stood revealed.â€
“In caring for a quarter-acre field, one or two people can do all the work of growing rice and winter grain in a matter of a few days. If seems unlikely that there could be a simpler way of raising grain. This method completely contradicts modern agricultural techniques. It throws scientific knowledge and traditional farming know-how right out the window. With this kind of farming, which uses no machines, no prepared fertilizer and no chemicals; it is possible to attain a harvest equal to or greater than that of the average Japanese farm.â€
“To grow crops in an unplowed field may seem at first a regression to primitive agriculture, but over the years this method has been shown in university laboratories and agricultural testing centers across the country to be the most simple, efficient and up-to-date method of all.â€
“Man’s mischief is what causes weak plants. Nature, left alone, is in perfect balance. Harmful insects and plant diseases are always present, but do not occur in nature to an extent, which requires the use of poisonous chemicals.â€
“Before researchers become researchers, they should become philosophers. Research wanders about aimlessly, each researcher seeing just one part of the infinite array of natural factors, which affect harvest yields. Furthermore, these natural factors change from place to place and from year to year.â€
“It is the same with the scientist. He pours over books night and day, straining his eyes and becoming nearsighted, and if you wonder what on earth he has been working on all that time – it is to become the inventor of eyeglasses to correct nearsightednessâ€
“Lao Tzu, the Taoist sage says that a whole decent life can be lived in a small village. Bodhidharma, the founder of Zen, spent nine years living in a cave without bustling about. To be worried about making money, expanding, developing, and growing cash crops is not the way of the natural farmer. Natural farming goes nowhere and seeks no victory, it is non-active, a methodless method, a non-opposing state of mind where all duality ends. When it is understood that one loses joy and happiness in the attempt to possess them, then the essence of natural farming will be realized. The ultimate goal of farming is not the growing of crops, but the cultivation and perfection of human beings.â€
Scott: Being unenlightened is probably the main reason why human beings are stupid.
Cory: Yes, to be stupid is to be un-enlightened, however, one must realize wisdom is a quality of action that is born out of awareness. Indigenous primitive cultures were not necessary comprised of supremely enlightened beings, but most cultures managed to sustain themselves, due to their holistic awareness of the ways nature and physiological sensitivity to energy and sensation, for thousands of years without any major problems.
Many explorers who first arrived in new lands were puzzled by how the primitives were not toiling and slaving. The more intelligent and introspective explorers would wonder with perhaps a bit of admiration: how did they survive without depending upon a large population working and toiling miserably?
Before long, the explorers who originally came in search of the garden of Eden (ironically) failed to recognize the primitives as significantly wiser and thus proceeded to manipulate them, spread disease, germs, guns, alcohol, sugar. White man hardly hesitated in his will to spread what has essentially become hell on earth. In the course of 50 years, white man manages to unintentionally destroy what primitives sustained themselves on for 1000's of years.
So, the primitives vs. the explorers are an interesting study.
Jared Diamond’s Gun’s, Germ’s and Steel is an excellent book on this sort of phenomenon.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/039331 ... e&n=283155
I don't know. For what end should the whole of humanities contribution be what is valued? For the sake of human kind? That's nice, but it's still based in delusion.
Why do you think Solway urges humanity to conquer space? Why do you think the QRS go to such lengths to publish books, do radio shows, and make websites? For the sake of humankind? Truth? You must realize that humankind is a part of truth. When I act for the sake of truth, I act for the sake of humankind. They are part of one whole.
I value being not only free from delusion, but free from the stupid demands of other deluded people, of university, of the work place.
I work at a call center where I’m influenced and pressured to do a lot of what I don’t want to do. Everyone is. Should I go to university and try and get in a better position? And rack up how much debt? It's a trap. And then teach people to be free? I must practice what I preach, neither being the enemy, nor depending upon the enemy.
The chances of one having the energy to break free from the stupidity of other people is greatly enhanced when you find yourself living directly in a wise environment, with wise people. I am emphasizing natural farming and permaculture because, like a good book, it will greatly enhanced ones chances of having direct contact with reality.
Universities, and the work-place will only diminish ones chances of finding reality, they make people bitter and financially burdened.
What goes up must come down. Human kind will end one day. What begins must end. There will always be challenges in our lives.
Ok, so should we then, in the meantime, keep subordinating our selves to the stupid demands of culture while masochistically chanting the mantra: "What goes up must come down. Human kind will end one day. What begins must end. There will always be challenges in our lives." ??
I am not content with mediocrity.
I am not talking about the importance of preserving humanity anyways.
I am talking about the rationality of wanting to spend ones life in an environment that helps free one from the stifling demands of delusion.
There will always be ways to improve and make our existence better. This will end, though. Nature survives beyond us....the truth is eternal.
Why are you interested in philosophy then? Is it not to improve and make your existence better? I agree, yes, it all will end, but in the meantime I might as well work towards earning a livelihood, towards establishing a way to surviving that doesnt leave me metephorically: 'lice on the pig'
Thus, I don't seek utopia, but I seek wisdom.
Well, first of all, neither can be sought. It's only the unwise who seek. the wise simply act wisely - they dont seek, they dont try. And second, a wise individual is the seed contributing to the forest of heaven on earth (utopia).
You are pretty much saying: I don’t seek growing a tree: I just seek planting a seed.
Scott, when you are wise, you are contributing towards heaven on earth whether you like it or not.
When you free yourself, you inadvertently help free humanity.
You say that the message is important, not the messenger.
Well, then messanger is equally important, if not more important. For the message is an incidental bi-produt of the messenger. The messenger is the essence of the message.
Besides, when the messenger profoundly changes, that very change morphogenetically contributes toward the ease to which humanity can also profoundly change.
Are you familar with Rupert Sheldrake? Not a perfectly enlightened man of course. But his theory he contributed to biology is very significant. Morphogenetic fields is an interesting concept, and if true, well, then the messenger becomes more important then the message.
The message is just an incidental affair, that can however be helpful.
As I said before, wisdom seems to accomplish all things...and I believe seeking wisdom brings about utopia. Not being interested in humanitarian ideas. Farming is one aspect of life...the truth is what created farming, though.
Truth and farming are, among everything, one whole. There is unwise farming and there is wise farming. Wise farming is born out of truth, and unwise farming is born out of delusion.
You're right that the desire for perfection is neurotic.
Like perfection of living, through permaculture.
I don't think that seeking perfect enlightenment is the same, though. It's the sanest thing to do.
I am saying that an environment of natural farming is a superior environment to seek perfect enlightenment. Ones chances are vastly improved. Otherwise, you must earn your livelihood through a narrow talent (which is a hindrance) or by means of a stupid job that demands you to do what is stupid.