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How to Design Your Perennial Farm and Your Life – Insights from Mark Shepard

by papprentice 30 Comments

It is said that there are a few pivotal moments in your life that will determine its trajectory. Well, I must say I’ve certainly had my share of these on my permaculture journey! The first was when I discovered permaculture through Bill Mollison and Geoff Lawton, shortly after I quit my job as a geologist. The next came about was when I stayed with David Holmgren for a while and released that I wanted to go back to my home country and prepare for uncertainties that lay ahead and lastly, when I met Mark Shepard on a recent workshop and decided to …

You might notice a pattern here and no, it’s not that I’m crazy or boldly going where no man has gone before, it’s that all of these men were my mentors in my journey, showing me the paths that lay before me and guiding me in the right direction, albeit unwittingly. I didn’t have to reinvent the wheel for myself, they paved the way for me and assisted me in my travels. All I needed to do was just listen, learn and adapt what they were doing to my circumstances.

One of these great mentors is Mark Shepard, he is an amazing individual who, in my book, is living the good life. This is what this permaculture journey is all about to me.  It’s about making a living not making a killing, it’s about creating a life that is meaningful and yes, it’s very attainable according to Mark, but …

Achieving this dream doesn’t come easy or quickly – it’s a marathon rather than a sprint, and it took Mark a while to get where he is today. However, we should not be disheartened by this, it’s possible, and if Mark can do it, so can we.

I believe in life you either have excuses or results. While a lot of people offer reasons for failure, fewer show results, and fewer still can guide others to attain them, Mark is one of these few, and when he speaks we should listen. So, why don’t you make a cup of tea, close that distracting YouTube video and learn from Mark and his life experience!

Mark Shepard – New Forest Farm, 106 Broadacre Perennial Agricultural Savannah, 22 Years in The Making

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Photo Credit: Van-Kal Permaculture

For those of you permies who have been living under a rock and haven’t yet heard of this permaculture icon, Mark is the founder and President of the Restoration Agriculture Development, and CEO of Forest Agriculture Enterprises. He teaches Agroforestry and Permaculture worldwide and is the author of Restoration Agriculture. He runs New Forest Farm, the 106-acre perennial agricultural savannah, considered by many to be one of the most ambitious sustainable agriculture projects in the United States, this is permaculture applied on a big scale.

While all this sounds impressive, his farming journey began in the wilds of Alaska, in the middle of nowhere, I don’t recall the exact story but he mentioned something on the lines of three-hour walk to the closest asphalted road, then 300 miles to the closest town … See, I told you he’s an amazing individual.

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See this red arrow? Well behind that mountain Mark’s journey began…

After the Northern Exposure episode (pun intended) Mark and his wife Jen moved to Wisconsin and, in 1994, founded New Forest Farm. Today this farm is one of the most developed and productive perennial farms in North America – trees, shrubs, vines, canes, perennial plants and fungi are planted in association to produce food (for humans and animals), fuel, medicines, and aesthetic delight …

This is the greatest example of how permaculture can feed the world and produce staple crops that our civilization needs. This is a model that can be repeated across the world…but let’s get few things straight right off the bat…

The Truth About Farm Economics

In this post I wanted to explain in layman’s terms the exact technicalities how Mark’s farm works and give all the information about size, location, what is he producing, how, all other info about the farm, etc and you can still read it here. … However, I wanted to add a twist to this story and talk about the elephant in the room.

What elephant am I talking about? Well, the making a living solely from agriculture elephant. A lot of us like to pretend it’s not there have an idealised view of what’s possible once you start farming. Here is what I mean …

When I asked Mark if there was one message you would like budding permies to hear, he said: “If you think you can move somewhere, buy land and make your living just from agriculture – you should think again”. But what do you mean I can’t make a living just from agriculture, isn’t Mark the guy who makes all his income just from agricultural activities? Well, you would be amazed how diverse his income really is and how it has changed throughout the years, but more about that later …

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I’m telling you guys and gals, the deck is rigged!

During the workshop when Mark discussed farm economics he offered a great metaphor for today’s farming, he said: “Starting a farming enterprise is like going to the casino and gambling with your life savings, the deck is rigged, the house is dealing and the house always wins”. Unfortunately, in most cases the house does win, but not always …

So, if the deck is rigged how do you win at this game, or at least better your odds. How do we enjoy the quality life that Mark is living – that’s what we all want, isn’t it? According to Mark this is exactly what we should be aiming for, and here is what I learned from his example.

Thinking about starting a permaculture farm? Skip the guesswork and use this free checklist as your reference.

How to Start a Perennial Farm and Create a Quality Life for Yourself

Ok, so let’s say for the sake of the argument that you already have a farm or some land, it’s a reasonable acreage and now you want to quit your job and make your living from farm activities alone. Should you just dive in, or perhaps do some strategic planning? Following Mark’s presentation, I must say that it is best done strategically. Here are the steps:

1. First start with your goals

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To win at this complex game called life you always start with your goals; this is the first thing you will learn from Mark. You should always ask yourself “what are my goals”. This is important, because you want context-specific solutions, not solutions that work for Joel Salatin, Paul Wheaton, Jack Spirko or Geoff Lawton … You want to have reality-based solutions, and that means your individual reality, not someone else’s.

You’ll see for yourself in time, but everything you’ll want to do on your farm comes back to ‘what are your goals?’ Should you have an orchard, market garden, grazing operation, put in swales? The answer is “it depends”. While this may sound vague, it is because there is no one-size-fits-all template to permaculture success; therefore, I ask again: “what are your goals?”

2. Don’t quit your day job just yet!

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Grinding it out on your job literally but not for long…

When Mark started his farm he still worked part time, he wasn’t rash, like some of us who quit their jobs and jumped into the farming game, thinking ‘I  like growing things, how hard it can be to make an income from this?’ One of the biggest faults of us humans are biases and one of the most frequent one is overconfidence. When we think about the future, we tend to imagine it better than it can possibly be in a reality, we are overconfident; we understate what it takes and overestimate our capabilities. How many times have you started a project just to realise that it cost you twice as much and it took twice as long to finish?

Optimists, pessimists or anything in between, humans suck at predicting the future, So don’t quit your job just yet, use the capital you have to develop the woody crops on your farm, do it during the week for an hour or two, more on weekends or holidays. The best thing you can do is to have a part-time job, this gives you some stability while still giving you time to develop your property, Mark has done it this way and so can you. Don’t box yourself into a corner.

3. Analyse your local biome and grow the trees that want to grow

world-biomes-map
Use maps as a general guideline and include human activity in your study of the biome.

Before you start growing anything, observe your local biome. You want to identify what’s grows naturally in your area and find the so-called ‘keystone’ species. This is what the restoration part is all about, you’re not creating something new, you’re observing nature, in your case your local environment, and trying to imitate it.

This is crucial because it’s about doing less work, and it will be considerably less hard going if you have nature as your ally and grow species that are naturally indigenous without anyone needing to take care of them. This is the one of the fundamental permaculture principles of working with nature rather than against it.

Therefore, as Mark said in his book: “Look around you and identify the plants that are thriving near you. Identify the perennial plants, observe how they grow in relation with one another, then imitate what you observe using selected, productive variants of the wild plants.” Sure, it might not be as sexy as growing Japanese Persimmon or Goji Berry but you want to grow trees and crops that will be happy to grow – meaning less work for you, the whole point is making your life easier.

4. Develop your property using keyline water management

keyline-crop-design
Keyline design on Mark’s farm in its full glory.

No matter where you go and what mineral deficiencies you have, there are plants who can adapt to these conditions, but no plant can live without water. Water is the ultimate nutrient and acquiring water should be your first task on the farm. 

You know that aerial image of Mark’s farm – you see the outlines there? Well, that is the almighty keyline water management pattern. Developed by the great P.A. Yeoman, it’s all about optimising rainfall distribution and, when used in conjunction with a keyline plow, it helps to quickly turn subsoil into topsoil.

Keyline pattern cultivation involves moving water from valley to ridges, and it all starts with finding a keypoint – a point of inflection and deposition in a primary valley. Once you have the keypoint, then the contour going through that point is the keyline – a line that you end up copying across your property.

I won’t try to go into detail on how it works, there are whole books written on this subject and, if you want more information, read this article. It can be applied to small- or large-scale projects, but using keyline design principles for designing the property and using swales as am management strategy is optional because “it depends” – it depends on your terrain and, of course, “what are your goals?”

5. Focus on planting woody perennials and use STUN to select the best-adapted ones

sheer_total_utter_neglect

Once you have your keyline cultivation pattern set, you can start putting trees in the ground – in the swales, on top of the swales, on the lower side of the swales, all depending on your local site conditions. The width of the alley between the swales is determined by the type of intended activity and equipment you’ll be using. In Mark’s case, he is growing annual crops and animals in the alleyways, but more about that later …

Because trees take a lot of time to bear fruit or nuts, they take priority over other elements of the farm, so you want to focus your efforts on planting woody perennials. Once you have your trees growing use the STUN method (Sheer Total Utter Neglect) to select for the most adapted ones. STUN entails planting loads of trees uncomfortably close to each other, totally neglecting them and selecting the survivors who are most capable of flourishing without your intervention.

Before I discovered Mark’s work, I put considerable effort into growing my trees, I would dig a hole, plant a tree, apply the best fertiliser I could find, weed the whole area, water it, apply the fertiliser again and… eventually the tree would die on me. Now you can imagine how much labour I put in just for that one tree and then it dies on me. However, after reading Mark’s book here is what I do today, I dig a hole, I plant a tree, spread some mulch and … that’s it! No weeding, reading bedtime stories, special treats … if it survives it survives. It’s survival of the fittest, if it’s a survivor then congratulations, if not, it’s history. Again, it’s about doing less work!

Thinking about starting a permaculture farm? Skip the guesswork and use this free checklist as your reference.

6. Use agroforestry practices to diversify and start generating some income

New-Forest-Farm-Drone-Fly-By-crop
Growing Apsagarus in between the trees as a quick cash crop.

Agroforestry is a set of practices that include alley cropping, sivlo pasture, forest farming, windbreak and riparian buffers. Mark makes extensive use of alley cropping and silvopasture practices. Alley cropping involves the growing of an annual or perennial crop between rows of high-value trees, and silvopasture is the intentional combining of trees and/or shrubs, forage and livestock.

They both include using alleyways to produce short-term income while the longer-term crop matures, which is great because you want to use the alleys for annual and perennial crops and other opportunistic, miscellaneous projects so you can start generating some cash.

Until those chestnuts start falling from the sky you’ll have to pay your bills somehow and Mark achieves this by growing grains, asparagus, butternuts and raising cattle, pigs and chickens and lots of other crops as opportunity presents itself.

7. Now you start upgrading your infrastructure

MarkShepardfarmaerialview_D
Mark’s off grid home, notice the distance from the main road.

Once you start generating some income, you start investing into infrastructure – better housing, fences, roads, etc. Mark said that he had no running water until recently. Now that’s what I call dedication to your cause! You can see the same level of commitment with Grant Shultz Versaland, who lives in a FEMA trailer while putting all his money into planting trees.

The lesson here is that, you want to use your money in the beginning to plant woody crops, they’ll take some time to mature. While you’re waiting, don’t invest in building a nice house, as it might take two-three years before your chestnuts are close to bearing nuts.

In saying this, I’m aware that some people have different properties and infrastructure. However, while housing and comfort might be more important to you than planting trees, think again about your goals: can renovating the house wait, do you really need a Jacuzzi – or you are better off planting 1000 trees?

8. Join a Co-op so you can easier compete with big Ag

Let’s talk about the big X – when it comes to farm economics you need to know where you are situated on this X. Looking on the far left side are big Ag farms producing commodity crops like corn, beans, soy – they get a low price for their products but have to produce high volumes to compensate for that low price. On the far right side is the high-price, low-volume direct marketing game, this would be your value added products, going to farmers markets and selling directly to the customer.

The right high-price side obviously takes a lot more effort to sell and it’s more about branding, marketing, and telling a story about your farm. The other side, in contrast, is more about output, less story, less interaction with customers but your competition is a heavily subsidised conventional agriculture machine that eats producers with an output like yours for dinner.

The best way for small producers to stand a chance against the might of big agriculture is to join forces and start a co-op. Co-ops are able to compete with conventional big Ag as they are composed of lots of smaller producers working together in a mutually beneficial way, pooling resources, sharing their market, logistics, processing facilities. Through their collectivism, everybody gets their piece of the pie, when otherwise there wouldn’t be any pie at all.

In Mark’s case, he has been part of the Organic Valley Co-op almost since the outset. Today, this is one of the biggest certified organic co-ops in the world due, in no small part, to Mark himself. In my mind this is also one of his secrets to success, you can read more about Organic Valley Co-op here.

9. Gradually increase profits from farming and other related activities

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Hybrid varieties of Chestnuts (Castanea spp. hybrids); Zone 4, developed on the farm. Seedling trees sold by Forest Agriculture Enterprises – Mark’s Nursery Business.

Ok, so if you performed all the steps above, and even with its rigged deck, you are about to beat the house, but the journey thus so far hasn’t been easy at all. If we look at Mark’s example in the early years (and when I say early I mean the first eight years) he was growing row crops, annuals, cattle, hogs, he had part-time jobs and has done a lot of miscellaneous things.

In the middle years he was still growing annuals, cattle, hogs, asparagus etc., but now other things started to kick in such as selling nursery stock, woody crops began to bear, he started teaching/consulting and his wife started a massage therapy business to bring in some stable income. In addition to all this, he was also doing a number of opportunistic jobs. This eventually resulted in less part-time work and more farm work.

At present, he is still growing asparagus and annual produce, his fruit and nuts are gradually increasing in volume, he is still working with hogs, cattle, teaching/consulting, his book is also bringing in some income as do tours of the farm. There are no more part-time jobs or any salaried employment, just farm-related activities.

All in all, as I said in the beginning, his income is diversified and, I would add, enduring and fairly secure. As Mark cautions, if you’re in this game, you don’t put all of your eggs in one basket – you put multiple eggs in multiple baskets. This is one of the fundamental lessons of permaculture, and one that’s well worth taking away with you.

10. Quit your Job and enjoy the good life

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Mark sharing his life wisdom with RAD pioneers – thanks to ZMAG team who organized the event.

With all the activities you have going on around your farm, you are at the point where you don’t need your mundane job anymore. You are heavily diversified, each of the business units is bringing in more than enough income for you to lead the life you want.

You’re eating a lot of fresh, beyond organic food and enjoying your life. Your farm is at the point where, even if left to itself, it will transform into an edible forest, not to mention the increase in its real estate value. From this point, you can fill in the blanks regarding how that good life looks for you, as it might be different for each of us.

In Conclusion

These were some of the lessons I learned from Mark. They gave me clarity on what I should focus upon, and how to pull off this initially difficult game. For me the end goal is the meaningful, high-quality life. How am I going to get there? Well, I’m going to leverage the opportunities around me – nursery stock development, growing herbs for the market, tourism, teaching/consulting … hell, I might even write a book and go on speaking tours and drink beer with cool people around the world … in my mind, it all counts and all the hard work is a rewarding means to an end.

What is important is your life and your goals and, if you’re a permaculture devotee, I’m sure that the planet and its inhabitants will be a better place because of your activities. Don’t be religious about making a sole income from farming or obsessively dogmatic, always come back to your goals – if you’re into permaculture and farming, ask yourself why you want it and you’ll find your unique path to ultimate success.

So, what do you think about farming today and Marc’s example? Let me know what you think in the comments!

How to Start a Permaculture Farm From Scratch – a Case Study With Grant Schultz

by papprentice 21 Comments

Yesterday morning, while walking on my farm, I thought to myself: “I haven’t done enough this season” “Things are moving slower than I expected” “Can I really make this happen?” “What if I don’t have what it takes?” “What if I fail and have to go back to a job?”

Starting a permaculture farm from scratch and going all in is a risky business. There are so many factors to consider; getting the startup capital, generating income in the first year, housing, and all other necessities of life.

In general, there are three main techniques for becoming successful: 1. Trial and Error (takes too long) 2. Over time (takes too long) 3. Modelling/Copying – the smoothest route. Modelling is the path most likely to provide you success in whatever you’re trying to do.

Accordingly, when considering how to start a permaculture farm from the bottom up, we’ll use the example of the Grant Schultz from Versaland, He bootstrapped his venture from nothing, just bare land, yet today he has a thriving business and makes a good living from his farm.

Before we start here are few interesting facts to consider about Grant:

  • He started mid-April 2013 – that’s just 2.5 years ago
  • There was no infrastructure on his land – nothing, just bare land, no buildings, electricity or water
  • He is leasing the land with option to buy – long-term land tenure with a predetermined strike price
  • Yes, he does workshops, but they are not his primary source of income – the land itself generates his main sources of revenue.

With that in mind, let’s dive in.

Versaland – Iowa City, Iowa, USA – 145-acre farm, laboratory and homestead – 2.5 years of establishment

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Grant went to a conventional agricultural college and took a horticultural path. However, he soon started to believe something was wrong with the conventional system and began searching for a viable alternative, eventually finding permaculture. Following graduation, he became involved with startups, and also gained some valuable experience as a real estate agent. Nonetheless, to him, food security was the most important path to pursue.

He started a successful commercial garlic growing operation on rented land and began to play an active role in the new food and farm movement, but had a problem all too common for novice farmers: land access. However, through networking with farmers at the 2013 Practical Farmers Annual Conference, he eventually found a permanent home at Versaland Farm near Iowa City, and Grant hit the ground running.

Currently, VersaLand is developing an agricultural ecosystem that seamlessly blends technology and tradition. It’s a silvopasture, an agroforestry practice that includes both trees and livestock. Grant focuses on resilient farm infrastructure, perennial field crops, superfoods and grazing management. Using a keyline water management system, Versaland showcases the early stages of an agroecological design alongside mature oaks and hickories.

The Versaland Model

1. Location and Size

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Mid-West USA, 12km from University of Iowa

Versaland is a 145-acre farm located in Iowa City, Midwest USA. It’s in the USDA Plant Hardiness zone 5, and in a cool temperate climate.

Grant set clear goals for himself and then selected land suitable for meeting them. He wanted to set up a farmscale permaculture demonstration site in the Mid-West, yet also be close to people of similar age.

The criteria for land selection was the proximity of markets and social groups. Therefore, he had to be within 30 minutes’ drive of a major university or metropolitan area, and an area eight miles (12 km) from the University of Iowa turned out to be ideal for his purposes.

Grant’s method offers a valuable lesson in acquiring suitable land: first set up a holistic goal and then have your list of criteria ready to help inform your search.

2. Agroforestry system – silvopasture with a keyline layout

Pretty dense tree planting

Grant does perennial polycultures at scale. This is broadacre permaculture and, in a similar fashion to Mark Shepard, he practices silvopasture. An agroforestry practice fundamentally includes trees and livestock, producing high-value fruit crops for direct marketing and U-pick while grazing livestock in alleys. At present his primary livestock are grazing pigs.

The general layout of the farm is in a keyline pattern. This helps in optimizing rainfall distribution across the landscape. His planting methodology is rows of trees, 2.5 or 5 feet (0.7 – 1.5m) apart and 30 foot (9m) wide alleyways. This amounts to around 100 trees an acre. The trees are planted in a similar method to ‘Permaculture Orchard’ trios but in a slightly more complex manner, with significant amounts of paw paws, chestnuts, nectarines, persimmons, quinces and more.

3. Basic infrastructure and low housing cost

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Cheap housing – more money for the business

As earlier mentioned, there was no infrastructure on the property at the outset, nothing at all. To date, Grant hasn’t yet performed any significant water earthworks, but he has a well and a basic water system for his animals. However, large-scale water storage is expensive, and as a new farmer his cash is tight. He is a vocal proponent of mobile infrastructure and lives in FEMA mobile classroom of under 250 square feet with no running water. His housing costs are low, and by living in a mobile home there is an extra bonus: no property taxes.

He is living small to go big, so he is able to use his capital on getting plants in the ground. If you want your farm to succeed then you must embrace frugality and downsize your lifestyle like Grant did, at least when you’re in the most vulnerable phase of starting out. This means keeping your housing expenses low and not spending too much on buildings. You can nearly bankrupt yourself spending $100,000 building a house or you can build one for $5,000, or, even better, live in a mobile classroom like Grant.

4. On-site Permaculture Nursery

Chesnuts + Soil + Water = Smallscale nursery

Since the earliest stages Grant has set up a small nursery for himself. He is, after all, planting a lot of trees. When establishing a broadacre system Grant has two separate routes, depending on the capital available: buying more expensive but already grafted trees or buying cheaper rootstock, planting more densely and later top grafting from free material. It all depends on how much capital you can invest upfront. You can choose your timeline – inexpensive but slower establishment or an expensive but instant orchard.

Starting trees from seed is also something recommended by Grant. This is the most inexpensive method and also offers genetic variability. He has collected chestnut seeds, put them into pallets, mixed with soil, added water and now has 300-400 trees a pallet. He has even inoculated the beds with fungi, to encourage growth in the young trees. Similarly to buying barefoot trees, you could obtain the seeds for free or buy them really cheaply, then wait for three years, or you can order $ 25 already grafted tree from nurseries. Again, you choose the timeline.

Grant started to sell nursery stock locally at the farmers market and through word of mouth. However, it wasn’t until he went online that he realised that there was considerable demand. These days, his nursery stock is an online e-commerce model that sells trees locally, along with regionally developing and supplying the select genetics for agroforestry. Versaland now markets all nursery stock exclusively through the e-commerce website New Farm Supply. The nursery provides 30,000+ trees annually and, from what I saw, can pass on wholesale prices to potential buyers.

5. Using government grants and low interest loans 

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Working within the system

Grant has become an expert in getting free money and borrowing money at low interest. In 2013 alone, he received over $135,000 of grants to build a high tunnel, install a well, and plant and protect approximately 28,000 trees. The reason why the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) supports permaculture is because what Grant does falls into the category of agroforestry, a farming technique recognised and supported by the USDA. Nonetheless, to obtain this kind of cost share you need to first and foremost do your research, understand the language, and learn how to work within the system. You might also wish to sign up for Grant’s email list at Freemoneyforfarmers.com to learn the ropes of USDA grant and cost-share opportunities.

Another key piece of advice Grant offers to potential farm owners is to start their farming enterprise today and begin producing something straight away. This is important because later on if you want to borrow money from FSA (Farm Service Agency), you’ll need to fulfil at least three years of IRS schedule F “requirement”. You see, FSA offers 5% downpayment loans for fledgling farmers, but to qualify you’ll have to prove sufficient business experience to manage a farm. This is where those three years of schedule F comes in.

In Grant’s case he also had to borrow money from FSA for continuing his farming operation, and to do that he needed to forecast his enterprise budgets and be able to manage his finances effectively. Running a 12-month cash flow budget is super important, because you need to be able to forecast if you’ll have money, and if not, you need consider whether you need to borrow and calculate in the interest rate. Therefore, being good with numbers and cashflow forecasting is an essential skill for a new farmer. Government grants will, however, speed up the process, and this is what you want – speed and inertia – low interest loans will also help to get things moving.

6. Polyculture of incomes

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Hay, Pigs, Workshops – Multiple income streams

The farm itself is a major income stream, with several on-farm enterprises. Grant is an enthusiastic proponent of many reasonable sized income steams rather than one big one. He offers a diverse range of products. The most popular enterprise is the on-farm nursery, specializing in permaculture plants and trees. He also added a 1,000-log mushroom operation, sells up to 500 large round hay bales a year, and grazes pigs on 100% pasture, with no supplemental grain required.

He was cashflowing from the beginning, because cash was going out for development and because some form of cash income was required. In the beginning he pre-contracted and sold oats as seed variety, and started a lot of Chinese chestnuts, planting 85% of them and then selling the rest, or bought them wholesale and sold 50% to cover costs. He also had other short-term businesses such as growing heirloom garlic and selling it as seeds using an e-commerce site.

Today his most lucrative sources of cash flow are hay and nursery stock. According to Grant, consulting and education form just a tiny part of the gross revenue.

Here is the breakdown of the farm income:

  • Hay – 35%

This is the biggest crop, last year’s sales were 500 round bales.

  • Nursery Business – 30%

He makes around $ 40,000 a year running a nursery business on an acre. Bare-root trees are shipped all across the country. He sells trees such as chestnut, pawpaw, apple and persimmon.

  • Workshops – 20%

Online and offline courses and workshops – four-day Farmscale Permaculture courses, GPS Keyline Design and GPS Keyline Workshop; an online course for technology developed by Grant.

  • Services – 10%

Working with clients to build upland. Services include Farm Design, Pond Design, GPS Keyline Design and Silvopasture Design

  • Livestock – 5%

He currently keeps livestock for breeding and growing rather than marketing although Grant said that “Livestock revenue will quickly increase when we begin to cull, but our relative herd size is small given the land base. (40 pigs, 50 ducks)”

7. Entrepreneurial mindset and continuous innovation.

Planning is important but not that important

Grant focuses on continuous improvement, constantly evaluating and developing innovations in order to improve his business.
He is building farm hack inventions, inventing new tools and constantly devising more productive ways of doing things that offer better ROI. Tree transplanters, custom row mulchers and electric tractors are examples of the specialized machinery used to plant, maintain, and harvest a multispecies agroecosystem at Versaland. GPS Keyline Design is another technology developed by Grant when he was faced with huge design implementation costs. Basically, this technology allows the inexpensive installation of large keyline systems using GPS technology.

This state of constant improvement and bootstrap mentality is something that has shaped Grant’s permaculture journey and we can learn a lot from this approach. A farm is a business and if you want to make a living from it, you have to approach it as such. You also need to develop a greater risk-tolerance to life, because in business things change quickly and no paycheque is guaranteed. Grant is the kind of person who is willing to take the risks associated with starting a farm from scratch and his quality of life is a direct reflection of this.

Conclusion

Starting a farm is entirely dependent on your unique concept. There is no fixed recipe for success; however, modelling other successful people’s techniques and adapting them to your situation is the quickest way to achieve your goals. As Grant would say, “planning is important but not that important”. A lot of people suffer from analysis by paralysis -if you sit around waiting for the perfect day, it’s never going to come. Frame it like you have nothing to lose because your quality of life is decreasing as you sit around, no matter what’s your age, you are going to have to seize the day.

In summary:

  • You don’t need land to start a farm – begin selling something today, start a mobile farm business and start filing Schedule F – you’ll need three years’ experience to obtain agricultural loans
  • When starting out make use of existing government cost-share programs to speed up the establishment of the farm
  • Live small to go big – if you have low expenses and live in a mobile home you’ll have more money to invest into your business
  • You’ll always need trees, start an on-site nursery, grow trees yourself and start selling locally, as you expand set up an e-commerce site and sell across the country
  • You’ll need other sources of income too – for Grant, in addition to selling nursery stock, other quick sources of income were hay and selling heirloom garlic as seeds
  • Your farm is a business, think like an entrepreneur and innovate where you can improve your business, understand enterprise budgets and finances, cashflow is the lifeblood of any successful business

This was a good lesson on courage and a can-do mentality. What do you think about starting a permaculture farm from scratch?

Let me know in the comments!

*Photo Credits – Peter Allen PV2 Presentation

 

Here is How You Make a Living From a 4 acre Permaculture Orchard

by papprentice 27 Comments

What if I told you that it is possible to make a living from a 4-acre orchard, and you can even do this with less work, more yield, and more fun?

What if I told you that the secret to doing this is already known, but the information about how to go about it has not reached you?

I wrote about Stefan previously, but his model deserves an in-depth explanation. His orchard took 22 years to establish, and to be honest, it wasn’t always rosy for Stefan.

He is a pioneer of permaculture orchards, and now he shares his knowledge so you do not need to go through 20 years of trial and error like him. You can learn from his experiences so that you don’t make the same mistakes he did. Learning from his experiences means you can save time and money.

But before we go any further, here are a few things to consider about Stefan:

  • He bought his 5-hectare block and 4000 trees for $42000 – he had no debt, no mortgage, and no money left to do anything
  • He had very little farming experience when he started his farm – he did, however, have a formal education that helped him
  • Stefan does not live on his farm – he actually lives in the city and commutes to his farm from home.
  • He had many setbacks along the way that would make most people quit, but he persisted, and now his farm is successful.

Miracle Farms: Stefan Sobkowiak – A 4 -acre Commercial Permaculture Orchard, 22 Years in the Making

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Stefan Sobkowiak is an educator, biologist, and master of landscape architecture. He has taught fruit production, landscape plants and design, and the natural history of vertebrates at Montreal’s McGill University. This experience helped a lot when he decided to focus on Permaculture Design and his ‘Miracle Farms’.

The farm that he bought was originally developed as a commercial monoculture apple orchard, making the transition to becoming an organic farm upon purchase in 1993, and was certified organic in 1996. Eventually, Stefan understood the limitations of the organic model originating from monoculture. Since 2007, four acres have been converted to a permaculture-inspired “u-pick” orchard.

Miracle Farms is the largest and the most developed example of a commercial permaculture orchard in Eastern North America. Production from the farm is sold to 30-80 member families with the short-term goal of reaching 100 families.

Recently with filmmaker Olivier Asselin, Stefan released a DVD called The Permaculture Orchard: Beyond Organic. This is a feature-length educational film that teaches how to set up your own permaculture orchard on any scale. Stefan has this to say about the film – “It will really save you 10 years at least of trial and error and thousands of dollars. Don’t reinvent the wheel, take what I learned and build on it .”

So let’s dive in and see what you can learn from Stefan’s model.

(Note: I’ve put together a bonus resource at the end of this post that will help you with starting your permaculture orchard so be sure to check it out!)

Permaculture Orchard Model

1. Location and Size

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Les Fermes Miracle Farms is about one-hour southwest of Montreal, roughly 100km away, in Cazaville, Quebec, Canada. It’s Canada’s warmest climate zone -Agriculture Canada Zone 5b: USDA zone 4. The property is 12 acres in size with approximately 4 acres planted in a Permaculture style orchard.

The location of the farm is very important. As with many models I have described before, Miracle Farm is located relatively close to the target market, in this case, close to the million-and-a-half people living in Montreal.

Although the original idea was 30 minutes away from Montreal, which is an ideal distance for a clientele membership club according to Booker T. Whatley’s Handbook on How to Make $100,000 Farming 25 Acres, after many years of searching Stefan settled for a farm twice that distance from Montreal but still managed to make his farm a success.

What Stefan learned was this: If you are close to the city, there is not such a need to diversify but if people invest their time and visit your farm that is further away, you need to offer them something more that is worth the visit. That is exactly what Stefan did.

2. On-site Permaculture Nursery

Stefan needed a lot of trees for his new orchard. Although there were 4000 apple trees in the orchard already, in the first two years of owning the farm he sadly lost 1000 of them. The cost of the trees accounts for more than 50% of the costs of an orchard, so to decrease his expenditure, Stefan set up a nursery project so that he could grow his own trees.

While teaching at McGill University, Stefan partnered with one of his students who wanted hands-on experience and started a tree nursery on the farm. In return for his help, Stefan agreed to split the trees they produced between them 50:50. They tilled a 12x23m area (276m squared), made 3 rows, and planted rootstock to be grafted later.

So think about it, if you want to start a permaculture orchard, you could plant a nursery ahead of time by using a 10ftx10ft (3mx3m) spot in your backyard. Plan now, gather your mother plants from which you will be able to take cuttings or scions for grafting, contact people in your area that are doing similar projects, and learn from them. You could grow just below 1000 trees in that small area (If you have trees in each of the pots, you should yield 900 trees).

As Stefan said: “There is a tremendous motivating force to find a piece of property once you have a nursery full of plants that will soon need to be transplanted.”

3. Trios Design Pattern

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What’s unique about Stefan’s orchard is that it is planted in Trios (originally called NAP – nitrogen fixer, apple, and plum/ pear), One nitrogen fixer, and 2 crop trees. This is very similar to David Holmgren’s European-style permaculture orchard, where he interplants with tagasaste (tree lucerne), also an N – fixer.

One characteristic of this pattern is that no fruit or nut tree is next to its own species in the row or in between the rows. Therefore, if any tree gets infested with pests, it is much less likely to pass the problem on to another tree of its kind.

Although 1/3 of the orchard aren’t fruiting trees, mixing in nitrogen-fixing trees among fruit trees is essential because it helps to create fertility and eliminates the need for external inputs of fertilisers, resulting in a circular ecosystem that virtually takes care of itself.

Amazingly, there has been no fertilizer used on Stefan’s orchard since 2007, and the fruit trees keep on giving as much yield as conventionally grown trees. N – fixers, in Stefan’s case, are Honey Locusts, and they also act as trellising for vines, kiwi, and grapes. The primary goal is to increase diversity whilst providing a diversity of crops and to reduce or eliminate the use of fertilisers and pest and disease control products.

This orchard now offers over 80 cultivars of apples, in addition to several types of plums, pears, cherries, and countless other fruits and vegetables. There are also trios in shrubs: red, black currants, honeysuckle, gooseberry, raspberry, and rhubarb, as well as over 100 different types of ground cover such as annual vegetables, herbs, and grasses.

With this hugely diverse amount of crops, trees, bushes, shrubs, and plants, you might wonder how Stefan makes sense of the countless plants growing. There is one more ingredient to this design.

4. Grocery Store Concept

grocery store

While the trios (NAP) design is a 3D pattern in Stefan’s orchard there is also the fourth dimension which is simply: Time.

In a permaculture orchard, everything is organized by following what Stefan calls a ‘grocery aisle’ concept, whereby everything in one row will be ripe and ready to harvest within a 10-day window.

Despite the huge diversity of species, this allows for efficient harvesting. Customers can walk down the row and easily gather the majority of the fruits and vegetables they require in one go, just like they would in the grocery store.

This also helps bring order to the high diversity madness of 100 cultivars of fruit & nut trees, dozens of small fruit shrub cultivars, and over 100 species of companion plants. Stefan also aims for a complete harvest season without any spaces when there will be nothing to harvest. Harvest dates are key to a successful ‘grocery aisle’ planting- Ideally, you need to aim for three periods of 10-day harvests per month.

While conventional orchards also use the idea of multiple harvest dates because labor is one of their biggest expenses, Stefan is able to keep his labor costs even lower. How? All the lower parts of the tree fruit picking is done by his customers! Leaving the tops of trees to be picked with ladders.

Want to start a permaculture orchard like Stefan? If so, you need to design it first. I’ll show you how to take that first step and design the orchard layout, just click here.

5. CSA/U-pick operation – Costco Style Membership

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Over the years, Stefan has built up a customer base that is willing to come and pick the produce themselves, thus cutting down on labor costs. He said: “The greatest single cost for most fruit production is harvesting and packaging, usually 40% of the total costs. If people harvest their own in their own containers, we can pass on some of the savings and still earn a better return for our efforts.”

His business model is a members-only U-pick operation – basically the same as a Costco membership. For those living outside the USA, UK, or Australia, Costco is an American membership-only warehouse club that provides a wide selection of merchandise at low prices, but membership must be purchased in advance for one year.

In Stefan’s case, members pay an annual fee of $55, which entitles them to come and pick up at all of his open days. They can also attend the tours for free and order meat that Stefan also produces. They also get $20 redeemable towards their purchase as part of their membership and benefit from getting fresh, beyond-organic food for up to 50% less than what they might buy in the supermarket. Non-members cannot pick any fruit or buy meat. They may be able to buy from a small roadside stand at twice the U-pick price when Stefan has extra produce.

Stefan also makes sure to use one of the most powerful words in the world of marketing: NO. He often says this in response to people who would like a one-off experience on the farm. This makes his farm an experience limited to the group of people who have chosen to be members and are opting for an experience and not just passing by. This way, Stefan can provide value to his customers and better convey and inform members of what foods they have. He can tell the ongoing story about his orchard, as well as its history, and educate his members.

Stefan did not always work this way. Initially, he started selling to the public and built up a customer list of satisfied buyers. Stefan said: “A list of satisfied buyers is worth gold.” Later on, he converted to the paid membership model, and a lot of those existing customers signed up.

6. Innovations in the Management of the Orchard

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Do you know how many plants Stefan has on 1 acre of land? If we look at the figures, it is – 450 trees, a minimum of 450 shrubs, 16×450 = 7200 perennials + ground cover, 150 vines, this is a total of a minimum of 8250 plants. And this is just in 1 acre of land. Stefan has 4.

How can one man maintain this many plants, prune all of his trees and not even live on the farm? There must be a secret.

Stefan was clever and open-minded enough to embrace novel methods of caring for his trees. This enabled him to do 80% less work when it came to pruning- although it would be more accurate to say training rather than pruning.

He still prunes his trees but only the branches that actually shape the tree, i.e., doing steps to have a chimney to a tree, keeping only 12 -14 branches, and pruning or maintaining every branch he keeps. He learned a lot from various French horticulturists in the compiled book Growing Fruit Trees: Novel Concepts and Practices for Successful Care and Management.

On top of that, he uses whey to displace fungi diseases, uses insect traps containing molasses, and creates favourable habitats for his wildlife that will help protect his trees and plants..

His methods are innovative, and he innovates and experiments all the time. He does still use some conventional orchard methods for doing things, such as using plastic mulch and irrigation pipes. To have a better understanding of his whole method of Permaculture Orchard I would encourage you to watch the film where he fully explains his methods and reasons for doing them.

7. Income from Diversification and Stacking function

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Although the main crop is fruit, fruit alone would not be enough to earn Stefan a decent income. It is also important to note that in farming, you do not get to decide which year will be a good harvest.

Stefan knows a lot about farming, but he is not the boss Mother nature is, so there can be years with a low fruit tree yield, which, when it is your main crop, is a big problem.

The answer to maintaining a sustainable income in bad harvest years is like in investing, you don’t invest all your money in stocks and put all of your eggs in one basket. You must diversify and be consistent with production. When people come, have something else to offer besides your primary crops.

Making a profit on an acre is stacking functions of apples, pears, vines, and herbs, as well as keeping animals that graze in the grassy lanes. The grassy lanes are used for pasture (as Mark Shepard does). In these lanes, he raises chickens, turkeys, guinea fowl, ducks, and geese. The farm is used as a continuing education lab for students in the permaculture courses, offering workshops (grafting, pruning, nursery propagation, raising small fowl, processing fowl) as well as for interns. Farm tours are also available for groups. Here is the full income breakdown.

Farm Income:

  • Sale of Produce and Products – 70%
    – Herbs, Flowers, Fruit Trees & Berries, Vegetables, Traps.
    – Meat birds.
    – Added value products: Juices from apples, dried fruit
  • Education – 20%
    – PDC, Workshops
    – DVD
  • Consultancy Service = 2%
  • Tours of the farm – 8%

Just note that the exact figures for farm income vary from year to year. As Stefan remarks: “ Last year was dismal with no tree fruit, although the best year for small fruit. So last year was a reversal with education and tours making up 70% and sales of produce and products 20% . It’s great to have a diversity of yields to balance things out from year to year.”

8. Learning-Oriented Mindset

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If you came this far, you, my friend, are a keen learner and this is a lesson for you. None of the success Stefan had after 20 years of hard work would be possible without embracing a learning mentality.

With so many setbacks and mistakes, many ordinary people would quit a project like Stefan’s, as the owner from whom Stefan bought his orchard did. But, as they say in Permaculture: “there are no mistakes, only feedback” Stefan accepted that feedback and kept moving along.

He said:” I was a near total newbie respecting orchards when we bought a 4000-tree conventional apple orchard. Began the conversion to organic and immediately lost 1000 trees first 2 years. (Ouch) Learned a whole lot.”

Stefan recommends, in the beginning seeing what other people are doing, learning from their mistakes, and building upon their good designs. He recommends starting and then visiting other farms and doers to see first-hand how things are done and to have a reference point for what you’re doing.

When he started he visited Joel’s Polyface farm and others, read books, and kept trying new things and innovating on his own farm. Traveling and seeing what other farmers were doing was eye-opening and taught Stefan a lot.

Conclusion

It took 22 years for Stefan to reach the point where he is today, and his road to success was paved with many setbacks and many learning experiences. Now everything he learned is readily available. So, watch his film and read his book. Everything is there; you just need to act on it.

If you want to provide a more natural environment, free from the artificiality of monoculture and welcome natural allies to do their jobs, if you want a greater yield of produce and more fun, with less work- then interplant with nitrogen fixers and increase plant diversity through different species and different cultivars.

To put it simply, there are four steps to establishing a permaculture orchard – 1. trees, 2. shrubs, 3. companion plants (perennials, herbs, vines) 4. allies. But there is much more to it if you want to adopt the permaculture orchard model and adapt it to your situation.

  • Don’t reinvent the wheel. Take what Stefan learned and build on it – save yourself time and money.
  • Location is very important – the ideal location, if you have produce to sell, is 30 min from the population center and on the main road, but you can make it work if you have to be based further away.
  • Grow your own trees to help reduce costs and motivate yourself – if you can, partner up with someone with skills and split the final trees.
  • Create Trios – interplant with nitrogen fixers and increase plant diversity through different species and different cultivars.
  • Use grocery store concept – windows for harvesting, same cultivars in the same row, while the understory is growing all year.
  • Start a CSA/U-pick operation – Costco-style membership – members harvest, so you don’t have that expense. As much as 40% of conventional fruit-growing expenditure is spent on harvesting and containers.
  • Embrace novel methods of maintaining trees to save time and keep your orchard beyond organic with innovative methods of pest control.
  • You want to be consistent with production- to do that, diversify. When people come have something else to offer besides the primary crop.
  • Making a profit on an acre is stacking functions of apples, pears, vines, herbs, and animals grazing in grassy lanes.
  • Never stop learning and trying. Period!
Stefan’s vision for the Permaculture Orchard is: 1000 hectares, 1000 people in 50 countries. Do you feel inspired to join his vision?

If so, here’s a guide that’ll help you with designing your permaculture orchard. One of the first steps in the establishment is deciding on the layout of the whole orchard because, of course, you can’t plant trees if you don’t know where to plant them.

In this guide, I’ll show you step-by-step how I’ve done it on my property when I was starting from scratch. I’ll also point you toward additional resources that will help you broaden your knowledge about starting a permaculture orchard.

To access the guide and additional resources click here!

How to Prepare for a Collapse – a Case Study with David Holmgren

by papprentice 23 Comments

It’s 2025, the long troubled financial markets have finally crashed the overleveraged banking system and the world is experiencing global depression on a massive scale. Precipitated by environmental destruction, heatwaves are scorching the planet, destroying the monoculture food crops, and there are food riots in every major city. In order to maintain the social order upon panicked and desperate populations governments are forced to introduce a command economy, issuing people supermarket food stamps.

But for you and your family nothing has changed, you are awoken each morning by birdsong and the gentle rays of the sun. You light your wood-fired stove and boil the cast iron kettle, as it boils you prepare a breakfast from your orchard’s fruit and listen to news that seems remote and alien. Your biggest problems are what to do with all the surplus food and what to make for the dinner you are preparing for your friends and neighbors.

Is it possible that this complex society we have come to take for granted is, like so many before, coming to its natural end?

What can we all do to prepare for this dystopian vision of the future? 

The answer comes from David Holmgren and Su Dennet. They are living the sustainable life outlined in the latter part of the scenario and nothing much would change for them if we experience the now almost inevitable “big crunch”.

Let’s learn from them and see how to create an enduring and self-reliant life.

Don’t have time to read the whole post now, you can download the PDF here. 

Melliodora – Hepburn Springs, Australia – 2 acre homestead in a small rural township – 25 years of establishment

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Family photo 1991; David, Kimon (19), Oliver (5) and Su.

In 1985 David and his wife Su purchased a one hectare block of land on the edge of Hepburn, central Victoria, to build a family home and develop a self-reliant lifestyle which reflected their values. When they originally purchased the land it was covered in brambles and rabbit burrows, hiding the rubbish and degradation of the earlier decades.

In the 25-odd years since, David and Su have transformed their block into garden of eden with more than 120 fruit and nut trees, a productive vegetable patch, and free-range goats and chickens. The property provides plenty of food, firewood, water and energy. The vast percentage (80%) of their food is provided from the property, and they make use of fermentation and preserving techniques to enjoy a largely vegetarian diet occasionally supplemented with locally hunted wild game.

Today this is one of the best documented and widely known permaculture demonstration sites on the planet. Sometimes, they open ‘Melliodora’ to the public for personally guided tours. It’s well worth of a visit and I would heartily recommend it.

The Mellidora Model

HD-Banners-MelliodoraMelliodora is a model permaculture property, showcasing how much of our needs can be catered for through good design and careful land use, particularly on smaller and urban properties.

David is fond of stating the importance of models others can replicate and modify. So, let’s see what we can learn from this pioneering couple.

1. Location and size

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Aerial view of locality autumn 1989, showing Melliodora at the centre.

The property is 2 acres in size and located on an urban-rural fringe. David perspective regarding location is that:

“The urban-rural fringe is an edge where the resources of both the city and the country are accessible. The location of the land and its relationship to both town services and the surrounding natural and community environment affect its potential as much as the natural characteristics of the land.”

Melliodora is an hour’s drive north west of Melbourne. It is in rural surroundings, in the midst of a small, convenient, rural township. This said, it still far enough from Melbourne that the influence of metropolis is largely unnoticeable.This said, it still far enough from Melbourne that the influence of metropolis is largely unnoticeable.

When choosing where to live they had to consider where the customers for David’s consulting microbuses would be. Central Victoria and small rural town Hepburn Springs were considered to be ideal: relatively close to his target market, yet still with a likeminded community.

Some might say that two acres is small, but those two acres is a lot for one or two people to intensively manage and, according to David, even that is a stretch. This acreage is also more than adequate to provide enough produce for the needs of a family.

2. Whole farm and landscape planning

whole farm
The strategic planning process for the farm.

While traditional farms were designed, they were mostly unconscious, based on slowly evolved practise. Melliodora, in contrast, is a showcase of the conscious design and integration of landscape, infrastructure, homestead and enterprise activities. Let’s see what this means in practice…

In a nutshell, landscape is the natural foundation and ultimate resource of any farm. It is the true source of its wealth and all other built “improvements” – infrastructure are added to landscape to enable the better use of this resource.

The homestead (zone 1&2) provides for household needs and also acts as a testing ground for new ideas, processes and species before they can be scaled to more broadacre use or for commercial purposes.

The enterprise is the connection to the wider society and economy and the financial engine of the farm. These days, making a living from a farm involves more than just husbandry, hard work and management, marketing and finance are significant aspects that can’t be ignored. Customers and partners have become critical players in making a farm economically viable.

This is the kind of framework that David and Su used for establishing Melliodora, and it’s essential for holistic planning. Let’s see how they utilised it…

3. Owner built house

owner built
House construction.

Although land used to be much cheaper, and could therefore be purchased without a mortgage, this doesn’t change the fact that the approach to land development has always been critical for the successful establishment of the farm. With the help of a few friends David and Su built their house from scratch using mud bricks sourced from Bendigo, wood from local traditional sawmills, salvaged bushfire-burned cypress and blackwood.

The house has a classic “passive solar” construction, with a greenhouse and full glazing along the north side. The thermal mass of the mud brick walls keeps the interior at a comfortable temperature. Food is stored in a “cool cupboard” instead of a refrigerator. Solar energy and firewood provide the majority of the home’s energy needs. Additionally, they burn about 5 to 7 tons of wood annually, which covers all the cooking, hot water, heating and food preservation.

Being an owner builder has many advantages, it allows for customisation, the use of natural building materials, passive solar design to water harvesting and reuse systems, and, most importantly, lower costs. Moreover, you can build in stages as money become available, the famous pay-as-you-go strategy. Moving into the house before it is fully finished also allows for further refinement of design details.

4. Advanced water strategy

water system
Water design at Melliodora.

Australia is the driest inhabited continent in the world, this calls for proper water strategy planning. To David: “Failure to manage water resources to optimise the biological productivity of the land is a fundamental cause of land degradation.” On small rural properties such as Melliodora, water supply typically involves more design and capital input than for any other aspect except that of the house.

Water supply is secured with 2 dams, a 42,000 litre concrete header tank, and a 3600 litre tank, which collects runoff from a small section of the house roof. There is also town water supply, and an interconnected network of roof runoff and drainage systems.

The total catchment for the dams is 40 hectares, the partially urbanised nature of the catchment resulting in the total water yield being higher than could otherwise be expected. The dam water is then pumped to header tanks at the top of the property to irrigate the gardens and orchard as well as reserve water for firefighting purposes. 

The entire water system is designed to offer a high level of self-reliance and redundancy, where priority is given to gravity fed systems. Irrigation tasks can thus be performed in a number of ways. Although there is a connection to the town water supply, it acts as a backup to the main water system.

5. Food self sufficiency

food self s
Zone 1 with chooks, raised beds and perennials.

Although 2 acres appears modest, Melliodora nonetheless has 120 fruit and nut trees in a European style mixed orchard, along with chooks, geese, goats, and an intensive vegetable garden. The orchards yield 2t of produce which, in combination with the house gardens, provides for their mostly vegetarian diet, and creates a seasonal surplus – mostly consumed in residential courses or traded with local community.

They are completely self-sufficient for fruit, nuts, veggies and herbs, only occasionally consuming meat from wild animals, and supplementing their diet with animal products such as eggs, milk, and honey. With the exception of grains and other small supplementary locally sourced products, Su believes they are 85% self-sufficient, and are able to cater for 10 people from garden produce alone. This kind of abundance wouldn’t be possible without the constant soil development which, according to David is: “the most important aim of biological agriculture and is central to the ongoing development of this property.”

Although ‘zone 1’ house gardens and greenhouse offer important yields, it is the perennial plants that provide structure, functions and the main yields of the system. The mixed orchard is planted with fruit and nut trees on the contour and is intercropped with tagasaste (tree lucerne), a small evergreen tree that offers nitrogen fixing capabilities, provides good quality fodder, mulch and firewood. Food producing species include apples, pears, peaches, plums, olives, figs, feijoa, walnuts, almonds and hazelnuts.

Animals are an integral part of this mature system. They provide additional yields such as milk and eggs, perform essential functions of vegetation control, nutrient recycling, and pest control, along with mechanical tasks such as shredding and ploughing. Chickens and geese are integrated into the orchard and goats are confined with electric fencing.

6. Voluntary frugality and a home-based lifestyle

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Su with her goats, source of the milk for the family.

The couple have downsized their lifestyle and, according to Su, decided “what is enough for them”. It’s worth mentioning that they haven’t been in a supermarket for 5 years and don’t have any products in the house. Their lifestyle was punctuated by Su milking the goats in the morning and evening, though David’s routine was less structured. Nonetheless, most days involved a combination of physical work in the garden and intellectual work in the office.

David firmly believes that “A normal existence is place-based,” and he sees huge advantages to this way of life. It’s way more economical and you can live at a much lower cost. You are your own boss and not subject to the interminable regulations and demarcation control. In essence, you set up your own rules. Another benefit of this form of home-based lifestyle, he believes, is the reduced environmental impact through no longer having to commute, and growing or making your own food.

In the grand scheme of things this kind of lifestyle will decrease expenses so significantly that even a modest income will be more than enough to get by. David believes:

“The constraints of practicing what you preach, ongoing self-training and research and the limits of the market place didn’t allow the generation of incomes much above the poverty line, which I find more than adequate to live on.”

Don’t have time to read the whole post now, you can download the PDF here. 

6. Household Economy

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David and his son Oliver processing a pig.

In pre-industrial society the non-monetary economies of the household and community were the bulk of the economy. Anything produced in the household was consumed by the household or gifted/bartered with neighbours thus cutting out intermediaries, or the government demanding tax. These days, in contrast, we are totally dependent on the goods and services that a monetary economy provides, and our jobs serve as a means for paying for them.

David and his family understand the importance of the household economy: that family and the household is the core economic unit. This economy is based on multiple family members running numerous enterprises for their mutual benefit. For example, Su preserves food and also sells food in bulk to the local community, Oliver, their son, is a tech support guy and also hunts game, and David writes and gives lectures. Together they form a core economic unit whereby everybody contributes to the household.

Their skills are directly exchangeable, both within the community and outside the centralised structure of the current monetary economy. David emphasises the development of these skills and recommends “Be jack of all trades but master of one”. Have a diverse skillset but master something you can exchange for other things. It’s the development of these skills that will prove advantageous as energy descent envelops us. Modern people have lost vital skills, and with them went the ability to be independent from the system. The more skills you have the more autonomy you can achieve, and anyway, it’s more rewarding than being dependent on others.

7. Income from creating intellectual value

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The office – economic engine of the farm.

The Holmgren’s household has very low expenses. They produce 85% of their food needs, the utility costs are low, they live a frugal and home-based lifestyle and the whole family mutually contributes to the household. This way of life has ensured that they don’t have to generate a large income to keep the household going.

Their income is 100% permaculture-related in regard to their businesses Holmgren Design and Melliodora Publishing, their connection to the outside world and an economic engine of the farm. Their Mellidora permaculture gardens produce surplus food which is sold to the local community or used as a form of currency, feeding both the WWOOF-ers and the people on the courses.

Farm Income:

  1. Publishing business – Melliodora Publishing; selling books, DVDs and other educational material.
  2.  Consultancy and courses – Holmgren Design is a well-known consulting micro business, and has been running since the early days. David is an in-demand teacher, with people coming to his residential courses, as well as teaching in Melbourne and South Australia.
  3. Tours – Around 10 times a year they open ‘Melliodora’ to the public for personally guided tours.
  4. Selling surplus food from the Melliodora Permaculture Gardens.

It’s not surprising that the main source of income comes from creating intellectual value. David is, after all, the co-originator of permaculture, and his contribution to the movement is significant.

What we can learn from this model is that internet has provided us with a platform for communicating with the world and, although the Holmgren’s have a home-based lifestyle, the value they create in the international permaculture community is, nonetheless, financially remunerated. The internet and computing have allowed for the development of location-independent international business.

8. Commitment to the local community

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Selling food to the community.

Let me ask you something: When was the last time your neighbour came to your place for a pleasant chat? Do you even know your neighbour? You know, we have become so individualistic in nature that we no longer even show an interest in people who we may see every day. This has led to an atmosphere of suspicion, where the default position regarding those around us is one of distrust.

David and Su were different from the outset, As David would write in his eBook, “Commitment to our local community has paralleled our increasing self-reliance and wider role in permaculture education.” They have been local environmental activists, promoting permaculture values and integrating them in subtle ways, knowing that this is one of the most effective means of social change. They are educating people with community movie nights, workshops and other events in the local town hall, schools or pubs. All of which providing value for local community and educate them about alternatives ways of doing things.

Another worthwhile endeavor is supporting and operating a local food co-op. Su buys organic food in bulk and resells to the local customers. The truly great thing is that she even doesn’t make any profit from it, but rather forges connections and creates value in people’s lives. Other growers use their property to sell their own produce too. What is important here is that these interdependencies bring local people together to appreciate the relationships they have with each other, making the Holmgren’s invaluable members of the community – and ones who provide essential services.

Conclusion

For the Holmgren’s the principles of self-reliance and personal responsibility have been central to everything they have accomplished. They are owner builders, grow the food they consume, their son was home-born and schooled. In essence, they took full responsibility for their needs.

In a world where we have the imminent peaking of global oil supply, encroaching climatic catastrophe and the ongoing financial crisis, Holmgren’s model offers insight in how to build a sustainable alternative way before we are forced to be “living with less”, an eventuality David feels is inevitable.

Even if you plan to be working on a bigger scale you can still adopt this model and adapt what you find applicable to your situation.

In summary:

  • Location on the urban-rural fringe in a small township offers the best of both worlds, being part of the community but far enough from the influence of a metropolis
  • Two acres is more than enough to feed the family and it’s on the far side of what one person can manage at the outset
  • Conscious integration of landscape, infrastructure, homestead and enterprise activities is necessary if one wishes to be fully self-reliant
  • Owner built house allows high customisation and lower costs, plus you pay as you go
  • Nothing can grow without water, capital investment in advanced water strategy is crucial for redundancy and self-reliance
  • Soil development is very important if the soil is mineral deficient, soil deficiencies become your deficiencies
  • Annual gardens provide important yields but perennial plants provide structure, functions and main yields of the system
  • Voluntary frugality and a home-based lifestyle decreases living expenses so significantly that even a modest income will be adequate for living
  • Household economy offers more autonomy and fun, skills acquisition is an essential part of  a non-monetary economy
  • Creating intellectual value is the main economic activity of the farm and a good way to take advantage of a home-based lifestyle
  • Being part of the local community is as important as self-reliance

In conclusion, I’ll quote David on the application of permaculture etches and principles to our lives:

“Whatever the starting point, it should become clear that the most important application of permaculture ethics and principles is to the self, through a process of self-audit of our needs, wants, dependencies, creative and productive outputs and by-products of our very existence. Getting grounded in this way is the start of a personal retro-fit or redesign process which does not require that we wait until we own land or are with the right crowd. We can be our own guinea pigs in creating a better world.”

I think they’ve taught us an important lesson in making a living by practicing permaculture! Let me know what you think about the Holmgren’s in the comments.

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