It was a very interesting and rewarding day yesterday at the Permaculture Mixer in Kalamazoo, MI. The daylong event that took place on Saturday, September 26th and was an opportunity to hear presenters and to meet others from the Michigan Permaculture Community.
The event was held at the historic 160 year old Gibbs House on Western Michigan Universities campus. This site serves as a living laboratory where students are creating a developing permaculture landscape, a food forest, vegetable and herbs gardens and using composting and verimiculture to make the garden soil more productive. This large demonstration garden complete with two 30 X 80 ft. hoop houses shows others what can be done on an urban plot and how to do it sustainably.
Tours of the garden and hoop house were popular.
There were sites tours, demonstrations of low energy use equipment, information booths, book sales and plenty of opportunity to mingle with and talk to other attendees of “like mind.” There were also a potluck and panel discussions of individuals who are farming, gardening and homesteading and personally making the permaculture system work for them.
Layers of plants are part of a permaculture system.
The day began with keynote speaker, Peter Bane, author, teacher and permaculture activist who presented a short history of how permaculture came about and a positive and hopeful path for how using permaculture systems will be part of the global answer to a more sustainable future for us all. Bane is known for his book; Permaculture Handbook, Garden Farming for Town and Country (www.permaculturehandbook.com) and as the long-time publisher of Permaculture Activist Magazine. Bane also offered a Sunday workshop on designing resilient homesteads as well.
In addition there were several other speakers who shared their journey and their stories about how they came to permaculture and how permaculture is working for them.
Presentations are an integral part of the diversity of permaculture options.
It was an rewarding opportunity and one I thoroughly enjoyed. If you have a permaculture community near you, I really encourage you to join and explore new ideas and make some of them your own.
Small House homesteader, Donna
Small House Big Sky Homestead 