Behind the Curtains

Well it's the end of an era... we'll all be missing Hannah's blog. And to avoid any comparisons, I thought I'd take a different tack altogether with my postings and write about some of the behind the scenes goings on.

The Christmas day last weekend reminded me of how far things have come since I moved here in August last year. The entire mandala is now in operation, and while the beds have a long way to go, there are distinct improvements, not the least that the blackberries are mostly absent! But more importantly it was good to reflect on the tremendous support that I've had in making Imago Forest a success.

I want to thank the organic farmers that have mentored me, my students that have provided me with income while developing the farm, past customers who supported me in the early days and current customers who support me right now!

At times the farm has felt extremely challenging, however when thinking of the number of people that have backed me, I regain the momentum to provide an alternative to the supermarkets and where people can have a direct connection with how their food is produced.

THANK YOU

Bumper Harvest to Farewell Hannah

By Hannah Parson

Well, my last week on the farm and my last blog. I can hardly believe how quickly the last three months have gone…it doesn’t seem like five minutes ago Julian and I had just met at Morisset train station and we were on the mammoth drive up to Imago Forest…and now it’s my very last day. It’s sad that I’m leaving but I depart with lots of fantastic memories and, of course, an online blog to look back on!

This week has been a busy one, trying to tie up a few ends before I go. For weeks we had been discussing doing road signs and a mandala map and as you know from my last blog I’ve been spending a lot of time on completing these projects. The signs are finished and ready to be put up, hopefully in time for Julian’s Christmas party on Sunday, so everyone can find their way around! And the mandala map is outside, in view from the window I sit at, just waiting to have the pencil lines rubbed out…and then that’s finished too. I feel very pleased with how they have turned out…I hope lots of you will see them in use on the farm in the future!

One of the things about this week that really sticks in my mind was the harvest on Wednesday morning. We got up at 6:30am before the heat and harvested the most lettuce, kale, silverbeet, tatsoi and bok choy I’ve seen since I’ve been at Imago. It was so good to be involved with such a great harvest on my last week, and also to be involved in the packing of each individual box and their delivery to you at home. Delivery day is usually quite a long one, but it’s the day all our hard work on the farm comes together and we can show it off a bit! We hope you are enjoying what you received…

So, it looks like it’s goodbye from me and my blog. It’s been a pleasure helping Julian in the process of getting his food to you at home and meeting some of you along the way. It was great to hear that a few of you followed and enjoyed my blog…who knows, maybe I’ll come back to Imago Forest one day and add another excerpt! Watch this space :o)

Painting Prefered

By Hannah Parsons

Following one hugely successful week came another week of change and growth down in the garden. Having had the weekend off, relaxing with a couple of Julian’s friends, swimming in the dam and eating far too much, come Monday the Mandala was once again like a new place. Frogs in the ponds, an array of lettuce and beans ready for harvest and our first sunflowers. Beautiful!

This week I’ve been working on my favourite project…road signs for around the property and a huge mandala map. Not having painted for quite a while I had forgotten how much I loved being creative…and getting paint all over me! I have spent as much time on them as humanly possible without neglecting all the other duties on the farm, as I’m pretty sure Julian wouldn’t be too pleased if I just spent time painting away when there were beds to cultivate and plant and propagation to be done!

So of course we’ve both been busy with many other tasks on the farm. Having fallen a little behind with bed planting due to rain last week we’ve been extra busy transplanting our seedlings into beds with our new system of mulching first, then making little holes for individual seedlings to be planted into. It seems to be working well, keeping down unwanted weeds and helping the soil retain some of its moisture in the heat.

We’ve transferred small apple grafts from the mandala down into the orchard, which seem to be getting bigger by the week, and propagated some daisy cuttings for Julian’s cottage garden, which will soon be starting to take shape at the front of the yurt. The only thing I wish is that I would be around to see even more changes take place, but as it’s my last week here next week I’m afraid that I won’t. Looks like I’m going to have to visit next year when everything’s blooming…Julian won’t get rid of me that easily!

So, I’ll finish writing and get back to some work…it’s raining outside…what a shame…that means I’ll have to do some more painting!

Tremendous transformations

by Hannah Parsons

This week has been amazing…

Suddenly, almost as if by magic, the Mandala has become a mass of green. We’ve seen our first zucchini of the season with their beautiful orange flowers beaming to the sky. Our beans have gone haywire, spiralling skyward up their blue string trellis and popping out little baby beans left right and centre. The potatoes look so happy that they’re almost smiling and the nectarines and other fruits have plumped, reddened and look good enough to eat…I just want to pick them all now!

Sitting out in the garden yesterday I couldn’t believe the change. All the work we’ve been putting in over the last few weeks has really paid off. We’ve all spent so much time weeding then mulching the bare soil, transplanting our lovely little seedlings into beds and watering until it seemed we could water no more! But what’s most amazing to me is that all this prosperity in the garden has suddenly occurred following Julian spreading BD501 (horn silica) and seaweed solution over the mandala. Although I don’t know much about biodynamics, looking down into the garden I can see there is proof behind all the theory.

So with all this success under our belts (fingers crossed!) Julian and I have been out in the garden admiring our work and planning for the coming week. We have plans to plant a huge circle of sunflowers around the mandala which will create a border between the garden and the now flourishing orchard, and also look attractive we hope! With the mandala looking good we have plans to create a big map which can be used for tours of the farm, and also for our own personal record of how things are coming on down there. And in the lovely rain we’ve been getting, and expect to get for a few days (hooray for the vegies!), I have the exciting indoor project of painting signs to be placed on the property to direct our visitors.

I can’t wait!

Watery Work

by Hannah Parsons

This week I return to sunshine at Imago Forest…a little brighter than all the rain of last week. Everyone’s had a relaxing weekend, so we’re ready for an action packed week.

Again work in the Mandala takes up most of our time, and we decide to weed all the beds and thickly mulch around existing plants to stop our soil drying out in the returning heat. Our seedlings have continued to grow in their little trays and we are able to plant some out into a new bed as well as to fill in some gaps in old beds where the lack of rain has stopped seeds from shooting. Having had little success with lettuce due to the heat and lack of water we make a new plan for growing seedlings, omitting lettuce and trying out some more herbs and flowers for in the Mandala.

Our ponds continue to take shape and this week we have three successes so far…we knew we’d get there eventually! We take pleasure in lining, then arranging old pieces of wood and rocks around the edges…we were going for the natural look, but they have ended up looking like something out of one of our English gardening programmes! We’re obviously still very proud indeed and can’t wait for the frogs to make their way over from the dam.

With the Mandala electric fence now around the orchard as well (little wallabies keep nibbling at the grafts!) we give it some attention and plant out some small grafts that have been growing in a pot near the yurt for some time. We carefully dig holes, treat the soil with lime, dolomite and phosphorous and transplant the little babies. After a big drink of water we mulch around each tree to stop evaporation. Good luck little apples and pears!

Imago Forest Family expands

By Hannah Parsons

We jump straight into the week with more amazing pond action first thing Monday morning. Hannah, Paul and I manage to dig and line with plastic a pond in one of my mandalas, surrounding it with beautiful old pieces of wood and plants from the dam. I feel exceptionally proud of our efforts until the water line starts reducing! We realise we were hasty in our excitement and didn’t check the liner properly for holes…we all begin to wonder when we will complete a successful pond…one day we hope!

We continue our work in the Mandala, putting in some seating and planting a strong and sturdy ‘bean farm’ out of bamboo and string. We stagger the planting so we have a lasting crop and can’t wait to see the first shoots to trail onto their trellis. Julian has the task of mowing some of the long grass in the mandala, which is now starting to look almost park-like it’s so tidy! While I begin to rearrange my much used and rather unkempt seed box indoors, Hannah and Paul plant three special pumpkins in their own individual beds in the mandala. We end the day with news of a new Wwoofer, Michael, who will be arriving in a few days to join our ever-expanding Imago Forest family!

Wednesday Julian goes off on delivery duty while we three remain enveloped in a cloud at the farm. First thing, Paul and Hannah discover a very poorly chicken (one of the Barbarellas in dome 1) lying on the ground…she’s rushed inside by the newly formed chicken ambulance crew (Hannah and Paul) and nursed all day in the warmth of the yurt…we fear she won’t make it. It rains continuously, except for a break of 30 minutes when we rush out to dig yet another pond. We get it done and back inside to the warm fire just before the heavens open again! We bake bread, little rolls and carrot and orange soup for dinner. Julian arrives home at 7pm and we all tuck in…yum.

Thursday we seed clover, cowpea and alfalfa into beds for future chicken feed. We sow sunflowers in areas around the mandala and around the verandah at the yurt which will look stunning when they come up. We sow some more seedlings into trays as our recent success has been pretty good, and plant some of the older seedlings out into a pot to later decorate the mandala. With lunch on the stove Hannah, Paul and I sit and wait for Julian to return from the top gate with our new Wwoofer…how exciting!

Peeling Ponds

By Hannah Parsons

The last few days here at Imago Forest have been extremely productive, and all of us feel pleased with ourselves as we approach the weekend. I sit inside, looking out into the cloud which envelopes our cosy yurt as I write this week’s blog…

Looking back, we’ve made a huge difference to the appearance of the Mandala garden and spent many hours out there in the sunshine pruning, mowing, planting strawberries which have already thrown up bright green leaves, and transplanting our beautiful little seedlings into a bed. Although through the rain I can’t see any of our achievements, I feel pleased that our garden is getting the watering it deserves.

Hannah, Paul and I dedicated a full morning to digging two ponds in the mandala and lining one with bentonite clay…an experiment which unfortunately went a bit wrong… we awoke the next morning to find the clay had peeled away from the edges and a good portion of water had escaped! We’re disappointed, but put it down to experience and look forward to our next pond being more of a success.

As usual the chooks have been up to mischief! This week we have been taking particular care of one chicken who has a sore and swollen eye, giving her eye salt water baths every morning and feeling sorry for her as she grumbles at us in discomfort. During the moving of chook domes we had several escapees who evaded us until later in the day and then got put back in the wrong domes, and we’ve spent a good portion of time catching the pecked hens to put Tiger Balm on their bare bits (a taste the chooks are supposed to hate)…a very unusual task!

So now the week’s work is complete we look forward to seeing friends and climbing Mount Royal tomorrow with our neighbours…

Glorious Rain!

by Hannah Parsons

Well, what an eventful week we have to look back on! Our weekend was spent at Imago Forest with a gathering of friends, eating wonderful food, relaxing in the sun, trekking across Julian’s land, running from snakes, swimming in the dam and entertaining three very lively and excitable children! A fantastic period of leisure to prepare us for a busy week on the farm…

With Hannah and Paul in Sydney for a few days, Julian and I are on the farm just like old times. We spend Monday exchanging between outside work in the Mandala and inside work on the computer, typing up and modifying the instructions I have been working on for the past six weeks. We have decided to make them into an organised manual for future Wwoofers, so a little part of me will live on at Imago once I’m gone! Whilst on a stint in the garden I notice two of my poor chickens have runny bums and so I spend the best part of 45 minutes trying to catch them to administer castor oil, chasing them round in circles while they hide and run…I don’t think they like me that much anymore!

On Tuesday Julian and I have fun moving one of our chook domes to a new location as the rooster ‘Sunrah’ and a few of his ‘Spooky Kids’ decide it’s a good idea escape out into the garden! With all my catching practice from Monday it doesn’t take us long to scoop them back into the dome. We spend time completing a new observations and actions sheet for the Mandala, and have some ideas for future work and improvements. The afternoon consists of sowing some seedlings for transplant into the beds at a later date.

Wednesday is a quiet day with just me on the farm while Julian is in Singleton doing what seems like thousands of vital jobs. I do some maintenance on my chicken dome, heightening the roost which has dropped down of late, and replacing some bolts which have come loose. I re-seed some beans which haven’t grown in the recent heat, and make trellis for some that are desperate for something to climb…they look much happier when I’m finished.

I harvest some beans and peas and have a cheeky taste…delicious!

Evening comes round quickly and Hannah, Paul and Paul’s parents arrive back in the rain (which we’re obviously loving after weeks of pure sun!) and dark, welcomed at the yurt by a warm fire and a dinner of homemade soup and bread. Tomorrow will involve bed planting and work in the Mandala so we jump into our beds to get a good nights sleep before another busy day…

King Henry VIII, Sun Rah and Pratt

With four of us now working in the garden, we've divvied up the mandalas between us. This means that we take responsibility for our particular beds and chooks. To make it more personal, Hannah Parsons has named her rooster and chooks King Henry VIII and his wives. Hannah Lawrence has named her rooster Sun Rah and the chooks are called The Spooky Kids. While Paul has called his rooster Pratt and the hens Barbarella 1-9.

Following on from last week's success with the hand sprinklers. Two movable micro-jet systems have been set up which allows us to put a decent amount of water onto the vegies, but in a gentle way.
So we're expecting some good growth out of the gardens now that we can keep the water up to the plants and have a system to do it regularly.

Wonderful Water

Reflecting on the last twelve months at Imago Forest, we've learnt so much and grown more vegies than we thought would be possible without using irrigation. In particular salad mix and carrots are now possible, whereas previously they were not.
With the warmer weather we've been excited about all the crops that we could plant. However almost exactly in time with the warmer soils came the "Big Dry". All of five weeks of no rain. On a typical farm this would barely even register, we imagine, however at Imago Forest we've been looking anxiously to the skies, but have realised that as we are now growing crops that are much more water dependent, we must choose to start irrigating occasionally, or stop growing these extra crops.
As the carrots and salad mix have been popular, we thus began the investigation into how to irrigate... and it was looking like it would easily run into the thousands of dollars. So with a bit of initiative, Paul and Hannah took advantage of the dam being uphill from the mandala garden (part of the permaculture design) and pieces of hose around the farm and constructed a gravity feed pipe from the dam into barrels in the garden.
From the barrels we now hand water the beds as required. Fingers crossed that it will rain as predicted this week, however we now have an option to get by on.

Hannah and Paul

I arrive back at Imago Forest to be greeted by two new WWOOFers, Hannah (now there’s two of us which could get confusing!) and Paul. They are also from England, and are going to be helping me in the Mandala Garden as well as pursuing an exciting project of their own…building a small shelter on the property.

Julian, Hannah and Paul go off to Singleton for deliveries this Wednesday so I formulate a list of activities to keep me busy in their absence. In the cool of the early morning I paint wound dressing onto the grafts we planted in the orchard two weeks ago to stop them dehydrating in all the recent hot weather…I pray for success and a little bit of rain! Following this I bag up some grass cuttings that Paul has slashed over the weekend, and spend a few hours raking, sweltering, drinking gallons of water and applying copious amounts of sun block. Lunch time is a much needed rest in the shade of the yurt, safely away from the three brown snakes I’d encountered during the morning! The afternoon is spent in the shade writing and improving my farm instructions.

Thursday comes round quickly and we WWOOFers spend the morning out in the Mandala, pruning, tidying and getting to know each other. We talk about things we miss about England, and things we love about Australia. Julian does a farm tour with a family from Newcastle, and Perra looks on in amazement at all the unusual noise and activity. We sell some of our stock of eggs…the chooks have been extremely busy of late! After lunch we chill out briefly in the cool of the tipi where we chat about Hannah and Paul’s amazing building plans. They tell me stories of falling frogs and kangaroos outside at night and I wonder if I’d be brave enough to sleep out there! In the afternoon I lead in planting two more beds with help from Hannah and Paul. We plant summer vegies that are a little more drought resistant such as capsicum, eggplant and tomatoes, so our veg variety is increasing quite nicely. After a successful day we head inside for a movie and homemade pizza…heaven.

Fowl Tales

I arrive back to Imago Forest to reports from Julian that the chooks have been letting standards slip a little in my absence and not so many eggs have been collected over the weekend. So Tuesday morning I head down to the domes to have a little chat to them and give them a bit of encouragement for the coming week….they weren’t being very attentive but I’m pretty sure they got the message! The rest of the day is spent in the vineyard planting another 31 fruit trees. This time we put in Nectarines, Peaches and Nashi (a delicious type of Japanese pear that I’ve never heard of before!) so now we have a good collection of different fruits.

Of course on Wednesday is delivery day again so we’re up early to harvest bok choy and pack the boxes. While in Singleton I get some much needed time at the library to continue on my ‘Farm Instructions’ for planting a bed and also moving chook domes…and I try to remember all the details. Lucky that the weather is beautiful as our car breaks down and we spend half an hour at the side of the road waiting for a kind neighbour to pick us up. When we eventually get home I go out to the chooks to find a total of 19 eggs…see, I told you they were listening!

Thursday we’re up early and talk about Mandala layout over a cup of tea. We identify an area to cultivate and get straight to it with the broad fork, loosening all the old roots from the ground (slightly back breaking I must confess!). As usual we add lime and dolomite and dig through, removing weeds as we go along. With the chooks watching from the nearby dome (shouldn’t they be hard at work laying those eggs?!), we finally get to plant our Asparagus, and all before lunch. Our afternoon is spent planting 2 more beds, making a grand total of 6 since I arrived just 3 weeks ago. Hopefully I’ll be quite the expert soon!

Champion chooks keep count

Week two at Imago Forest and I’m really starting to settle in. The chooks are getting used to me and have stopped pecking me quite as much! This week they have laid fantastic amounts of eggs…and I feel quite proud!

Monday we collected Paul from Singleton who is coming to help us on the farm for a few days. We get stuck right in and sow a bed Monday afternoon and I’m pleased to find I remember enough from last week to be able to explain to Paul the reasoning behind the planting patterns we use in the Mandala Garden.

Tuesday the weather is perfect and we plan to plant 36 trees in the newly cleared orchard area. Morning is spent grafting several types of apple tree to root stock…Julian cuts and joins each piece in a clever fashion which will hopefully ensure successful grafting, while Paul and I use grafting tape to bind and label each new tree…Cox’s, James, Sauvages and Esopus etc all heritage varieties. After some hard digging by Paul and Julian, and once again the mixing in of lime and dolomite, the gentleman kindly allow me the best job of planting the trees! Our production line works well and we finish just in time to quickly admire our day’s work before dark falls.

Wednesday, Julian and Paul head off with the deliveries while I remain on the farm. Perra follows me around as I see to the chickens and collect the morning’s 15 eggs…that’s my girls! With some time to sit I add to and alter our farm operations flow chart as we keep having brainwaves on how to better it, and we can see how it’s developed in just one week. Following this I do my first small stock count in the Mandala Garden and realise I need a lot more practice at recognising what’s what! The cool of the afternoon is spent planting 2 more new beds, and this time I do one on my own…cant wait to see if it turns out well…I did put a lot of love into each and every seed!

Thursday arrives, not a cloud in the sky and another day ahead of us in the newly created orchard. We rake up all the grass from the clearing, put a good amount of manure around each tree leaving space around the trunk, and then cover the manure with straw for protection. A job well done, the orchard now looks like a mass of huge nests with sticks sticking up in the middle! After a day in the sun we shower, relax, read our books and look back over what we’ve achieved this week.

Hannah Parsons

Hello from Mount Royal! My name is Hannah and I'm currently up here at Imago Farm, working with Julian through the WWOOF (Willing Workers on Organic Farms) programme. As a complete novice in the field of biodynamics I'm looking forward to learning about the various levels to the work Julian does here on the farm, from the day to day schedule through to the thought and theory behind the concept of the Mandala Garden. So for a few months I'll be helping plant, nurture and harvest the produce you receive...and I hope it's all to your satisfaction!

Each morning since arriving here on 2nd September, the first thing on the agenda has been to tend to the chooks. Day one Julian showed me how to feed, water and collect and clean eggs which has become my first small responsibility on the farm. It's been my first experience with chickens so I'm still getting used to getting pecked!

Day 2 the weather wasn't so good and we found ourselves concealed by a cloud being so high up. We put our minds to writing an operations flow chart (a work in progress) and I began to get a pretty good idea of all the work needed to run the farm each day of the week. As I hand made bread baked in the oven, I learnt some of the theory surrounding the Mandala garden, in particular guild planting and its advantages.

Wednesdays are delivery days so we awoke early to pack the fruit and vegetable boxes before the chance of any sun. We weighed each item according to the order sheet and arranged the fresh produce into labelled boxes ready to deliver. Julian explained how it can be useful to do a stock count of the remaining produce for help with our orders later in the week. Boxes packed and loaded onto the ute we set off to Singleton, amazing views to both the left and the right.

Day 4, Thursday and we take the opportunity in the finer weather to spread some lime and dolomite over the Mandala Garden to sweeten the soil. Julian teaches me about soil acidity and how using these two materials can improve the availability of nutrients and thus the growth of our fruit and veg...so hopefully the hard work has been worth it! We relax for a much needed lunch and then head out again to move my first chook dome. Again I learn more about soil preparation and how the chickens fertilise and scratch, partly cultivating the earth for us.

The day ends with the much anticipated sowing of a bed...first we do a little cultivation and Julian explains how he tries to cultivate shallowly to prevent soil compacting underneath. We then sow a nice mix of asian greens, zucchini, coriander and others, and I see guild planting in action as we sow in radishes between our other vegies which will be the the first to be ready. We should see our first shoots in about 2 weeks which will be extremely satisfying for me, and eventually I'll have seen my first cycle from sowing to harvesting and delivering to your door!

Farm sitters

Thank you to the wonderful farm sitters, who looked after the chickens and watered the seedlings while I was away! Without them I would not have been able to have my all too brief break from the farm. On my return I found the chickens in high spirits and the garden looking healthy after four inches of rain.

Unfortunately, the warmer weather has made most of the plants go to flower, reducing the harvest. However on the positive side, there are many self-sown baby bok choy coming up.

It's actually the most difficult time of year as it is not warm enough for most of the warm weather crops (tomatoes, eggplants, corn etc) to go in yet but the cool weather crops are bolting.

As Jackie French says, wait till you can sit comfortably on the ground with a bare bum before planting! In the meantime i'll be raising seedlings under cover.

Aotearoan magic

Spending a fortnight in New Zealand has been a great experience -- personally and professionally. I visited NZ's most acclaimed organic farmer, Tony Mallard and got to chew his ear about how he farms. He now has 18 acres of deep, finely structured rich topsoil that looks good enough to eat and he puts it down to compost. So even in NZ where they have soil that we could only dream about, compost is still the key!

Painting with Poo

Ha Haa!
My sister called me and asked what i was up to... quite truthfully i answered that i was painting poo on trees.

To explain, I was painting Biodynamic treepaste onto the trunks and branches of the recently pruned fruit trees. The tree paste is made up of fresh cow pats, sand or diatomaceous earth and potting clay or bentonite.

The idea behind it is to seal wounds from the previous year and from the pruning. It also provides a nourishing "cream" for the plant in this season's growth.

Rudolph Steiner said that "the trunk of a tree can be likened to an elongated mound of Earth, upon which plants (leaves) grow." So the tree paste carries out a similar function to compost spread on the ground.

Pruning the Fruit Trees

Well, it was well and truly time to prune the fruit trees by the time we got out there with the secateurs. The peaches and nectarines had their leaves starting to show already... naughty naughty!

So we sharpened the secateurs, and went to each of the trees and cut it back to vase shape. It seems a bit drastic cutting off so much material, but the theory goes that you set the shape in the early years, and reap the benefits in the future. I'm after a vase shape here to maximise fruit on each tree. Whereas a central leader shape maximises fruit production per area (if you pack in lots of trees). Also a vase will work better with the domes that come in quite close.

Paul and I kept the "scion" wood that we cut in readiness for grafting it onto rootstock when it arrives.

Tipi

In preparation for setting up the tipi, the poles which were cut from saplings in the forest, were sanded back and oiled up.

Then Paul and I set about creating a flat spot to put the tipi on. In a couple of days, we accomplished with great satisfaction what a bulldozer probably would have done in about ten minutes!

The tipi from Rainbow Tipis arrived a couple of days later and i couldn't help myself, but i had to unpack it all. After getting instructions over the phone, i raced over to the tipi site and set up the poles. It was hairy setting it up on my own as the poles are tall and quite heavy!

The next morning, i thought i could tie the poles better so i took it down and set it all up, including the skin in time for breakfast in the new tipi!

Of course it rained that same day so i got a chance to try out the rain shield.

Perra was a bit nervous of the whole thing, but i encouraged her in. I was going to sleep in their but didn't want to risk a bad night's sleep with a talk I was giving at the Healthy Living Expo the next day.

I did sit and admire it for a while from across the lake and saw the swallows flitting and soaring around it and just occasionally right into it.

Budswell

It's amazing the flexibility of some plants. The Tatsoi (chinese leafy green) grow right through the year, the scorching heat of summer and even the severe cold and frosts of a mountain winter. What's great though is that the plant grows completely differently throughout the year. In summer its a vigorous upright vegie, while the winter versions are flat to the ground and very distinctively show off their rosette.

Not too long now though before we go back to the tall versions! The daffodils are poking their leaves up and the nectarine's leaves are starting to emerge from their buds. Better enjoy the cool weather now before it's gone!

Getting easier?

The chook domes have finally done a full circuit of the mandala! This means each vegie bed has had a chook dome one it once for two weeks sometime in the last six months.

This is making getting the beds ready for planting much easier as most of the pasture grasses, bracken and blackberries have been dug out of the beds. It also means that the beds only need to be cultivated to just below the surface and therefore the soil structure is less disturbed... good for the worms and other soil life... and so make healthier vegies!

The intention is that after the next six month complete rotation, the soil should have improved to the point where transplants are put straight into fertile and friable soil -- a no-dig market garden!

Windy chooks and CSA's

With all the winds that we've been having lately, a lot of work has gone into devising ways to stop the chicken domes from from being crushed flat. The solution so far is to wire in some light but sturdy bamboo poles, which the chooks have been chasing each other around!

With Farmer Mick's fruit and veg store closing down in town, the options for getting local and fresh produce (not to mention organic) are getting slimmer and slimmer. So once again, thank you for supporting small and local and keeping the options open!

What is a Mandala Garden?

Imago Forest is set up using a mandala design, biodynamic methods, good business practices and a home delivery model to demonstrate that small-scale farms can be supply local communities in a viable, enjoyable and sustainable way.

Mandala Garden

Imago Forest is based on the mandala design developed by permaculturalist Linda Woodrow in her book "The Permaculture Home Garden".

It is a circular design that when fully operational will feed 20 people their fruit and vegetable needs throughout the year from only one sixth of a hectare. The mandala at Imago Forest contains:

• 42 vegetable beds (4m diam)
• Three chook domes (10 chooks each)
• 31 different fruit trees
• Seven ponds
• Many compost piles
• An increasing number of perennial plants such as lavender, rosemary, arrowroot, asparagus etc as a border.

Introduction

Hello and welcome to Imago Forest's Blog or "Musings from the Mandala".

This will mainly be reflections on my experiences using the mandala design garden and biodynamic practices. However I will be adding other commments along the way.

Feel free to post your own comments too!

regards,

Julain.