Pip Magazine Issue 8

KOREN HELBIG Koren is an Australian freelance writer recently returned from Spain and now living on an organic farm in South Australia’s Adelaide Hills. She is particularly fascinated by unconventional people and oddball lifestyles. Koren stumbled across permaculture while interviewing various folk for magazine stories and noticing this strange word repeatedly popping up – many referenced permaculture as a major turning point in their lives, so she had to know more. Now completing a permaculture design certificate at The Food Forest, Koren dreams of building her own straw bale house and living l argely on homegrown food. See her work at korenhelbig.com. SAMANTHA ALLEMANN Samantha is a Melbourne based writer and editor. She has recently joined the Pip team as Editorial Assistant. With a background in higher education publishing, Sam was also part…

Hello faithful readers, In bringing together this issue of the mag, I am reminded more and more that permaculture offers so much in the way of solutions to the challenges facing many of us today, from rising house and food prices, work and time pressures, and the industrialisation of our food systems. In this issue, we meet people around the country responding to these problems by being more self-reliant and creating their own solutions. When we read about Meg Ulman and Patrick Jones’ life and their bucking of the system in Neo-peasantry; a way of life, we see that we don’t have to be weighed down by the costs and demands of modern living. They live car free, have a modest-sized house and block, and use their neighbourhood commons for hunting,…

PERMACULTURE IN THE ARCTIC www.tofrar.com What’s it like to do permaculture in icy climates? Quite different from anything we have here in Australia? There seems to be a growing movement of permaculture in Iceland, and this is where the Nordic Festival of Permaculture is happening this July. A new permaculture farm in Iceland, Tofrastaðir, aims to become the permaculture school for cold climates. It has been offering PDCs since 2015, with the first one led by Robyn Frances and Albert Bates. Tofrastaðir is starting to grow food for their local community and keenly working with animals, particularly chickens. Through their program of courses and workshops they are showing others how to permaculture in cold climates too. Tofrastaðir describe themselves as being about ‘making a better life, advancing agriculture, creating abundance and building a community that…

BEEKEEPER BACKPACKS BeeKeeper backpacks help reduce waste by using fabric remnants discarded by local factories that would otherwise be thrown into landfill. For every BeeKeeper backpack you buy, you will send one child in rural Cambodia to English class for one whole year. That is an incredible thing to be able to do for a child! BeeKeeper’s eye-catching backpacks have these practical features: • Secret zip-up compartment at the top, to keep your secret stuff safe. • Laptop compartment on the inside. • Two front compartments, one with an organiser. • Two side pockets that can hold 750 ml bottles. From $89. www.beekeeperparade.com ROOT VEGETABLE THUNDERPANTS Thunderpants are made from 90% organically grown cotton and 10% spandex to give them that super comfy, soft stretchy feel. Designed for comfort and built to last, they are available in women’s original…

SCHOOLS TREE DAY ON 28 JULY 2017 Each year, around 200,000 Australian school students participate in a special National Tree Day event designed just for children, called Schools Tree Day. It’s a wonderful opportunity to get kids into nature, instill a love for the great outdoors, and teach them the importance of environmental stewardship and taking care of the planet. Students nationwide learn how to plant and care for the seedlings they grow. There’s many ways for schools to get involved. Visit www.treeday.planetark.org/schools for more information. AUSTRALASIAN PERMACULTURE CONVERGENCE (APC14) 2018 ON 15–19 APRIL 2018 IN CANBERRA The theme of APC14 is ‘connectivity’. The convergence will kick off with a one-day public permaculture festival held at Canberra City Farm on the Sunday. This will be a day jam-packed with stalls, talks, local food and…

We have access to lots of coffee grounds. Just wondering about putting it around the fruit trees in the orchard which is also the chook run? Will they bother eating it and is it bad for them? Or will they be cackling and crowing all night?! [Cheryl, Brogo, NSW] Chickens don’t tend to eat used coffee grounds. They hold little nutritional value for them and caffeine is not good for chickens. The chickens will however scratch around in the coffee grounds and may make a dust bath in it. Their scratching will help you spread the coffee around the garden. In the chook run, the mix of coffee grounds, manure, hay and food scraps makes a great base for compost; I rake this all up and put it directly into my…