Ah...



What do we learn here?



It is hard to tell when there is little time that you spend anywhere
else. You find yourself completely imersed and feel as though your are
getting used to things rather than learning anything. But when we had
visitors come to stay for the weekend and we worked with them and
explained why we do things here the way that we do, it became apparent
to me that I have been learning.



Some of the interesting conversation actually came from the visitors
sharing what they felt and how that was the same or similar to
decisions we would make based on permaculture principles.



Whilst clearing Lantana we came across a plant that was soo huge we
would have to remove it with a mattock and even then it would take a
while. It was also situated on the edge of a steep embankment and was
acting quite nicely as a peg for the soil.

It was then that we thought of poison.

We weighed up the options;

We could poison it now and be done with it.

This was about the maximum power principle, least effort for maximum
effect now, not to mention using a resource (the poison) of high
embodied energy from limited supply.

BUT it would mean that the lantana would stop growing and the native
plants would have a better go, increasing the diversity and one step
closer to our goal of returning the land to it's previous state before
disturbance.

The other option was to hack it off as much as posible and leave the roots in place for the stability of the bank.

This would be using organic methods but would require a follow up
regularly until the roots no longer had any vigour left in them. A
method using time and human labour instead of the high embodied energy
of the poison. This falls under the Permaculture principle 'small and
slow solutions'.



You can see that both options had clear positive and negative aspects
and would both be relatively fine to use unless we started talking
about the more subtle effects of the poison or the more subtle
realities of the organic method.



In the end we decided to not use the poison as we were working on the
top ten acres that are certified organic. Lucky thing too because I
think between the 5 of us we had enough reasons not to and to use both
methods.

One aspect of the issue that I found really usefull was Naomi's suggestion.

She had us all sit down and one by one explain our take on the matter.

It was clear to me that it wasn't ever useful to be too dogmatic in
either direction and instead to weigh up the pros and cons for the
particular situation at that particular time.

That said not everyone has the time to sit down and hear everyone out,
infact sometimes that is exactly what will get people stuck in theory
and NOTHING will get cleared.



It's all about balance...

Balance of old methods with new technologies, balance of talking with
action, balance of theory with practice, balance of care for self with
care for community with care for the earth, balance of growth with
decay, balance of competition with cooperation, balance of order with
chaos, and so it continues.

What do you think?

Hi Sophy,

This is a great post. It really shows permaculture thinking in action- natural patterns applied intelligently to real situations. You are going to do some great work out there. We are all really going to miss you, mate.

Tim