The book Totem Salmon has the intelligence of nature as a central theme. It beautifully portrays how each stream’s salmon population has a collection of problem solving abilities reflecting the challenges and opportunities of that given stream. One example I saw in person was on the Elwha in the Olympic Mountains, which produced the largest salmon ever recorded (137lbs!). If you go to Goblins Gate, which stands between the spawning fish and many miles of ideal spawning grounds, you see why the fish had to get so big to run up an unimaginably powerful torrent that a pretty large river that gets channeled through into a shoot just a few yards wide. This way of looking at evolution and intelligence that each species reflects about the environment it evolved in has framed my perspective ever since reading that brilliant book.
Great post, Tagasaste will be on my look out for list. Here we are a lot wetter, but where you have water from grid runoff alder is a good nitrogen fixator, and California willow has recently been found to do so as well. Ceanothus/California lilac also fixes N and is up and down the state in much drier areas than where I am. I’d also consider nutrient accumulating trees like mulberry, which does so by attracting so many birds, which provide manure every time they land, take off, and eat.
I have a 6yr old pyr, Wilson, also an unfixed male, and we haven’t had any livestock since we moved about a year ago. We have intended to breed him but haven’t pushed it and live in a very remote area so haven’t had many good opportunities. He has stayed in our 1 acre fenced area (5’6” high) even though he definitely could get out if he really needed to in a fire.
His happiness was part of why we’ve fostered many dogs, probably for 3/4 of his life he’s had a buddy of some kind. We currently are fostering the prior owner of our property’s Doberman female while he looks for property in Maui. She was born here, is a homebody and very sweet. They don’t interact like a lot of dogs, very different mentalities, but they play more and more as they’ve bonded. He seems much happier with her around. He’s also very bonded to our cat.
I’d look into fostering non bird killing dogs (no huskies! We tried that and loved the dog, but she took apart a barn and fence to get to and kill our birds, while our Pyr couldn’t follow through the small gaps she made). If they are not bird killers or escape artists, I might also offer your neighbors with dogs in pens to have them hang out at your place while they work instead of caging them. Probably would help to not put it in a judgemental way, but I definitely do judge those who confine dogs to small areas alone (why have a dog then?). Otherwise, it also helped to just take our pyr on long wilderness walks and bike rides (he is great at running along side, even on leash where cars may come by). Hope this helps!
Glad to hear of your intentions. I’d look into the Humboldt Permaculture Guild if down there, or if you are in Del Norte County sometime contact our Wild Rivers Permaculture Guild (you could pm me for more info, I’m one of the founders). I just moved on from my job developing the Crescent City Food Forest at the College of the Redwoods CC campus, with the help of many high school and college age interns and volunteers. The new manager is a great person and is undoubtedly looking for good help as volunteers or interns (funded through our local workforce center WIOA program). Feel free to reach out via PM if interested in getting involved in permaculture in Del Norte county. Best of luck, I know it can feel isolated, but we have many great young people around here and I am glad you are around the area looking to do good work.
Black bears are not much of a risk to dogs unless the dog is dumb enough to corner one, but rattlesnakes, cougars and coyotes and if it’s a really small dog raptors are a real consideration. I have two large dogs, and do not worry about anything hurting them but cars and guns.
It’s only been less than a year, but these 3000lb rock jacks have held up to 70mph winds supporting gateposts, and along with a couple H-braces (also partially supported by their own rock jacks as the bedrock is 18-24”down), it holds up a 200ft run of fence on a steep slope. Overall the fence is about 800ft. We rocked in salvaged old growth redwood 6”x6” for corner posts. For t-posts, we have heavy duty 10 footers driven 24-30” into the ground, with the bottom 6” into bedrock. It is soft rock, but still a bear of a job by hand driving into it with a manual post driver. We rented a beast of a pneumatic post hole driver, a jackhammer and auger for the bulk of the hardest spots, getting through about 60 in two days. 15per day was the best we could do by hand with a strong helper.
Here are my rock jack gate posts, built onto bedrock with salvaged old growth from a burned down old structure for the frame and native boulders. Working well for about a year now.
I hope this works well for you, but my incorrect math not withstanding (forgot its an easy formula of w/v=A, I was just estimating off what could be safely run continuously off a 15amp circuit, 1250w, 1440w at peak), using solar to produce light during the day seems a bit like running a fan to move your sailboat when lacking wind. Here, when it's not sunny we get a lot of rain (105" since April 2020), and I plan to use micro hydro in addition to my storage tanks and ponds as a battery for my solar pumped water. It may be more viable to look into wind in your region. Also, most "winter veggies" are actually grown in late summer-autumn, and just hold tight in the cold dark of winter, not growing much if at all.
It may be worth considering how nature, and people who've lived with it for generations, adapted to cold climates by storing plant energy from summer in animals that fed them through the winter, and then jumpstarted plant growth in spring with their manure, carcasses, and afterbirth from mass calving. I do wish you and your project well, and will learn from your experimentation as I try to get plants started off grid myself without using any more diesel in my genie.
Sounds like a good plant mix. A soil drainage test and observing your high water mark will help answer your mound question. The fruit trees you mention generally need their root crown 2’ above the water table. Ideally they’d be closer to 4’ above. Short term exceptions won’t necessarily kill the tree, but anything over 36hrs of really wet feet (standing water) can be fatal. If you do have inadequate drainage, hugel beds and Woody debris filled trenches for pathways can also help a great deal.
I am also off grid and would love a solution to such a problem, but I do not think it’s feasible. When I was doing so on grid about 5yrs ago, for decent vegetative growth indoor growers look for at least 40w/sq foot. 60-100w is more ideal and necessary for good flower/fruit production. That would put your 28sq ft at 1120w+, which is about 11amps at 120v if my memory and math estimates are correct. I know technology has progressed l, but I doubt to the point of 11x the efficiency. A certain amount of light is a certain amount of energy, and once we light a space in a way to mimic a nuclear reactor millions of times the size of the earth (the sun), we then almost always have to actively ventilate with fans, which usually draw a significant fraction of the power used for light. Of course you don’t need light all the time in a hoop house, but you need it on days we don’t get much solar power. I am considering micro hydro as an alternative, as its not inversely correlated with when power is needed for lighting like solar. Wish I wasn’t such a downer, but this is part of why I do not grow indoors anymore.
Manzanitas are a very valuable medicinal tree, fruit and leaves, and are they are not viable building materials for structures. Manzanita's anywhere close to building material size are also one of the best and most beautiful fire breaks you can have, as they have the highest strike temperature of any North American wood. It can also melt a wood stove if burned in one. I also live in the mountains where Manznitas are abundant, and I would not cut down manzanitas to build a home in the name of permaculture.
A good analogue is how farm raised salmon loos the ability to reproduce naturally in about four generations as I’ve been told by fisheries biologists. Organic, or better, will require parent genetics to survive in more diverse and regenerative conditions in competition with weeds and with potential pests around. This is the long term value of such seed.
My first joke answer was put some seasoning salt on the unsavoury bastards. Second was to watch and study Home Alone, a paint can to the head seems like a fair punishment for a thief. In reality though, multiple big dogs (a pyrenees-akbash and a doberman) inside a fence that keeps them in is my solution. The dogs are actually sweethearts, but their bark doesn't sound like they are, and they are breeds know for sensing the intentions of visitors. The few people they haven't liked and barked viciously at, after only short interactions with those folks, I feel like the dogs were right.
I would also point out that none of us are immune from math, and the statistics on guns, their relationship to the owner's safety, and who actually falls victim to their use (the owner, and those closest to them are far more likely to be harmed by them than any criminal), might give caution to those who consider their usefulness for protection. Of course they are tools and the user is the most important factor in their safety, but when we are spooked and its dark, unintended stuff happens. Some can manage them safely, others less so. Dogs have night vision, hearing 200x our own, smell 10,000 our own, and are far less likely to accidentally kill a kid sneaking back in after a night out. I don't mean to make this political, and of course responsible gun ownership is possible, just sharing my logic on all this.
Last spring I was pulling a 5gal bucket of slugs and snails off of the crescent city food forest, and overwhelmed all my friends’ fowl at that rate. I have used sluggo, but the mollusks were worst when it was not appropriate to spread the stuff (warning on the label to not use before rain).
So I just started crushing the snails under foot and spearing the slugs in the head with a sharp stick or hori hori/knife. Much quicker, and I figure it keeps their biomass in the soil.
To invert our thinking a bit, I would bet slug manure is pretty darn good for the soil, if only our plants can survive to use it!
Elaine Ingram has mentioned straight compost being her preferred medium. She knows her soil, but I would think better drainage and aeration would be advantageous in my rainy winters (80-100”/yr).
Geoff Lawton recommends 50%-70% sharp river sand:30-50% well finished compost
50-50 is for trees, 70-30 for veggies. This worked as well for me as high end potting soil (roots organic) in a side by side trial starting tomatoes.
Here's my sketch of a potential Pacific NW mixed conifer-deciduous guild with native plants and introduced plants. The idea is to utilize the benefits of large native conifers' thermal biomass, biodiverse soil, wind break, condensation formation, rain slowing-spreading, and fertility shedding nature for plants downhill on a south-facing slope. On north facing slopes its tougher to compete with the well adapted native conifers and shade loving understory plants.
Seems like you are a good person and I am confident you will find your people. This might seem like an odd way to meet people, but I met my wife hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. The Appalachian or Colorado trails which she's done sound great too for meeting good people while having a great time. I have also met some of my favorite people doing Wilderness First Responder courses, internships in National Park trail crews and Wilderness restoration crews. These may not be exactly your thing (though a Wilderness First Responder course would benefit any homesteader). Whatever your thing is though, where you are being your best self with others sharing your highest values is where I think you will most likely find your people. Good journey to you!
Great post George, a helpful visual and formula. If not relying on heavy equipment, more beneficial ecological edges can be created with staggered (checkerboard), or other non-linear patterns. Gaia's Garden (Toby Hemenway) is another great reference on patterning for edge. It also provides Walnut planting guild suggestions--plants that tolerate or even benefit from Walnuts and buffer their negative effects for sensitive plants.
Resource base is another consideration for spacing, in addition to climate and equipment intended for maintenance of your food forest. Capital of all kinds, financial, natural, social, time, knowledge, physical ability and talents, labor help from family or neighbors, or the lack thereof, all can influence decisions on spacing and other general design approaches.
Tighter spacing is generally going to be more labor intensive for pruning, as it will usually require hand work. On the other hand, weeds, nutrient and moisture loss will be mitigated by shade from the trees more quickly. This makes understory plantings eventually need shade tolerance, and this generally rules out fruiting plants in all but the sunniest spots. Tight spacing also brings more costs or work to obtain planting stock. If using the Holzer method of spreading juice pressing mash that is then mulched, the cost can be minimal and we can get site adapted (landrace) new cultivars or root stock. This will inevitably add some time to the process, and will require thinning out for the best tree in any given spot. Time allowing, this can be used to one's benefit, as trees removed can be easily dug up and separated in their first year though. We have well over a hundred apple seedlings from cider mash heeled in for planting around the property once our earthworks are ready. Plus we'll have many more to give away and account for loss/weak genetics. I plan to make juice with any local fruit I can get my hands on over the next year, and use the mash for site selected trees, digging up all but the best suited tree for any given site and heeling them into a nursery bed for future distribution.
Wider spacing will be less expensive for trees to start with, and allow them to get bigger and not require as much pruning or thinning. It will also lead to less fungal disease due to air flow, and brix will rise more quickly over the season. This is not always desirable, as it correlates with inferior flavor, less complex acid formation, and lower nutrient density in some fruits, like Pinot Noir grapes. Soil erosion, as well as moisture and nutrient loss will also be greater with more soil unprotected by shade and leaf deflection of rain for the earlier years. This could be compensated by cover crops or mulch (organic ideally, I would strongly recommend against plastic, with evidence and experience to back my reasoning), and that can be done much more easily with the heavy equipment wide spacing allows for.
Ultimately wider spaced, larger trees are going to have the greatest ecological, climate temperating, and hydrologically beneficial effect. Even though I will be starting with tight clumps of seedling trees in many places, and often plant bare-root semi-dwarf 9-12ft apart, standards 15ft apart, my ultimate goal will be to have full sized standard trees on the north (poleward) side of any clearings in our native conifer forest, with successively smaller trees and shrubs going south. With many steep south and southeast facing slopes, we can also go with slightly tighter spacing than flatland because the light penetrates more, and this will help reduce erosion and leaching with more leaf cover and roots in the ground.
I didn't mean to write such a long post, but I didn't have time to write a shorter one!
I think if I were in your position, I would have a very hard time not fighting back even more angrily. However, from a distance and with the luxury of it not being me whom they are attacking, I think letting it distract from all the other good things you are doing is counterproductive. I don't agree with everything you've ever said, but as someone who enjoys learning from you, appreciates your research and projects' educational and practical value, and having enough of a bullshit meter to see through the hate mongers, I would selfishly like it if trolls weren't such a pain in the ass for you so you could just focus on the awesome ideas you have and projects you are working on. I would probably be less tactful than you in your position. I think your insights are spot on about how the troll filter has improved the quality of of folks going to the Lab. I try to apply this mentality when I get excessively concerned about what others think of me. Mainly I just wanted to say that I appreciate the work you've done and how you've put yourself out there and seem to do your best to walk your talk. I know many others do too.
I am hosting a workshop on Climatic Factors this Sunday (1/24/21) for the Permaculture 201 course I am teaching for our local Wild Rivers Permaculture Guild. It is supposed to snow, and as long as it doesn’t endanger participants getting here and back, I hope it will, as snow would be a better modeling medium than the gravel and clay I have to work with otherwise. I have a few other activities in mind (ie modeling our regional and home landscapes to demonstrate landforms’ climatic and weather shaping power) and plenty to talk about, but I always love to learn and use new activities that facilitate hands on experiential learning.
If you have any activities that you have participated in or led that tie into the Climatic Factors chapter of the Designers Manual, I’d love to learn about them. Even if you see this after the workshop, please share. I am also interested in any experiential, hands on activities you might have for other chapters. Thanks.
Sepp Holzer recommends making it as steep and tall as possible for its width. It will naturally get shorter and wider, but starting steep makes for less compaction, and easier working of the bed, as the top is in arm's reach, if big enough maybe you'll need to lean over one knee. This has worked for me, but just keep the inevitable slumping in mind in you pathway design and bed spacing. I underestimated this and made some areas inaccessible with my double-wheeled barrow (which, by the way, is vastly better at moving heavy stuff 99% of the time).
Shore pine would be helping with salt effects in the air if they are planted as a wind break from the ocean. Pines' allelopathy (deterrence of many other plants) largely comes from root exudates, and their needles and bark are not actually very acidic (6.2pH if I remember correctly). The needles make excellent mulch and bird bedding. In this part of NW CA, they seem to correlate with hedgehog and chanterelle mushrooms. Understory edibles that seem to mutually benefit from shore pines are evergreen and red huckleberries, salal, thimbleberry, wild raspberries and blackberries, hazel and tanoak. They also host many animal species (more than one might think). As evergreens, they are far more effective than deciduous trees at slowing and spreading rainfall that comes predominately in the winter in our climate. As they grow equally fast in our mild winters they pump sugars into the soil to support biota in the ground (like mushrooms) through the period when deciduous trees are dormant.
I should correct my previous post. It seems I misinterpreted what I was told. The spraying occurred on native plantings at another part of the campus. It was still unacceptable, but it was not on the food forest site.
I am saddened to report that the young food forest at the local elementary school to the Gensaw’s in Klamath, CA, (Margaret Keating) was sprayed by school district maintenance against the wishes of the community, teachers, principal and myself (the food forest site developer) with some herbicide I have yet to determine. It was most likely roundup, which I fought to get them to stop using at Del Norte High in Crescent City. The district maintenance crew also cut down the native trees we planted with students. This makes me all the more relieved to have that site and it’s surrounding cattle grazing fields will be hereafter controlled by the Yurok Tribe, its ancestral inhabitants and stewards. I am also very glad the Gensaws are doing such great things with their own garden on their own land. The school district maintenance, through either ignorance or malicious intent, has proven to be a perpetuator of institutional suppression of native sovereignty, health, and freedom to sustain themselves. I wish the Gensaw guys and their friends all the good fortune in the world.
We have hired a fantastic candidate, who is local, committed and perfectly suited for the job. I am very thankful to know she will be caring for the food forest and helping it succeed.
I figured I’d post these signs we are putting up at the Crescent City Food Forest. Thanks to the original artists and Jarlath Caldwell, who did our graphic work:
Alders are our primary native nitrogen fixators, and host fungus beneficial to most native conifers. Thimbleberries, ferns, wild blackberries, salmon berries and raspberries, salal, currants, elderberry, nettles, devils club, sorrel, gooseberry, hazelnut, are edibles that grow underneath in the wild, doing best in edges where they get some sun. Here in nw California, tanoak, madrone, big leaf maple and vine maple all succeed alder as understory trees as the shade intolerant alder it gets displaced by conifers.
I am happy to announce a job opportunity as Food Forest Program Manager for the Del Norte and Adjacent Tribal Lands Community Food Council. I will be moving on to focus on my own 25acre property and design consulting, but will be available to train my successor and support them and the site however I can. We have at least one great candidate from our local Wild Rivers Permaculture Guild, so please apply only if serious, qualified, and willing to commit to this place and the wonderful people involved with the food forest. The formal job description is in the attachment below:
Food Forest Program Manager
Job Description
Location: Crescent City, California
Employed By: Family Resource Center of the Redwoods
Reports To: Food Program Director
Time Commitment: 40 hours per week including some evening and weekend hours. This is a temporary position funded through December 31, 2021. Extended employment in this position beyond that date will depend on additional funding and is not guaranteed.
Compensation: $20.50 an hour, plus monthly health and wellness stipend, retirement benefits, and paid vacation/sick leave.
Application Deadline: This position will remain open until filled. The first review of applications and interviews will begin on January 11th with a desired start date of January 25th.
Area Overview
The Del Norte and Tribal Lands Community Food Council (DNATL CFC) is seeking an energetic, collaborative, passionate, and experienced Food Forest Program Manager. This is an exciting opportunity to work as part of a team in increasing health, well being, and access to food and farming knowledge through projects in one of California’s most beautiful, isolated, and socioeconomically disadvantaged regions.
This position will be headquartered in Del Norte County, the breathtaking northern corner of coastal California. This region is home to Redwood National and State Parks, the Wild and Scenic Smith River, miles of rugged Pacific Ocean beaches, and four federally recognized Tribes. There are abundant opportunities for hiking, camping, surfing, and kayaking.
About the DNATL Food Council
The DNATL Community Food Council works to build a vibrant local food system that provides healthy, affordable food to all DNATL families. Our programs are organized around four primary objectives: ensuring food security, growing our local food economy, shifting DNATL’s resident food culture towards healthful foods, and establishing a resilient regional food system. The DNATL Community Food Council is housed within the Family Resource Center of the Redwoods (FRC) and works closely with many government, Tribal, and non-profit community partners.
DNATL is one of 14 communities within The California Endowment’s Building Healthy Communities (BHC) initiative: a ten-year, place-based, equity-focused program aimed at improving health outcomes for all residents. The DNATL Community Food Council was founded with a BHC grant in 2010 to bring together all area food systems stakeholders to advance healthy food access and consumption
for Del Norte and surrounding tribal lands residents. Due to an extension, 2021 will be the final year of the BHC initiative. The following are examples of current DNATL CFC work:
• Convening the Del Norte Food Security Taskforce comprised of over a dozen collaborating organizations, meeting regularly to address food insecurity in the County.
• Designing and carrying-out summer Food and Farm Academy and Camp at the Taa-‘at-dvn Chee-ne’ Tetlh-tvm’ Food Forest in Crescent City. • Maintaining the County’s only choice-based food pantry; sourcing locally grown food items; and expanding food bank programing.
• Collaborating with the Office of Emergency Services and partners in Humbolt County to design a resilient regional food system and ensure emergency food preparedness for regional residents.
• Executing a CalRecycle Food Rescue project, currently having recovered and redistributed over 75,000 pounds of food that would otherwise have gone into the landfill.
• Working with the Nature Rights Council and Yurok Food Sovereignty Division Manager to support and further food security and food sovereignty initiatives for the Yurok Tribe.
Job Description
The Food Forest Program Manager will play the lead role in designing, implementing, maintaining, and ensuring the longevity and programming of the 60,000 sq. ft. Taa-‘at-dvn Chee-ne’ Tetlh-tvm’ Food Forest located at the College of the Redwoods Del Norte in Crescent City. She or he will work closely with the Food Program Director through strategy consultation and program design, carrying-out the following essential job duties:
• Lead a community visioning process for the site, fostering buy-in and establishing a steering committee that will be integral in ensuring the vision comes to fruition and is sustained into the future.
• Establish and maintain collaborative relationships with the agriculture teachers and other pertinent partners at Del Norte and Sunset high schools and CR to design and implement a student farmer program at the site.
• Recruit and supervise volunteers to help maintain the site, including interns/crews from the Yurok Tribe Youth at Risk Program, and the Del Norte Unified School District’s Transition Partnership Program (TPP) and WorkAbility I—which provide comprehensive employment services to youth with challenges, impairments, and/or disabilities.
• Plan, execute, and oversee all site production and maintenance including ordering and starting seeds, using and maintaining tools and irrigation system, planting, harvesting, composting, pruning, weeding, etc.
• Collaborate closely with the Director of the College of the Redwoods to compose an acceptable MOU and Land Control Agreement for the site.
• Establish a functioning farm stand run by youth in the student farmer program.
• Design, lead, oversee, and supervise summer Food and Farm Academy and Food and Farm Camps.
• Plan and carrying-out logistics for workshops, trainings, field trips, and events at the site.
• Carefully track data and budget relevant to the programs and operations of the site.
• Be willing and able to assume new/unspecified duties as necessitated by being a team member of the DNATL CFC, and as the food work grows and evolves.
Minimum Qualifications:
• At least two years of demonstrated skills and abilities in stakeholder collaboration, community organizing, and building and maintaining effective partnerships.
• Adept at creative problem solving and able to produce desired results independently with little supervision.
• At least two years of experience working in a food production capacity. • At least two years of experience in a supervisory and/or leadership role. • Passionate about building sustainable food systems.
• Proven ability to work effectively as a member of a team of diverse individuals.
• At least two years of experience designing and managing programs or curriculum in an educational setting.
Preferred Qualifications:
• Experience working effectively with Tribal nations, populations of low socio economic status, youth, people with disabilities, and in rural communities. • Bachelors or professional degree or certification in food systems, sustainable
agriculture, education, program management, community organizing, or related field.
• Experience working in or managing a farm education or summer program.
To Apply: Email a cover letter and resume to ahixson@frcredwoods.org, with “Food Forest Program Manager” in the subject line.
Questions: Contact Amanda Hixson at 707-464-0955 ext. 2116, or email ahixson@frcredwoods.org.
Equal Employment Opportunity/Reasonable Accommodation:
The FRC is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, ancestry, sex, religion, sexual orientation, age, disability, marital status, or other non-merit factors in its hiring practices, including the
process of recruitment, selection, promotion or other conditions of employment. In accordance with the Americans with Disabilities Act, we will make reasonable efforts during the interview process to accommodate people with distinct physical or mental requirements. If special accommodations are necessary, please contact the FRC (email ahixson@frcredwoods.org or call 707.954.0955 ext. 2116) prior to your interview date.
I am happy to announce a job opportunity as Food Forest Program Manager for the Del Norte and Adjacent Tribal Lands Community Food Council. I will be moving on to focus on my own 25acre property and design consulting, but will be available to train my successor and support them and the site however I can. We have at least one great candidate from our local Wild Rivers Permaculture Guild, so please apply only if serious, qualified, and willing to commit to this place and the wonderful people involved with the food forest. The formal job description is in the attachment below:
Food Forest Program Manager
Job Description
Location: Crescent City, California
Employed By: Family Resource Center of the Redwoods
Reports To: Food Program Director
Time Commitment: 40 hours per week including some evening and weekend hours. This is a temporary position funded through December 31, 2021. Extended employment in this position beyond that date will depend on additional funding and is not guaranteed.
Compensation: $20.50 an hour, plus monthly health and wellness stipend, retirement benefits, and paid vacation/sick leave.
Application Deadline: This position will remain open until filled. The first review of applications and interviews will begin on January 11th with a desired start date of January 25th.
Area Overview
The Del Norte and Tribal Lands Community Food Council (DNATL CFC) is seeking an energetic, collaborative, passionate, and experienced Food Forest Program Manager. This is an exciting opportunity to work as part of a team in increasing health, well being, and access to food and farming knowledge through projects in one of California’s most beautiful, isolated, and socioeconomically disadvantaged regions.
This position will be headquartered in Del Norte County, the breathtaking northern corner of coastal California. This region is home to Redwood National and State Parks, the Wild and Scenic Smith River, miles of rugged Pacific Ocean beaches, and four federally recognized Tribes. There are abundant opportunities for hiking, camping, surfing, and kayaking.
About the DNATL Food Council
The DNATL Community Food Council works to build a vibrant local food system that provides healthy, affordable food to all DNATL families. Our programs are organized around four primary objectives: ensuring food security, growing our local food economy, shifting DNATL’s resident food culture towards healthful foods, and establishing a resilient regional food system. The DNATL Community Food Council is housed within the Family Resource Center of the Redwoods (FRC) and works closely with many government, Tribal, and non-profit community partners.
DNATL is one of 14 communities within The California Endowment’s Building Healthy Communities (BHC) initiative: a ten-year, place-based, equity-focused program aimed at improving health outcomes for all residents. The DNATL Community Food Council was founded with a BHC grant in 2010 to bring together all area food systems stakeholders to advance healthy food access and consumption
for Del Norte and surrounding tribal lands residents. Due to an extension, 2021 will be the final year of the BHC initiative. The following are examples of current DNATL CFC work:
• Convening the Del Norte Food Security Taskforce comprised of over a dozen collaborating organizations, meeting regularly to address food insecurity in the County.
• Designing and carrying-out summer Food and Farm Academy and Camp at the Taa-‘at-dvn Chee-ne’ Tetlh-tvm’ Food Forest in Crescent City. • Maintaining the County’s only choice-based food pantry; sourcing locally grown food items; and expanding food bank programing.
• Collaborating with the Office of Emergency Services and partners in Humbolt County to design a resilient regional food system and ensure emergency food preparedness for regional residents.
• Executing a CalRecycle Food Rescue project, currently having recovered and redistributed over 75,000 pounds of food that would otherwise have gone into the landfill.
• Working with the Nature Rights Council and Yurok Food Sovereignty Division Manager to support and further food security and food sovereignty initiatives for the Yurok Tribe.
Job Description
The Food Forest Program Manager will play the lead role in designing, implementing, maintaining, and ensuring the longevity and programming of the 60,000 sq. ft. Taa-‘at-dvn Chee-ne’ Tetlh-tvm’ Food Forest located at the College of the Redwoods Del Norte in Crescent City. She or he will work closely with the Food Program Director through strategy consultation and program design, carrying-out the following essential job duties:
• Lead a community visioning process for the site, fostering buy-in and establishing a steering committee that will be integral in ensuring the vision comes to fruition and is sustained into the future.
• Establish and maintain collaborative relationships with the agriculture teachers and other pertinent partners at Del Norte and Sunset high schools and CR to design and implement a student farmer program at the site.
• Recruit and supervise volunteers to help maintain the site, including interns/crews from the Yurok Tribe Youth at Risk Program, and the Del Norte Unified School District’s Transition Partnership Program (TPP) and WorkAbility I—which provide comprehensive employment services to youth with challenges, impairments, and/or disabilities.
• Plan, execute, and oversee all site production and maintenance including ordering and starting seeds, using and maintaining tools and irrigation system, planting, harvesting, composting, pruning, weeding, etc.
• Collaborate closely with the Director of the College of the Redwoods to compose an acceptable MOU and Land Control Agreement for the site.
• Establish a functioning farm stand run by youth in the student farmer program.
• Design, lead, oversee, and supervise summer Food and Farm Academy and Food and Farm Camps.
• Plan and carrying-out logistics for workshops, trainings, field trips, and events at the site.
• Carefully track data and budget relevant to the programs and operations of the site.
• Be willing and able to assume new/unspecified duties as necessitated by being a team member of the DNATL CFC, and as the food work grows and evolves.
Minimum Qualifications:
• At least two years of demonstrated skills and abilities in stakeholder collaboration, community organizing, and building and maintaining effective partnerships.
• Adept at creative problem solving and able to produce desired results independently with little supervision.
• At least two years of experience working in a food production capacity. • At least two years of experience in a supervisory and/or leadership role. • Passionate about building sustainable food systems.
• Proven ability to work effectively as a member of a team of diverse individuals.
• At least two years of experience designing and managing programs or curriculum in an educational setting.
Preferred Qualifications:
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Rosie Carducci wrote:I hope it's ok to revive this discussion. I"m just now reading through PDM for the first time.
It seems to me that much of the section on Zone and Sector Analysis applies more to a much larger property than I am envisioning for myself, or at least one with much more variation in climate and elevation. We haven't purchased property yet, but we will likely be starting with about an acre or less of essentially flat land. Should we be actively looking for something with more slope?
I think the point Mollison and others generally made was that flat, arable land is often the most expensive to buy and costly to maintain if energy inputs are accounted for due to inevitable wind on flatland and the lack of potential kinetic energy which elevation change provides that can be harvested in myriad ways. If it was flat and arable, it has likely been plowed to death. Having moved from somewhere too flat (flooding) to somewhere quite steep (300ft over less than 1/2mi) I agree with Trace that it can be easier to work on flatter land, but it has its downsides too. I think one of the beauties of permaculture design is how it provides methods for finding competitive advantages in markets and ecosystems that we can turn towards supporting the other living things that support us. It really depends what you want to do, and what you value. If you can find a situation where those things will work well on a site but they are not as valued by the seller/market, I think you can find a nice sweet spot.
I wrote my masters thesis on a related topic. “Seeking Self Realization Through Wilderness Service Learning” (a 156 pager I will email to anyone who wants it), was based on my own experiences and research as a burnt out philosophy major in undergrad who fell in love with working in and for the land as a Student Conservation Association intern, which drew me into a career as a professional environmental steward and educator.
This paper seems like it was published a long time ago to me now (2012), and the questions it raises beg for the permaculture research I’ve done since. I also wish I’d been more concise and been allowed to retain the more readable and entertaining aspects of the first drafts. However, it definitely reflects some extensive research and reflection on how environmental ethics can be cultivated and reinforced in individuals and communities.
My basic thesis was that people working hard with their hands to serve nature—something greater than themselves and of which we are all a part—is a path to self realization of the kind that many cultures aspire to as the ultimate human ideal. I do not claim to have reached this pinnacle, but I think I’ve seen some of the beautiful false summits on the way through serving nature.
Of course to get to that highest point on Maslows hierarchy of needs we need material basics, emotional security and stability, social bonds and love. Reflecting permaculture design principles I only now begin to understand, in my experience, many of the same structures that well run wilderness service learning programs employ for the base of the pyramid can also be positively reinforced by how they allow for the “higher needs” to be actualized. An example was how trail crews I led that were well prepared materially (good food and gear to stay warm and dry), encouraged in developing friendships (games, free time in nature together), and supported in achieving progressively more challenging goals, showed incredibly material and emotional generosity to each other when it was needed. On a crew with all boys that ate like the 16yr olds they were and never seemed to get enough, it was never necessary to remind them to share equally anything that got scarce. When kids started sharing their deeply troubling pasts (it was a program for underserved kids from many countries of origin), they were met with compassion I have never seen in a modern school setting. All of this allowed for more of the actual physical work to get done, as we worked together better because we worked for each other and for something greater than ourselves.
Its published but I’m not sure if it’s in print and I wouldn’t see anything for your paying for it anyhow, so if you’d like to read the paper, or others from my masters research, or see my presentation powerpoints, I’d be glad to share them. I could also send my reference list if you’d like to cut through my malarkey to the original sources. PM me if interested.
I like Mike Haasl’s approach of having clumps of canopy trees on the north side of understory shrubs and smaller trees. This reflects the banana/palm circle approach in the Designer’s Manual, which seems like it could be useful anywhere excessive sun and evaporation are a bigger problem than humidity exacerbated disease. The Apple-nitrogen fixator-plum pattern (or some other similar alternating cycle of trees for your area) also seems to help nutrient cycling and disease mitigation.
This debate seems to reflect a similar variety of approaches in what I’ve seen around various grape growing areas. Some older vineyards that were put into replace apples or walnuts fifty years ago still have row spacing based on the tractor size of the apple grower (10x8ft). Their vines are very vigorous due to a lack of competition and space to spread out, and seem less prone to mildew and botrytis than the newer, French style. These grapes get planted at 3x6ft or less, with smaller tractors to suit this intensive style that produces less fruit but of supposedly higher quality for wine due to competition causing deeper rooting and more complex mineral uptake. The French style also seems better suited for the changing climate that is getting hotter and drier in the Willamette valley, but it costs more to start more canes and prune them to manage the tight spacing.
I think where I am now where heat, wind and sun can be over abundant, tight spacing is better for shading soil sooner, and in these places the understory still gets plenty of light for a lot of things. In western Washington or at my old place near the coast of NW CA, I’d spread things out more to allow airflow and light penetration.
In the western US, many “natural” apple and plum trees have grown along roadsides where the workers who built the highways tossed their cores/pits. The campground down the road from me has perennial human-bear interactions due to the 100yr old fruit trees growing feral around it on the edge of old growth redwood forest. I have also started many apple trees from seed with mash from cider pressings.
I had the privilege to watch this film (Gather) with some of the central people in the film, Sammy Gensaw and his brothers (the Yurok fishermen), who I've had a few interactions with over the last few years. This outdoor screening was put on this fall by my workplace, the Family Resource Center & Community Food Council for Del Norte County and Adjacent Tribal Lands (DNATL). The Gensaw guys and their friends are doing some great things in our regional community as well as their tribe. They started a very impressive subsistence and market garden this summer with very resourceful use of what they had available. A food council colleague (with a couple pdc's under her belt) helped advise a bit, and I went down this summer and had some ideas for how they could expand and leverage their resources, but they really put in the work and grew an impressive amount of good food for the local community. I really think they are on the right track on their own from determination and ingenuity, but it seems they are also open to how permaculture design can support their traditional practices' integration with contemporary factors. These include dealing with ongoing racism (systemic and overt), a fairly recent history of land and resource theft, and that this region of NW California was the place of the second largest genocide in US history. It was also, in my opinion, subjected to some of the greatest environmental crimes in human history against the forests and fisheries that the Yurok have been integrally tied to in similar ways to bison and the peoples of the great plains.
I thought Gather was very moving and ultimately inspiring. While I disagreed with Paul's initial negative opinions, I respect where he is coming from about being proactive rather than dwell in anger. I also respect how he has some wonderful people around him, who he seems to welcome disagreeing with him. Josiah and Jen made some points that I definitely agreed with throughout the podcast, and Paul seemed to appreciate a lot of my favorite aspects of the film, in spite of his initial comments. I think a lot of the hopes expressed for the success of the film's subjects in moving towards food sovereignty are being exceeded by the Gensaw brothers and their allies in this community, but we all have a long way to go. I hope to help how I can.
