Education

Practical Agriculture Workshops
Hāmākua Harvest
NOTES from April 5, 2019 by Jim Crum

Tracy Matfin is an educator turned gardener, mother, permaculture instructor and lover of life. She is a founding member of La’akea Community (permaculture-hawaii.com) where she has been living and experimenting with sustainability for more than ten years.
Site Specific Crop Production On island 17 years Commune for 12 years Tracy@permaculture-hawaii.com
Every day is a learning experience. 

Permaculture principal- Mollison coined the phrase and it means permanent agriculture- developing sustainable systems – connection- elements: climate, desires, landforms, water supply, infrastructure, microclimates (you can create your own) – zones: where is the human energy and how does it move on the land. What does that system need? Zone 1 is chicken feed with starter plants with herbs so you can grab them all at once. Things in zone 2 are things that need less attention and don’t need daily attention. like pineapple and zone 3 are things that need even less attention like bees and orchard trees. Zone 4 would be timber. – Step 1 is observations: the 5 senses and “the vibe”, patterns, species, zones, sectors (how energy and matter move thru the site like water, sun, pigs)- block unwanted energy or invite it in. Banana berm (anywhere it’s wet and soggy), windbreak, bamboo hedge, etc. – step 2 is interpret: what pleases and doesn’t please, use intuition, thoughts, – step 3 is vision/dream: no constraints. What is wanted now. In the future. “In respectful harmony with the ‘aina, I grow a combination of starches (taro and sweet potato), fruits (oranges, lemons, limes, figs, banana, papaya, avocado), and vegetables (peppers, onions, lettuce, tomatoes, cabbage), and perhaps a few happy animals (chickens and goats) in sufficient quantities to sustain 2 people for the next 15 years, and l my children and their families’ needs in the future if they want to be there.”- step 4 applies analysis and investigation to know how to achieve the goals. – every element supports many functions. Nitrogen fixing (gliricidia, pidgeon pea, pirrenial peanut, clovers) that you can chop and drop.- Hügelkultur: sticks at the base with soil on top of that – it’s a cycle. Learn by trial and error and what you like, then make change based upon what works. Robinziroli@gmail.com
In Hawaii:Annual differences- 11-13 hours- 6 degrees temp difference during the day- 8-20 degrees difference at nights- so altitude acts as if it were 
Permicopia books (some of the original books)

**banana in wet spots **gonna need a greenhouse to limit the rainl eaching nutrients from the soil. ** grow indigenous micro organisms (Korean natural farming) to use in plant health