Students at the Goedgedacht Leadership Academy spent some time in the garden after a tour of the bio digester, black water cleaning system, fog harvester, worm farm, flow form and compost making sites...hard to believe they still had energy to plant out comfrey, vetiver grass and lemon grass. Well done girls!
Goedgedacht Care for the Planet shared a link.
Johanes Asja a gardener In the Care for the Planet team shows off his popular natural medicine- honey infused with garlic and ginger. Community members know it’s benefits and already he has more orders than he can handle. Well done Johanes!
South Afrika has an amazing heritage of diversity. This diversity defines us as the Rainbow Nation. Can we use it as a gift by seeing the variety in each other and in ourselves, just for today.
Drying herbs grown in the garden is a great way to add value to an already good product. Thyme came out and some hot red chili went in.
Fun things to do on a farm over the weekend? Make your own medicinal tincture! Today we made a tincture of Afrikan Wormwood grown in our garden.
A few days ago we got a much needed little sprinkle of rain. 5 mm and cloud cover for half the day. About an hour after the rain I checked the moisture in the soil. Where we had mulched the soil was completely dry with only the mulch being wet and where there was no mulch only about the top 15mm was moist. We need that soft rain that falls for hours and soaks into the land... but those days are over. And along with that dreams goes the usefulness of dams. We will be developing new strategies to address water management on the Goedgedacht Farm including Yeomans Keyline system and an integrated system aimed at harvesting every bit of run off.
As the drought intensifies we are taking steps to secure our most precious plants in the garden: our trees. We are making bigger dams around the base of the trees filling them with beautiful compost that Mike Maneli has been working on for months. Then placing a protective layer of mulch around their roots. Deon is seen here putting the finishing touches onto the teams work.
So the water crisis has everyone thinking of what they can do. Here is what we are doing. When the garden House was built 4 years ago we didn’t want a flushing toilet and came up with a way to have a dry toilet indoors with no smell that contributes to the long terms sustainability of our environment. We put in 2 buckets to keep liquid and solid waste separate. Urine goes into the compost pile so that urea ends up in the garden and solid waste is processed in an aerobic chamber that ensures no smell and no hazard. But you probably think I’m talking sh...
Eish this drought!
Our garden is being ravaged by flocks of birds taking advantage of the abundance we have been working to create. Our Kale, Swiss chard even our brinjals leaves are being destroyed as they eat everything.
Our initial response was to put up all kinds of bird deterrents. But if they worked we would have less birds in the garden. Can you imagine a quiet birdless garden. Not fun! Especially as we have worked so hard to attract birds. The realization that came a...fter a time of sitting with this question was: “are we creating a garden for consumption or are we creating an ecosystem capable of balancing itself and meeting needs on multiple levels”. The answer is obvious. So as we reach for high more lofty goals we see the path of the Great Mother teaching us to be less selfish and more compassionate as the garden moves into its next stage of evolution. What a beautiful journey to be on with Mother Gaia.
It’s fruit time on the farm with apples, pears, plums and peaches ready for tasting. Come visit before they all gone.
Goedgedacht Care for the Planet shared Newsner.com's video.
Here at Goedgedacht Care for the Planet Anele Twaku is our tree growing hero. 2 months ago he made 600 truncheons that are now growing and soon we will be making many more as we follow the example of tree hero’s just like this. Enjoy
A poor farmer is called crazy for planting "useless" seeds.
20 years later, the world sees the result and call him hero instead!
This is how we green communities! Six weeks ago we posted images of Aniel with the truncheons he planted. Those truncheons have started growing. This allows us to grow many trees for a tiny fraction of the cost we would have incurred if we bought them, so we can plant them out in the communities were we work. More importantly by teaching community members to do the same we can kick start the greening of these communities from the ground up.
The kids are taking over! The children of Riverlands are showing such a keen interest that they arrive at Harmony’s house eager for their next lesson. And the bread is just getting better and better.
Come visit us.
Goedgedacht Care for the Planet shared a post.
