Permaculture

[WiseGorilla]

http://www.geofflawton.com/fe/32461-surviving-the-coming-crises

This guy is a genius I think. Return to the garden of eden style.

No fertilizer needed ever. No watering needed! (for the basic food forest with a swale)
Design properly, plant the correct plants in the correct order, dig a swale on contour to gather the rain fall and voila nature does the rest. Just chop and drop certain plants at certain times to mulch the ground and it takes care of itself forever. They've set them up in deserts even.

 

[Seamaiden]

Look up Hugh and Shabari Bird Lovel, too. :) Not quite as simple as Lawton suggests, because we have to work with the soil we've got in situ. That's where Hugh can be educational.

 

[NachoBznz]

My mother and brother and myself are permaculture consultants/designers/teachers and yes with a properly designed system, one can grow ganja without any effort. In our aquaponics system we had two Momma's Haze (My mom's hybrid of Purple Haze X Northern Lights) plants that came out amazingly last year. We never watered or fed it once. We grew a Big Bud plant on a HugelKultur once and only watered in jan and feb (temps get s high as 45, and the plants all looked and tasted amazingly in a well designed, synergistic system. At the moment we're trying to naturalise cannabis sp. in our zone 7 (wildlife zone) but it's a struggle because the climate here favours succulents and really hardcore plants (and people if I may add).

 

[Seamaiden]

Tell us more about your zone and how it's determined. I saw you mention in another thread you're living in the desert, and the first thing I think of are the climatic conditions the Afghani strains grow in, as it appears to be very, very dry (and rocky). I think more of us would like to know more about how you grew weed in an aquaponic system. If I had room in ours, I'd have at least one plant in it, but I've already run out of space for the actual vegetables.

 

[NachoBznz]

Yup, a sandy, shaley desert. Well, a permaculture design divides the land into zones, most people have between four and five, they all serve different functions (0- living area; 1- perenials and herbs; 2- annuals and grains; etc). Ours is a bit different, because of various factors, i.e. space, river-beds, etc. I was referring to my wildlife zone, which most people have as a zone 5, a corridor extending from the living area, mine however is primarily made up of small succulent shrubs surrounding our living area. the plants are the beautiful mesembryanthemaceae and Apocynaceae, with the most exquisite birds. Our problem is yes the dry, sandy shale and an annual rainfall of +-30mm per year.
For the aquaponics system we tried many things that failed (most of what I know is from hits and many, many misses). I know lots of people that have a space problem, so we ended up making a huge one, connecting a repaired 10000 litre tank, a Carpet pond for our ducks, and a fish pond. We have a clay pipe that runs through our forestry area (mainly varieties of almonds, date-palms, olives and pomegranates) that connects our res, our fish and our ducks, it loops around tree-pans as it flows. I grew some very pretty good indica in the shade there within the food forest next to the clay pipe, they got all their water from fish-poo fertigation that is slow released by the colloidal clay.
Yes! Yes! Yes! Afghan is what I need, but seeds for good afghani-anything are rare in this part of the world, I remember getting shitloads of gold-seal hash for pocket change at one stage. At the moment by "naturalising" i mean I'm just seed bombing it and seeing which sprouts survive. Alas, not many make it past the cotyledon stage though. Afghan is the answer, duh! thanks!
Sometimes the answer is under your nose.

 

[Seamaiden]

Ok, I thought you were talking about "zone" like USDA planting zones. :) My folks recently moved out to the desert north of Joshua Tree. They're doing things slowly, not in any permie way, but they are minding my suggestions on a few things.

 

[NachoBznz]

Oh I see. I do want to create more micro-climates in the ecosystem, I never thought of it until now, but it would be a great I dea to name them after USDA zones. That way, choosing species will be super-easy.
THANKS, Seamaiden! Unwitting advice
Hey, Slowly is the permie way (and the desert way) and the more you show them the more their eyes will be opened to the possibilities of off-grid life.
They'll figure it out sooner or later.