At 06:48 PM 2/28/2000 +0000, you wrote:
>>Robert Hart's forest garden is one I should have mentioned. It is close
>>to my ideas too. His gardens are too well planned and too well structured
>>for my tastes and I think a bit more randomness will reduce the work
required.
>>It will, I freely admit, likely reduce the yield per area as well.
>>
>>==>paul
>Hart had only a small area to build his garden in - a small fraction of
>your acreage so he didn't have any option but to do it the way he did if he
>was to eat. He tried more randomness and found it greatly increased the
>workload - I asked him about that when I visited his plot. The difference
I'm not sure how letting things go wild increases the workload, but I
can see how it wouldn't work well on a small plot. Hart's methods are
also a far cry more natural than almost any other method, it just doesn't
suit my needs or tastes at this moment.
>between Hart and Fukuoka to my mind is that Hart never suggested to anyone
>that they try anything he hadn't tried himself with his own unassisted two
>hands over a long period, whilst Fukuoka always had other people doing the
>donkey work
I've heard others make simliar remarks about Fukuoka's free help, but
I was under the impression that most of the help was with the grains and
mostly after he had been doing it on his own for some time. It's hard to
get a following dedicated enough to volunteer until you have something
to show them. Fukuoka had been experimenting for 30 or 40 years before
his books were published. I'm quite sure he got his hands dirty sometime
in that period.
==>paul
>
>kathryn
>
>
