Learning about sustainable practices is fundamental to the long term success of your garden.

Length of party:

6 hrs plus breaks

Full Menu Items:

• Permaculture
• Garden Soils
• Composting
• Support Species

Taster Menu Items:

• Beneficial Insects
• Worm Farms
• Crop Rotation
• Seed Saving
• Garden Maintenance
• Soil Improvement

Outcome:

Creating a sustainable garden that requires minimum input for maximum output.

Host Gift:

• Compost bin supplied and setup or
• Worm farm supplied and setup
• 3 x support species, planted.
• DVD

Guest’s Goodie Bag:

• Notes Pack
• Small pot containing support species
  
• Soil improvement kit - Soil conditioner, organic Xtra, NatraMin

Cost: $95 per person

• Minimum 12 people required
• Early bird specials apply

Full menu items:

An introduction to permaculture ethics and principles.

Theory:

• The history of Permaculture - the beginnings and the name
• Design ethics and principles
• The importance of this for the future
• How to incorporate this into our daily lives

Practical:

• Activitiy to familiarise everyone with Permaculture

Everything starts with the soil.

• Understanding soil and its relationship with plants; importance of humus
• Soil testing
• Getting your soil ready to grow food
• Ways to improve soil
• How to care for your soil to keep it healthy in the first year
• Strategies for healthy soil; compost, worm castings, green manure cropping, mulching
• pH testing
• Looking at compost and worm castings

Composting made easy.

• Why compost?
• What is compost?
• The role of compost in an organic garden
• The life in compost
• What goes in, what stays out - ingredients
• Building, maintaining, harvesting, using and storing your perfect compost
• Troubleshooting common problems (vermin, odours etc) & easy remedies
• Selecting and preparing the site
• Selecting & preparing the materials incl compost starters
• Build a small compost heap to manage kitchen scraps and provide soil for your garden
• Large compost systems
• Fungal vs bacterial dominated
• Importance of feeding microbes
• Bokashi systems

Using plants to support your garden's health

• Identifying common support species in a sustainable garden
• The role of support species in an edible schoolgarden, orchard and food forest
• Using them in garden design
• Exploring the many uses of plants and their benefits
• Growing your own mulch, fertilisers and compost activators
• Growing your own shade and structural plants
• Identifying various species and how to grow them

Attracting the good bugs into your garden.

• Introduction to beneficial insects
• The role of beneficial insects in an organic garden
• How to attract and keep beneficial insects in your garden
• Identifying common beneficial insects in an edible garden
• Resources for bug ID
• Identifying insects in the garden with magnifying glass
• Planting Good Bug Mix
• Good Bug vs Bad Bug role-playing game

An army of workers for your garden.

• Why have a worm farm?
• Worms role in soil
• What type of worms?
• Where to buy worms
• What worms need to thrive
• What type of worm farm best suits you? (can-o-worms, worm cafe, bathtub, polysterne box, worm tower)
• Selecting the best site for your farm
• Setting up a worm farm
• Feeding, watering and caring for your worm farm
• Troubleshooting common problems
• Harvesting and using worm castings in your garden

Create an abundant garden year after year.

• Introduction to common crop rotation cycles
• Preventing disease and breaking pest breeding cycles using crop rotation
• Mixing annuals and perennials in crop rotation

Invest now for a sustainable and productive future.

• The story of seeds and why seed saving is so important
• Easy seeds to get started with
• How to select quality seeds to seed save
• Storing seeds
• Local seed suppliers
• Different seed saving techniques
• Getting set up to seed save
• Join a local seed saving network
• Processing seeds (wet and dry)
• Packaging and labeling seeds

Maintaining a healthy and productive garden.

• Edible Schoolyard yearly maintenance schedule
• What is maintenance and why we do it
• How to maintain your garden
• Successional Planting
• Pest and Disease Management
• Jobs in the subtropical edible garden
• Tips for saving time, energy and money
• Selection and care of garden tools
• Garden tidy ups
• Understanding weeds
• Weed management - the organic way

Soil improvement strategies.

• Why we need to continually improve our soil and how to do it
• Organic inputs
• Building Humus
• Changing pH balance
• Increasing moisture holding capacity
• Mineral Balance
• Green Manure Crops
• The benefits of compost, worm farms and mulching
• What is Crop Rotation?
• Plant out a green manure crop
• Looking at different soil improvers - touch and smell