Ruminations as we develop and manage a small farm in southeast Iowa. Click photos for larger images. Click here for farm map.

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Tuesday Morning Walk

This first is the Year of Observation as we plan for good development and management of the farm by paying attention as best we can to the succession of seasons across the various landscapes and biomes, and learn what we can of the plants' and animals' habits of growth and behavior, the energy fluxes of sun, wind, and rain. We're guided in our thinking by the principles of permaculture, which include minimizing external inputs, exploiting self-managing biological systems, and designing for the waste of one process to be the input of another process. It's a fantastically creative opportunity, with no one set of right answers.

We're similarly guided by good humor, and it's been great fun to discover the acts of whimsy perpetrated by previous residents here, for instance the Eye Chair in the woods.


Also deep in the woods, this unexpected sight.


The raspberries have set lots of fruit, and the several patches around the place are much more lush than anything I've grown in gardens.


My walk eventually took me down to the ruined bridge near the culvert where Kincaid Creek leaves the property. The county road we're on is relatively new and this bridge and its predecessors used to be the only way to get from the west to the east side of the farm. The planks and perhaps the rails are salvageable and it will be a good project to eventually build a new bridge.




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