Michael is an Australian living legend in sustainability who gets out there and does things about the issues he uncovers about food production in Australia developing options for personal actions that are not hard. This is one of his characteristically inspiring talks about what he has done, a terrific willingness to talk about his childhood and early adult life, reflections of the role of governments in sustainability and waste, touches on food security and heaps of other discursions (I like that better than digressions which always carries that sense of irrelevance or wastefulness whereas Michael's wanderings are anything but).
I've been to his house on several occasions, one of over 19,000 internationally who have.Thankfully I went as a friend and not an eco-tourist, not that there is anything necessarily wrong about that). He is very clear about the limits of what a person can do, but also suggests how what you do when you start talking to neighbours, passers-by and your community.
It was he who inspired me to get the Council not to plant turf on the footpath outside our house when they lifted the concrete, but rather to let us plant flowering and food plants, the latter I admit limited to parsley that now self seeds majestically for salads and tabbouleh, a lemon balm that self seeded after escaping over my backyard fence where its original is, a lemon tree that hopefully will give me its first fruit this year, a passionfruit that for the past two years has just given and given and given, an incipient avocado tree, chickweed and dandelions (I still can't quite come at eating the milk-thistles) which I love adding to salads or vegetable pies, marigolds from which I can pick the flowers, marjoram that's having a nice time spreading.
Michael talks a lot about water wastage and how to cut down on it. I treasure the moat that our architect Misho built for us as part of our renos that has only ever been dry once in its 8 or more years history, being filled by the smallest shower onto the vast expanse of corrugated tin roof on the kitchen/dining space, which also now sports a significant bank of solar panels - which Misho rightly says are not pretty, but do look somewhat interestingly scientifico-architectural in our case as they have to be raised and angled and there are so many of them. The moat is the prime source of watering for the whole of the back garden. The plants on the footpath and in the front garden, which include olive, mango, guava tree and something that I had always thought was a NZ plant but someone the other day reckoned was a feijoa and to tell the truth the fruit look like it but I have not put mouth to them as yet - may well do this season while holding the mobile set to 000).
http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/classic/midday/201211/miv-2012-11-05.mp3
I've been to his house on several occasions, one of over 19,000 internationally who have.Thankfully I went as a friend and not an eco-tourist, not that there is anything necessarily wrong about that). He is very clear about the limits of what a person can do, but also suggests how what you do when you start talking to neighbours, passers-by and your community.
It was he who inspired me to get the Council not to plant turf on the footpath outside our house when they lifted the concrete, but rather to let us plant flowering and food plants, the latter I admit limited to parsley that now self seeds majestically for salads and tabbouleh, a lemon balm that self seeded after escaping over my backyard fence where its original is, a lemon tree that hopefully will give me its first fruit this year, a passionfruit that for the past two years has just given and given and given, an incipient avocado tree, chickweed and dandelions (I still can't quite come at eating the milk-thistles) which I love adding to salads or vegetable pies, marigolds from which I can pick the flowers, marjoram that's having a nice time spreading.
Michael talks a lot about water wastage and how to cut down on it. I treasure the moat that our architect Misho built for us as part of our renos that has only ever been dry once in its 8 or more years history, being filled by the smallest shower onto the vast expanse of corrugated tin roof on the kitchen/dining space, which also now sports a significant bank of solar panels - which Misho rightly says are not pretty, but do look somewhat interestingly scientifico-architectural in our case as they have to be raised and angled and there are so many of them. The moat is the prime source of watering for the whole of the back garden. The plants on the footpath and in the front garden, which include olive, mango, guava tree and something that I had always thought was a NZ plant but someone the other day reckoned was a feijoa and to tell the truth the fruit look like it but I have not put mouth to them as yet - may well do this season while holding the mobile set to 000).
http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/classic/midday/201211/miv-2012-11-05.mp3
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