Articles

The following message is from Erin Axelrod, Outreach Director for the Permaculture Skills Center in Sebastapol, CA: I hope your hearts are healing from the loss of our beloved Toby. We here in Sonoma County at the Permaculture Skills Center are missing Toby, yet we are trying to move forward and heal as we strive … […]

Update: December 20th, 2016: A message from Toby’s wife, Kiel: "It’s with the deepest grief that I tell you that Toby passed away early this morning, Tuesday, Dec. 20. We were both so very moved by the outpouring of love and support from all of you. Before we settled down for the night, Toby was … […]

Part 3 of The Cosmos, the Earth, and Your Health – The Story of Soil In the first two episodes of this series on how soil is formed, we’ve been operating at the cosmic level, talking about the how the elements of life were molded during the Big Bang, inside stars, and in explosive supernovae. … […]

Part 2 of The Cosmos, the Earth, and Your Health - The Story of Soil [This is the second in a series of articles about how soil is formed and its link to health and nutrition.] Where does soil come from? In keeping with the big-picture perspective of this series, let’s tackle that question from … […]

“Give me a place to stand and a lever long enough, and I will move the world.” With these words, the ancient Greek philosopher Archimedes taught us the power of leverage points. It’s a key concept in permaculture design, too. When we deeply understand the system we’re working with—be it a garden, a business, a … […]

One of my constant refrains is “Permaculture is a decision making tool for arriving at regenerative solutions.” Here I’m going to show how permaculture can help create strategies for deciding what cover crops to use. In permaculture, we’re always looking for potent leverage points, and soil-building is a big one. If we create fertile, water-absorbing, … […]