After leaving Clare Island last week I continued my travels to the Organic Centre, Rossinver, Co. Leitrim, where I ran a couple of one-day Introduction to Permaculture Courses and spoke on Peak Oil at the Permaculture Conference on the Sunday. Right: mulching and making key-hole beds in the forest garden
Billed by event organiser Phil Wheal as “The Real Live Earth Event” the conference provided a welcome alternative of earthy realism to the extremely surreal spectacle I caught a glimpse of on TV in the flat I stayed in (thanks Wayne!) of Madonna prancing about the Wembley stage invoking the assembled masses to “jump up and down to save the planet”. (The hubris and hypocrisy of Al Gore’s “Live Earth” event has been well exposed by commentators in the mainstream media; suffice to say, small local acoustic gatherings around the (carbon-neutral) campfire would have been more appropriate.)
The two permaculture groups I had on the days before did some work on the Forest garden at the Organic Centre, which is shaping up to be one of the better examples of this gardening genre that I know of in Ireland.
To the existing border of currents, medlars, apples and eleagnis we added an under-story and herbaceous layer of Gaultheria Shallon, Rubus species, comfrey, alpine strawberries and day lilies.
We were once again blessed by the weather and hopefully the course participants went home with some fresh ideas and enthusiasm for their gardens, and an idea of how permaculture can help them design their way to a low-energy world.
The day of the conference also saw sunshine, and was attended by about 50 people who heard presentations by: - Peter Bourke from the Irish Seed Savers Association on seed saving and biodiversity in food crops;
Left: Peter and Hillary from Iriah Seed Savers discuss the apple varieties in the Organc Centre’s orchard
-Peter Cowman of the Living Architecture Centre on some of the more personal and emotional aspects of designing and building your own house;
-Olan Herr on constructing reedbeds and wetlands;
I teemed up with Brain and Sinead from the Ballinamore Localisation group,
who followed my usual Peak Oil Intro with a presentation on what they have been up to, including free-cycle schemes and film showings.
It was a full and busy day and a great networking opportunity, and I was also delighted to catch up with several old friends from when I roamed around Leitrim and surrounds.
Congratulations to the organisers and volunteers at the Organic Centre for staging this event and hopefully there will be more in the future.
