142. Cruelty Free Living and Organic Farmer | Seaview Cottage | Kim Romeril | Dunedin, New Zealand

Sophie Piglet

From Townie to Organic Farmer – Transitioning from Urban to Rural Lifestyle with Kim Romeril Cruelty Free Living at the Seaview Cottage

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From the other side of the world in New Zealand meet Kim Romeril from the Seaview Cottage!

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Kim romeril dogs DogsOnBeach

Tell us a little about yourself.

Oh Gosh?! Where do we start? Im a 33 year old mother of 3 children… We live just out of Dunedin, just out of Dunedin up the coast a wee bit in a small rural community called Purakanui …  we were living in a really small community before that … it’s a Seaside community and  my children go to this fabulus school which at the moment has 12 students! IT’s an enriched environment being close to the coast and being in an agricultural environment. 

We originally lived in town, which is 30 minutes probably not far away in the scheme of other cities and stuff in other places and even for New Zealand. We lived in Dunedin for about 5 years prior to that we lived in a small community. But we really felt we were disassociated, driving all over the place to a plethora of extra curricular activities scattered across the city, both my husband and I were really stressed and tired.

RushingWoman'sSyndrome

I was doing  a bit of  research on emotinoal well-being through my job and I realized I kind of hit the rushing woman syndrome. I was really exhausted because I was just flat tagged constantly…as a result the kids were losing touch with some of the grassroots values we held as a family. We decided that we needed to do something about it, we started with our diets, we were really aware through social media through the local newspapers etc about conventional horticulture and food systems and we learned about conventional ag and the terrors of glyphosate and horrors of conventional farming and chickens and pigs, so we kind of had the epiphany, that we really needed to really make a change, if we wanted to improve our health and wellbeing, how we interacted without environment and how we supported our food systems was the place to start!

So we made a gradual change to eating organically and an immediate shift to eating cruelty free!

That was a big kind of start for us in terms of where we are now… it was a bit of a struggle initially because organic food is not cheap. We were mindful of the financial implications of that choice, we ate organically when we could. We weren’t close to any markets, apart from Farmer’s Market in town on Saturday morning, but we were able to source organic products and stuff from a store in town and from the supermarket and from the Farmer’s market and it was all good!  We started noticing some heath benefits in terms of how we were feeling our mental health improved and surely our  physical health would have been improving because we were eating organically and reducing our chemical intake which was a good thing, but we were still rushing around, and still tired and still out of touch with grassroots. 

In New Zealand we have an online site trade me where people sell things and list rental properties, and you can buy houses and we stumbled across this little cottage, and we thought why don’t we do something huge! A bit different a bit bold and brave! And we moved out of town to a cottage on top of the hill!  Really romantic with views etc! So we thought let’s do this!

Prior to moving out we had discussed with a few friends, we want to get a bit of livestock, and had this notion of a vision of free range chickens and free range animals and not any clue of how to farm. WE are not farmers we do not come from a farming background in anyway shape or form. We just thought we can do this, it will be fun it will be great it will be fantastic for the kids! 

Boris the Kune Kune Boar Pig

We decided to adopt a four year old Kune Kune Cross boar who was living in town, it was kind of one of those things that we didn’t know what happened, my daughter was at a soccer break up, and this mom says, one of the teachers is going over to England and she has this pig, she doesn’t want it to be put in the freezer. We said hey we might be interested, we’re moving out to this property, suddenly she’s on the phone and she’s arranging these meet and greets.

WE thought, it’s one pig, it wasn’t our intentino to establish livestock prior to moving out to the cottage, but here was this pig. 

The day we picked the pig up and it’s the day my father-in-law sort of dines out on, and it was the weirdest rain you could possibly imagine, we were soaked through to the brined, and this stubborn boar wasn’t going anywhere. And his owner’s husband is quite a tall guy, like my husband and he got him up the bath, and the pig is big and burly and he just turns around and runs back through his legs.

It just so happens we have a wedding that afternoon to go to , and we’re under this time pressure,  so this woman’s husband is a volunteer with the fire brigade so he calls to his captain and say’s hey we need some help. And the need things we hear the siren going off, the firetruck, fire truck comes up the road flashing and they jump out in full gear … and it was classified as dangerous animal rescue… and it was hilarious all neighbors watching, and this fireman trying to get this 150gram kilo pig = 330 lbs into the car… 

The first time I ever heard a pig screaming, but it was emotional, and the owner is crying and he was going to a happy life, but you know she was going to England and saying goodbye and we got him home to his paddock and had to get back to town to the reception and I raced in to change and I still smelled like pig, and the car is still smelling like pig. And that was kind of our introduction to farming! 

It’s always an adventure! 

He would suddenly turn up on our doors step. he was always on our door steps

We put wires up to surround around his paddocks

were cows in the farm across the road from us

he got out a few times from his paddock

Pig's car raid terrifies Otago woman

He wanted to be chasing the cows and he was squealing with delight. One time he got out he made international headlines

a lady saw him in the road

and thought he might have been a wild pig and he might have got out of the

she tried to get him back in his paddock

Boys loves people…

I’m sorry can I just interrupt, so 150 kilos is like 330 lbs!!!

and he obviously started to get into the car with her…she’s in the drivers side and he’s trying to get into the seat with here, he’s stinking smelly

they smell like warm ham!! 

It really traumatized her and he’s huge! and he’s really really strong

so many times I’ve been out in his paddock for him, and the grass was quite long

fell over for a while

he would make these tracks, he was like stealth mode and you wouldn’t know where he was and I’d trip into a hole, and  he was right there and I’d be screaming

fortunately for this lady, someone drove past and saw what was going on and managed to pull Boris out by his ear and they called the police and the animal control was advised and the newspaper was involved

suddenly this boar has been

did a segment on my husband and his pig and the romantic sweeping views of the coast and they did a whole thing and it was making a lot of people laugh during some ugly and not so nice parts of the globe and the comments people left, “this had made me day”

what a laugh

I really felt sorry for the lady, we never met her, respected her privacy

he’s just a lovable rogue! We went out there in the dark and I went out to go and give them some pig nuts, we have an electric fence

forestry block

chasing

We got a 5 month old kootenai saddleback cross sow for him, so we can breed off when she’s old enough. But he has a friend which is nice! He provides so much hilarity to our lives and he’s such a character. What sends me is when you have high intensive pig farming and the health and well being of animals how can you do that to such an intelligent

Pigs are hugely intelligent! My eldest daughter, won’t eat meat, she wont eat pork

she sees them being like one of us!

I was gonna ask you about being cruelty free I don’t think anyone’s talked about that do you want to explain it? I like that idea!

Cruelty Free Living

we became aware of how our

New Zealand is known for it’s ag

lambs

a lot of conventional farming methods especially around pork and chicken and they are cruel and inhumane. Even our beef and dairy have some huge challenges to face and overcome in terms of our welfare and 

where I watched that Food inc documentary, it really influenced me it largely focused on the food systems in america

locally in Dunedin theres a poultry farm and it’s caged birds, the cruelty to those birds for our pleasure and consumption at the end of the day it’s our pleasure. It just struck a chord with us and our conscious, they give their lives for us! And we owe them the respect and to ensure that their lives are happy and healthy and that they don’t suffer for our us because that’s just not right!

We immediately went to free range

free farmed pork

paddocked raised

the taste of the product and the quality

 is so much better then  intensively farmed

so much better

and the animals have been living a happy healthy life prior to being slaughtered, that’s part of us respecting the animal

we use every single element everything gets used. The carcases get used into bone broth

sheep that we grow on the farm, they get shorn prior to slaughter, so their wool is saved, and their skin is used around fruit trees as a weed suppressant

  • eats 
  • the liver
  • the heart
  • the tongue
  • everything gets used for dog food

shown respect given it’s life for us, the least we can do for it.

IT’s a cruelty philosophy as a family.

what we would like to do, pork and poultry i really expensive here, as we learn and grow aw farmers, we want to supply ourselves with our own pork and poultry products with the self sufficiency… aspect! But it’s 

You’ll get ti! you’ll be a master before long especially with all these adventures! I just love that, I like the thought of being cruelty free… I’ve been trying to go vegan, but that has not worked for me whatsoever but I could see me being cruelty free…

We love meat, we’re not eating meat 7 nights a week, maybe 3 meals a week. As individuals we can’t process, it’s not good for us, our diet is largely based on

  • vegetables
  • legumes
  • pulses
  • grains

part of this journey

so diverse

conventional town suburban family

impacted  our oldest daughter is 11, it’s been a real ethical dilemma fro her since we made this transition, and around her beliefs

around meat

farming and processing, but it was real hard because she loves meat, I mean give her a chop and she’s happy! She went through various stages of different types of meat free

her gage is the level of intelligence, and the relationship she can form with the animal, she’s happy to eat sheep and lamb, doesn’t feel she can form a relationship with. Cows she hasn’t had the contact with beef, they’re beautiful animals but I love beef but definitely with pigs and there’s definitely no way she could ever eat one. So we don’t cook pork when she’s here if she’s away we eat bacon, but any products that we do buy, we buy cruelty free so we know they are happy healthy animals

real battle fro her.

towny kid to a farm kid and she struggles with some things but she’s getting there. 

Now how old are the other kids?

Our son is 7 1/2 and youngest daughter 6 in January…

might as well be twins

I’m actually busier now then I was working a 9-5 in town, I’m so much more involved in school community and outside of school and wha tI’m doing here at the farm and establishing the business

It’s an identity shift as well, I’m figuring out who I am, I have these big romantic ideas, and I look at Curtis Stone and who I am and I think,I could be that person but it’s a big idea and for me as a bit of perfectionist

it’s gonna take a bit of work

it’s a huge shift

an upheaval

So do you want to tell us about the business aer you 

So with the livestock

our aim is to be self-sufficient with our meat

we don’t sell any of our meat because NZ has quite stick regulations and controls around meat processing and unless you are a certified processor, it’s difficult to sell meat. We work with in our community in terms of other small holders

we might swap

we could swap when our Boris and Sophie have their “bacon babies” we might swap a pig for two sheep or something there’s a bartering kind of process. We’ve been in the cottage up on the hill for just under the year. The water quality system was not the best.  We came to blows with the property owners, and we came across where we are now which is slightly further down the hill and close to the beach… but here I am ripping up turf to plant and creating paddocks, it’s been a real long frustrating process to get anything growing, because I had to turf up paddocks and then let them lay fallow for a while.. then dig them over and weed them and get all the kutch grass out and we have Convolvulus here that drives me nuts!

We have a kitchen a pottager type garden. That was abundant in summer…

Seaview Cottage Deep Beds

Seaview Cottage Raised Beds

raised garden beds

that was abundant in summer. We have a local Market Gardener in the community who supports other small gardens and he’ll sell your produce on your behalf through the markets and through a road-side store. So we well as much as we can that we can’t use ourselves or process or put away or freeze. WE sell our excess to him, and he sells it on to other people in the community.

purple heritage potatoes seaveiw cottage

Our first big transaction of, we planted out some potatoes including some heritage purple varieties! They just grew fantastically! And we sold what we couldn’t store. He had a restaurant in town,  he had a 12 course restaurant and it was cool to know that people were paying for our purple spuds.

One of my friends I spoke to the other day, said she went to this restaurant and I said “Did you have purple potatoes on your plate?!” And she said “Yes, we did!” and I was like “those are our purple potatoes!”

We want to establish as the

  • salad greens
  • high tuna
  • culinary herbs

because we know that we can do that well here with our soil. We’re gonna continue on with our potato growing, next year we will try to grow instead of a 100 meters we will try to triple that, because when we consider what we use here as a family

without

next season instead of putting in 100

we as a family need 250 kilos of potatoes a year. We manage to harvest 250 kilos off that one patch, so we worked out that we need to triple that volume to store what we need as a family and sell the rest taking into account any losses to worms etc… harvest losses and things. 

In terms of the business, we are really starting out, it’s really new in it’s embryonic form, but we have seeds going in for a spring harvest of winter Mesclun! And then I’m hoping to get into micrograms and edible flowers, because the market here for that will be strong for  a local grower. Right now aa lot of our organically grown

food miles

local food is so much better

and you’re supporting local

talking about colors and logos

and our strategy guy about what we are

reading as much as I can! And Curtis Stone I’m just blown away by what he’s achieved! Unfortunately, he did a tour of New Zealand and I couldn’t make it. 

I’m watching his tube video, reading books and talking to people, I’m hoping to see  hopefully in the next 18 months, there will be an explosion, the ground work will be done and then well be planting and harvesting etc. 

I think there, I think there is some good stuff coming up! 

I’ve bene checking out Curtis Stone, I’ve just heard of him since January. I ordered his book from the library but I think it’s gonna be one I want to buy anyway. I think it’s ironic that your coming out of the city and he’s the urban farmer… I think obviously his lessons apply to anywhere. 

What I love about his principles is I Love that its scalable

no matter how small or large your land ability is, in town, its rare to find the space and property, the amount of space that they have in terms of backyards is phenomenal! In Dunedin, everybody’ chopping up their properties and pruting houses on the front of the yard, here, unless you go here, unless you go rural, it’s hard to achieve that urban farming model were fortunate enough where we are it’s 20 minutes drive and your out in farmland…  we have one main street in town… so it’s a small city!  there are 124k people here.. 

Dunedin city boundary…

a lot of farmland and rural land. If you want to move into farming, horticultural enterprises you can, there’s lots of land to lease on the outside of town…you don’t have to be forced into a backyard. Where we were in town, didn’t have much of a backyard…. and we were just renting. 

Its not hard to find that land availability to recreate his models and stuff. It’s very inspiring. And the more I talk to people, the biggest things, you you can go to youtube and go to websites and listen to podcasts, the most benefit leaping into the deep end talking to people. 

And also local people will know your climate specifically. 

The person that I work with Roger, down the road, and his environment is different than right up the hill, he’s right on a cliff. So his water is non-existent. We’re just up the road, were on a really good water line so we have the ability as a grower we can provide a lot of things that he can’t,  we rely on rain water, its an infrastructure

we’ve had one of our driest spring summer autumn, I think globally the last few months have been dryness on record….I say that after sitting here stuck inside after 3 days of torrential downpour and its been great filling up our water tanks! But we’re really at the whim of the water supply, it’s finding ways of using  the natural contours of farmland and accessing spring water   and using the natural runoffs of the hills. Dunedin’s a hilly city and we’re fortunate enough, you know if you are in the right spot… you can get a lot of natural fall from the drainage, but you don’t find out that sort of stuff unless you talk to people! Local people and local farmers.

And they watch there’s so many stories and my physiotherapist says to me… you guys need to write a book!

We on our previous property, had this the lambs we got, in this big paddock trying to roundup and the 

The 2 of us in this paddock trying to round up this pig and 4 lambs, and anybody who’s death with sheep knows its easier to deal with 400 sheep then 4 sheep. There’s was probably a lot of swearing involved. The farmer next door and contractors working o the fence and they toped and watched us. watching  us 2 city kids trying to round up this pig and these 4 lambs. They could have helped!

It’s hilarious!

That’s part of the journey! Your gonna get some stories! 

Exactly that’s part of the fun of it!

So Mike came up with this name for the second part of my show called “Get to the Root of IT!” And so even though we’re only on question one, I’m still gonna say are you ready to get to the root of things?

Tell me about your first gardening experience?

we’ll my very first gardening, my mom was a floral Gardener, one of the jobs was to do the weeding.

loves her rhododendron

didn’t do it much

my granddad was a prolific vegetable grower! I think it his is where I get the bug from and he grew  amazing veg

  • cucumbers,
  • tomatoes

he could come up with and spin yarns, and he was a bit of a fisherman, and you know the story, and he would say his tomatoes were as big as a dinner plate, probably was only as big as a saucer. And I remember when he would come visit he would give us a bag of Fiji

he wasn’t an organic grower he was a conventional, but homegrown produce is just amazing. You can’t get that, in super markets and stores, you can’t get that amazing flavor. 

His produce and veggie garden, he had a big family, four kids

he grew for family and I think that’s a gift you give to your children

job wa stop ensure

to be strong productive members of community, I think diet is a critical par tof that, if you are growing kids and instilling grassroots values and if your growning strong bodies

it’s not until know being a mother myself feelling this hunger for our own produce

remembering moer of my memories with my granddad and what that means to me, I’m really the only one out of all my cousins. She’s really conscious of my diet. She’s using 

I have one on the

TUMERICToothpastenaturally somethings like toothpaste

only one who has the growing bug

though

my granddad

often been

How did you learn how to garden organically?

It was the realization of the horrendous impacts of chemical farming does on the not only food but one the environment… when I was starting I had no idea the impact of what re

ability to inform

glyphosate is a horrible horrible thing, fantastic on food

horror that is monsanto

that light bulb!

that is how we started

i dont think we could use organically

we’re growing our own culture

we importing that onto our children

they will take that from our culture

take that with our family…

only in the last 4

trying to inspire myself as well, that spark that this is me and this is where I want to go

I have a habit that I have talk too much

as you’ve started to see

i;ll keep on talking and share our story

we’e seen in such a short time the benefits of this transition if our journey can

its gonna take a long time

to where we want to be

changes as you go

inspire somebody to make the change to somebody living in a small stressful environment

high chemical intake diet

lets be br evened lets do this

how cool is what your doing

really wish we ould do the same

what’s holding you back

good lord its not easy

its been really hard, there are times i’ve thought I can’t do this anymore! But I do because it’s for the benefit of our children and their children! 

if you can do it!

gosh!

I would recommend diving as you go!

I tell my mom all the time! I could live anywhere, I choose to live here because it fits me. Eureka Montana’s the best place in the world!  Now you’re the opposite of us right ready to go into winter?

Winter starts in June

off the record warm autumn

which is great for growing so we’re now coming into Autumn and things are falling off the trees 24 hours a day 7 days a week! 

Our fire’s always going pretty much all but 2 weeks a year, but Mike was a logger forever and I think he’s still a logger at heart and likes to cut those trees down so we have a lot of firewood.

Tell us about something that grew well this year.

Rainbow chard, the flavor it was so sweet and the colors are just amazing. People were saying to us “Can we have some?” My mom when she came to visit would be like, do you have any of that rainbow chard? Can we have some? I’ve been processing it and freezing it selling it. You swiss chard is fairly easy to grow! And it’s pretty good, 

protect it from slugs and snails

really good autumn, winter crop

80 odd seedlings… and another bead that I’m working on through the moment, and maybe I’ll sell a little bit yet to pay for m seed and 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t ask you for a recipe? What do you use all that swiss chard for? I like to use it to replace celery and I put it into everything. 

Pretty much all of that, the colors

if you want to get veggies into your kids

the pinks, the purples, the oranges the yellows! The standard whites!

It’s just a beautiful rainbow of nutrition! I put into everything!

It’s the beauty of cooking a lot of homestyle, Italian cooking, you can hide so much

  • It goes anything that’s got a sauce in it
  • stir fry it
  • put it on pizza
  • flavors amazing!
  • soups and stews

kale same with kale! I’ve got a good crop of kale

really bulky vegetable, so I dehydrate and then the kale flakes go into everything! 

How do you do that? In a dehydrator?

I just do it in my oven, and make kale flakes! 

110ºC = 212º

Kale Flakes

  • kale leaves
  • 1/2 hour in oven at 202º
  • chop in food processor
  • dry on baking sheet overnight

take the stalks off, just the leaves and it goes into the oven about 1/2 an hour until it’s really crispy and then I put it in the food processor till it’s flakey and then I put it out to dry just on some baking sheets. Then I just pack it away in glass jars. Kale is one of those superfoods that still has a high nutritional value after it’s dehydrated

another one that goes in everything!

  • smoothies
  • pizza
  • soups
  • stews

except I don’t put it on ice cream!

I finally grew kale this spring listeners! I have kale growing!!! I like that idea of making the kale flakes and putting that in everything! 

Is there something you would do different next year or want to try/new?

This season coming up is gonna be the first planting of our salad greens, so we’ll see how that grows. It will be officially the beginning of our business

is the harvest of

  • Mesclun mix baby greens
  • heritage varieties of potatoes
  • turmeric potatoes
  • sweet potatoes
  • three sisters

new Zealand amazing selection of different types of martie Variety

sweet potatoes, kumara, doesn’t grow very well on the south island….more of a north island

heritage potatoes, the colors and just getting into some vibrant variety

GrayPumpkinsGreenManure

3 sisters

  • corn
  • squash
  • beans

my potato patch currently has some mustard is my grain crop that will get turned over at the start of spring

100 square meters

quite excited about that, I really love how that method really

your using your environment to your advantage, so in an area where water is not abundant in summer having crops that actually help with water retention so the squash being the ground cover to keep moisture, I love those methods of growing that support your soil and environment to create something fabulous! 

So that’s really good, so at the moment i do’t have a lot of growing at all, but I have a lot of groundwork that’s been done and I’m hoping spring will just kind of explode with harvests and more!

Tell me about something that didn’t work so well this season.

There was a couple of things that did that! The biggest flop was probably my celery

I got really excited and the pottager area was completely overgrown! And I got excited because I had this great soil, country cottage type of garden, and I went down to our big meager hardware store! And I went a little nuts. I bought, and i figured if it was sold there must be a season! So I went out and I bought a whole lot of celery! We go through celery like rainbow chard. I planted ti at the completely wrong, and the hearts went black, the heart of stalks

So I discovered its only now and I planted it in October so I would have been oct – nov

should really be planting the celery, I  didn’t get my scarlet runner beans in on time, I planted them too late. But whilst things are still a flop, part of a crops failures are an opportunity for your to learn….how to improve our thinking and figure out what went wrong!. That was probably the only flop was the celery.

Celery’s kind of hard to grow!

Which activity is your least favorite activity to do in the garden.

Well, weeding’s not too bad, I kind of like to think. Weeding it provides me an opportunity to think, I struggle to relax my mind, can’t sit still, need to do something to relax, relax my mind,

the thing that I really struggle with is actually digging up ground, turfing up pasture. because it’s so awards a do a lot of the pasture full of cutch grass,

rhizomes and I know it looks  nice in beer, wait for a swear

Initially, it’s breaking new ground its are hard to do, even though I know in a months time mannered enriched full of so much promised  when you’re looking at grass, it’s really hard to see the end results! Especially its just me, he’s gone a lot, when I ‘ve got the kids hard to juggle and being able to get in there and devote a decent amount of day to turning a piece of ground, but I think, hey the moment that sod has been lifted I know it’s the first type needed to get to abundance.

PinkSunset

What is your favorite activity to do in the garden?

Wandering! I love to wander through our beds and actually look at what’s going on. I’m very task oriented. So lots of times, I’ll be getting in there for a specific task, harvesting, weeding or tilting or

Sometimes I have a hard time to look back and see what I’ve achieved in such a short period of time. I do make a point of actually grabbing a cup of tea, and walk about and you miss things, I wouldn’t necessarily see thing while I’m down in what I’m working on… 

a chance to take stock of the whole kind of system, not just the garden,

  • what’s happening with the fruit trees,
  • hows the soil looking?
  • particular ned favorite of weed?….
  • terms of a permaculture perspective
  • prune that tree?
  • turn the compost?

wondering is the reflective process, kind of keeps me sane, it’s not seeing the work because of the trees sort of things, 

And harvesting is probably! As hard work as harvesting is, you’ve got something that you’ve grown, to feed your family and to feed other people’s families.

What is the best gardening advice you have  ever received?

Probably, talk to people I think, talk to people who live locally im terms of who works for them. You have ta complete failure… you can discover so just from those that are already doing ti….. someone who was starting their own small scale horticultural venture, talking to local people as well. Also the great thing sabot small communities, is people want to help!

One of the things i started with last year, I was toying the idea of helping set up a community garden – helping people who have a level of food community garen.

so they have access to local for 

families growing their own vegetables…

sharing of skill, key to elements and strength of community

knowledge is power

start o something now

 can be daunting, and many hands make light work, And I started with, I’m starting up a group, we’re all kind of like minded and have a green thumb

We set up this local green thumbs group

the aim is you put up an even, say hey

  • Ive got to cultivate
  • I’ve got this massive project going on
  • I’ve got to prune my 100 years old fruit trees

the idea is to get as many people together and in return for the help you provide people come and help you. IT was quite cool on the weekend in November I had these people show up with their grabbers and pitchforks and stuff and half of us didn’t know each together and we planted out 100 meters of potatoes in half a day!               

woud have taken me all hours

helped other people organize other events

being part of that

shared network and knowlege

having that knowledge and network and connection was amazing!

A favorite tool that you like to use? If you had to move and could only take one tool with you what would it be

Rotary hoe, wherever you go, if you have a rotary hoe you can turn up new ground. If  you’re breaking through clay and hard top soil, it’s so much easier to do witha  rotary hoe! Especially self-propelled so you don’t drag… that would be my one favorite tool!

The Dirty LIfe Kristin KimballOne of my guest, I htink it was Julie Ross from South Dakota recommended this book The Dirty Life a Memoir of Farming, Food and Love  by Kristen Kimball, and this NYC writer gets sent to Pennsylvania to interview this farmer and she falls in love with him and they get married and move to upstate NY… which reminds me of when you were first talking. Who’s butchering their meat?

I had this other guest, Patti Armbrister, and she’s in the ranching community in Eastern Montana, but she started working at the school she was appalled to see they were shipping meat from Texas when they had this great local meat and a student even donated a cow from his parents ranch and they couldn’t use it but she’s working gon ti now ,s o I wondered where they processed their meat, but also they are doing everything by had. They use horses t plow the fields… etc.In the beginning she’s talkin about getting their team and how they taught them how to plow and my husband really wants a tractor we got him a rototiller last year because he planted this little minigram and it’s not working this year of course!

Walking Tractor Mandy Gerth

And Mandy Gerth in Episode 119  had a walking tractor that she used!

Kim Romeril Kids cooking

A favorite recipe you like to cook from the garden?

I think anything that’s got vegetables on it pretty much, my favorite

my kids would be a good place to start

we have more diverse pallets then our children, we eat quite interesting things compared to them, but I think my go to for them is 

spaghetti Bolognese

that I cram full of veggies, it’s a good highly veggies recipe

soups are really great as well, nothing better then getting a quick soup with veggies! Soup from the garden! 

I made a potatoes gratin and I layer it with purple  potatoes so it has these beautiful purple layers it’s a baked potato dish, …. yummy cream and cheese

not a huge culinary wiz! I’m more of a baker! 

Are you gonna grow any grains?

Probably not, New Zealand is a small country and we have a lo of friends who grow buckwheat and stuff

if there is somebody who can do it really well… enterprise

husband really wants to get into home-brew… so he’s really keen on looking oint buying bulk grains in bali and stuff for his home-brew beer which is fine. 

I was gonna ask you earlier you were talkin about heritage grains….

A favorite internet resource?

At the moment Im really just going to the Curtis Stone

The Urban Farmer Curtis Stone Website

and his you tube and videos

grains and tools and

its really invigorating what he does

he’s growing a lot of stuff that I’m keen to get my hands on a copy of his book as well. Ilm keen on drawing pictures and making notes and stuff. How he talks about using the weed-mat and the cloth, we call it weed-mat and burning the holes. I thought that makes perfect sense and as soon as you cut into the weed mat it shreds and burning the holes is just perfect. That’s when you talk to people. I didn’t even think about it! 

amazing 

MarketGardenerBookThe Market Gardener: A Successful Grower’s Handbook for Small-Scale Organic Farming

the Market Gardener – JM Fortier

on there for ages

harvestor

spinning kind of fingers

how amazing a job it does

salad greens

curtis stone is probably my go to at the moment

got to get my hands on a copy of his book

drawing pictures

something that makes so much sense to me know

 and making a template how begets the landscapes cloth or weed mat

burning the holes and offset

makes perfect sense

as soon as you gut it

that makes so much sense

that’s what talking to people and stuff and going to people who does things well that’s where you get knowledge grom the weed suppresent. I’m gonna by hundreds and hundereds of weed mat. 

I just saw someone’s layout of that in The Flower Farmer’s Facebook group doing that. 

A favorite reading material-book, mag, blog/website etc you can recommend?

Curtis Stone the Urban FarmerIn addition to the Curtis Stone stuff, he’s kind of a guru, aKoanga InstituteKoanga Institute, they focus on biotinesnsive growing of nutrient dense food, they have a whole lot of resources avaialible:

  • workshops
  • you can buy heritage seed varieties no where wells in the world
  • videos on their Facebook page and website

what we can grow in new Zealand

whole biodynamic going methods

because they’re down to earth realistic people was we’e not eke

If you have a business to you have any advice for our listeners about how to sell extra produce or get started in the industry?

My advice at this stage would be go talk to other business others, and try gathering as much in go as possible about what works and what doesn’t work

my neighbor and I are looking into a going venture for growing our own poultry – like proper free range gets throughway around quite loosely

some might call free range cause they are living in a shed but they are not really free range, so utilizing chickens and pigs as part of our rotations cycle of land use, so 

cultivation and fertilizing thorough manure and having them be an integral part of our land management system. IT’s going to be part of my growing salad greens

hoops and flowers and stuff

best advice is go see people, physically seeing what they are doing

that’s where you find your most information, you can read 

  • book after book
  • go to websites
  • look at tutorials

but if you’re not actually physically and tangibly drawing out what you need to know you wont’ know, 

feeling the soil

this might all look good on camera but someone said in a blog post. But the actually interaction with the environment.

  • what’s the weather like
  • where’s the wind coming form
  • through sharing what their doing

I think that is great advice, because some popel you might not realize, here’s an wind block or something. 

WE have a fabulous nursery down hear

open day at nursery

operation

permaculture methods

groundcover comfrey

I have heard about it but physically seeing it,

able to establish an orchard, comfrey’s gonna be everywhere because I’ve physically seen the benefits of it, people are willing to talk and share their resources, and they might know other people you may not have known that tare doing wha your are doing and also 

sharing tools

expensive machinery

don’t need to borrow mine.

IMG_6520

I really like what you said about the chickens becasuse that’s been a bone with me and mike for years, and it kind of backfired on me, I finally talked him into building a door, so they could get out into the woods, and one night something got them because of course I went and left the door open and now the ones that survived, the same fence that they never jumped over and bordered the garden now they go anywhere. And my lettuce grew, I put this chicken wire so they couldn’t get into it and it grew right through it and they didn’t eat it!

Final question- if there was one change you would like to see to create a greener world what would it be? For example is there a charity or organization your passionate about or a project you would like to see put into action. What do you feel is the most crucial issue facing our planet in regards to the environment either in your local area or on a national or global scale?

Well, I think the biggest issue for us, and in our experience as a family. being able to grow your own food, and to be able to support yourself, is one of those steps

how can I make a difference on a global scale,

I think we’re seeing the trend and the importance of being able to

rely on your family system

in termes of local food,

behaviors and stuff were gone

large scale commercialization of food is not sustainable, large scale

conventional chemical farming

what’s that’ sing to the land

store for a period of time, gott to travel well, as a result

people exploitation of those who are at risk because of poverty

exportation fo them and the land and their cultures…for their sake of soybeans

large-scale commercial production

for a country that is able to produce of much for ou exports

there’s a lot of fop people kids going to school for days on end without getting fed

the way our propel look at the environment and the health and well being

initiatives and support

skills themselves

supporting their own local food system

grow some veggies in a bucket on their doorstep

making small changes to the way they are

benefits of that change

they will have that knowledge installed upon them

one family can make a huge difference in he lives of generations to come

employing sel sufficient behaviors in their own backyard

read the par report eh UN reproduced

small holdings and benefits i tell bring

social economix

getting them out of generational behaviors

having to rely on someone welds for their food

no thing

instilling those behaviors

few organizations

charities that help to support who local people who need it, mentoring going on though schools, a lot of

employ rural schools, evidence of business i

supporting those that are in the community to

think that just being consciously aware of the impact you have on your immediate impact. That’s kind of where we can say change the world! 

LOVE IT!

You’re just another one of those rockstar millennials and parents raising their children to support your grassroots values and love it all!

Do u have an inspiration tip or quote to help motivate our listeners to reach into that dirt and start their own garden?

Just be brave! Making a complete change where you live I’ve or what your doing or growing something you’e never grown before if you don’t even try you’ll never know what happens

grow and develop as a person, what your growing and how your doing and it has a ripple effect and bring more opportunity and good stuff…

How do we connect with you?

Email us at seaviewcottagedunedin@gmail.com

As I said, to you before we’re really in the embryonic phase, I had a blog but I’m trying to figure out where I’m going with it, so that will come online,  what content is going to be…next few weeks, will come on line soon and Facebook has taken a bit of a back seat

Seaview Cottage FB Page

Seaview Cottage on Facebook

Seaview Cottage

The last post was  we’re changing to turmeric toothpaste and building our social media presence . Once we’re established well really up the ante!

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About the author, Jackie Marie

I'm an artist and educator. I live at the "Organic Oasis" with my husband Mike where we practice earth friendly techniques in our garden nestled in the mountains of Montana.

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