321. From Panic to Empowerment | Chloe Lieberman | Wild Abundance | Asheville, NC
May 24, 2020
Blog and Newsletter Writer, Instructor for Nutrition, Gardening, and Wildcrafting
Tell us a little about yourself.
Wild Abundance is more then a website it’s a school, I live here and the school is here in the Southern Appalachian mountains just outside of Asheville, North Carolina
- corn
- winter squash
- sweet potatoes
- micro dairy, one Jersey cow and mostly Alpine dairy goats
- flock of ducks
- beekeeper
medicinal and edible mushroom cultivation
medicinal plants
the school that i work for is located just down the road
campus is run by my dear friend, Natalie dog walker
together
this year
we are walking on an online gardening school
teaching people all over the world
pretty much because
we love it an are passionate
afraid of breakdown of supply chains
surge and your listeners have noticed
interested in gardening
when you first start out gardening it can be
- overwhelming
- discouraging
steering them in the right direction
folks who have that inspiration can have that success and keep going
I always think it’s interesting, I always dreamed of going to Montana, I knew a girl who always wanted to go to Maryland. She’s like doesn’t that just sound beautiful?
can really
20 acres
we have 23 acres
bigger farms in this state
piedmont
east
up in the mountains
Appalachian mountain chain in the southern part of that mountain chain. It’s one of the oldest mountain formations in the world
Lots of endemic species that live here
It’s a beautiful verdant jungle in the spring and summer
- temperate rainforest
- lots of rain
- gets chilly changing with climate change
A big chunk of that is wooded hillside
farm per se flatland 3-4 acres
where we have the animals
harvest timber obviously for wood heat cooking and mushroom cultivation My partner is just dedicated at working away at developing a silvapasture and nut orchard up on the slope.
I’m sure your listeners know 23 acres can mean a lot of different things if you have top soil and if it’s hilly land
so we are somewhere in between
- flat for the mountains
- do grow our vegetables
- steep land marshy boggy land
That’s similar where we are surrounded by doug fir forest and you can see before and after pics on our website. where he has cut the forest to build the minifarm.
Tell me about your first gardening experience?
well, I didn’t grow up gardeningI grew up in the suburbs in the bay area in Northern, CA
small rural western part of the county
alternative school that happened to be a public school, was really a blessing for me and my family getting to go to a private school that was public and free
alternative
project based
interdisciplinary
open classroom
in marin
more rural part
- best friend mom had dairy goats
- made her own beer
- apple sauce
My other friends mom
- grew beautiful roses
- berries and fruits
I did have early exposure
we had a garden at my school
early childhood exposure I was drawn to plants and animals
I didn’t tend my own garden till I was in college
I knew I wanted to study
- agri-cology
- environmental studies
- sustainable food systems
avid cook
vegetarain
love vegetables and cook lots
Anyone who cooks a lot has a visceral understanding of the difference of quality of veg
grown in sustainable
industrial food system
was a driving force for me
- flavor
- pleasure
- nourishment
- enjoyment
cooking
nourishment
sustainable
- macro systems
- food justice systems
way that the world works
How farmers are treated around the world
how they can make a living
farmers and gardens
current practices and practices that would be more optimal for farmers and land and the disconnect
there wanting to sunder
college and studying
renting houses
college students do
my first garden I spearheaded
in front yard
next to the highway
double-dug the beds gat I had been observing
grew some tomatoes
most successful
all Th.
I had worked on other peoples gardens and
volunteered on harvest days
translated into doing it myself that was my first experience, it grew from there.
Then moving out here to NC
One of my big motivations was to grow all of my food, not that I have to do that forever but just to know what that actually looks like
have that experiential knowledge
go to the store
- land
- water
- work
- have that hands on experience of my impact on the earth basically
That’s what I have been exploring
The listeners know I am going to ask the next question? I’m gonna ask. Are you a rockstar millennial? I think they are all like you! You are like my total avatar. My question is what in the heck made you say I’m gonna go to school to school and study sustainable ag systems and food justice. I feel like we are failing our kids of the opportunities out there still saying you can be a doctor, a lawyer, an architect. I think kids have no what the option are!
1983
Tell us about your courses? Or what you want to talk about next.
I’ll answer your question of how I got there because I think it’s an important question to ask!
I grew up in the Bay area of Northern CA,
I great up in a very privileged and mostly white community of progressives
These ideas were available to me
The idea of pursuing something passion not the bottom line of needing to support my family were present because of my cultural background. I just want to aknowlegde that
fact that I was able to pursue those things, yes was because of my social conscience and my inspiration and my life path but also because of the amount of privilege I lived with
what kids are exposed to there’s kind of this spectrum
some young people have huge amount of privilege like
white privilege
Don’t ever get asked questions about what is important to them?
Or brought into these discussions of how we can wield that power and privilige to the
ecological world
and human world
I feel lucky to be at intersection of those things and have the spaciousness to make choices based on my passion not just the need so support myself and my family
progressive thinking and social consciousness
I want to give credit to my parents who encouraged me to do what I’m passionate about and to learn and ask questions.
For folks listening and have children
I have a young child
overwhelming and look at raising right now
How can they find their place? this is so crazy right now
encouraging children and young people questions that might not have answers but to pursue those questions. thorough the asking and through their engagement in the world that answers might arrive that might not exist yet
I know my listeners are probably interested in the food forest and mushrooms and there are classes they can take.
Wild Abundance is a school that used to be until a few years ago where you had to go in person
you had to come here to the campus
connective community building
annual
permaculture design certification course
- in depth
- hands on
8 month program but
much more with that digging into
earth skills
ancestors have used to relate to the natural world to supply themselves with sustenance
a lot of amazing classes
- building
- re-wilding
- medicine making
But with many in person classes and with brick and mortar businesses we have had to cancel our classes and pivot into online learning
fortunately we produced an all natural
brain-tanning class
sueded leather that is 100% natural
producing that course
result to this huge surge interested in food gardening as a result from the pandemic and also to survive as a business
We have created this online gardening school
program to support new and intermediate in being successful
relating to gardening as a living system
mentorship calls ansering nitty gritty questions and also our approach for gardeing where
gardening is more for people to get food
connect with the natural world
that’s what we teach
food forests
chatted about them with the garden school members but it is not covered in the garden school program
We are looking to develop more online classes
It’s amazing how we can serve more people
not easy for everyone to come here where were located in a hot bed of
permaculture
back to the land
aren’t mentors and teachers
online program
Greece
new Zealand
lots of places in the US
may or may not have teachers available
encourage people to get on our newsletter and mailing list
developing more classes
- mushroom cultivating
- orcharding
- food forests
- which all fits under the realm of permaculture
I think after this is all over your going to find that 3 day course is going to be just packed! I think people are going to love each other and be into workshops!
I just want to clarify, the permaculture design courses are longer
subject to specific
woman’s carpentry classes and female identified folks
confident with tools
building things for them
3 day
- re-wilding course
- survival course
- permaculture courses are a little longer
8 month
3 days each month awesome way to go deeper but a great longer commitment
I think a lot of women would like that, because a lot of woman write me and say but I don’t have a Mike at home to build our beds and mike might say why don’t you go because I don’t have any of those skills, I kind of gave up after trying to build a few things.
That’s a really good point, I invite you to come, we have had wonderful feedback about these classes
I have cooked for them, we provide lunch
people come who have never picked up a tool, but others who have a some skills.
I don’t want to generalize too much as a gender, but my experience as a woman or female identified
not just by messing around doing it, in an environment where people have this kind of have this expectation
- come together
- support each other
- feeling really comfortable in commuity
- “stupid questions”
Oh yeah now I feel confident
gone through this process
vulnerable receiing help from experienced people
feeling good experimenting
on my own what questions
most popular classes are the woman’s carpentry class
one or twice a year we offer a more advanced class
building structures
basics
work on an individual project like a book shelf in the advanced class we work on something that stands up like a shed
The thing I want to learn, I can’t wait to learn is how to build gates.
I went to Free the Seeds, I gave a way a book, and the number one thing out of 40 people, I want to see 35 of them said was keeping deer out. My husband is really good at is building a fence. People might think, I just want to grow tomatoes. But trust me, pests, critters,are the biggest struggle and the answers are barriers is the biggest way to keep them out. Of course were still struggling with squirrels.
This relationship between gardening and really connecting to the larger world
A lot of people come to gardening because they want something to eat
which is understandable we want to grow food to eat the food.
Main reason I garden, super rewarding and people don’t even know when they start out that there are so many varieties of vegetables
then we can buy in the store
even to some degree
bread for ripening time, so they all ripen at the same time for harvesting ease
shelf life
home scale variety
production
bread for flavored and beauty
varied ripening time so if you just have a couple of plants you have
summer squash each day for a month or more
come back and pick them again
small scaled
containers on a balcony
human beings about zoom and snap chat
and all of the ways we’ve gotten so online
connected
not connected
connecting through these unnatural means seperating us from other humans and our connection with the natural world
suffering because
- depression
- anxiety
food related illnesses
- obesity
- type 2 diabetes
- blood pressure
list goes on
see it as this really appealing way to address all of those challenges
not only getting food to eat this daily reminder of the reciprocal relationship with the natural world
not just an intellectual way
earth gives us life
understanding of in their particular spiritual
or philosophical background
this is not philosophical
When you grow a garden
grow
harvest
eat
taste
sweet
goes into that
as you are digging your garden bed you notice a clutch of baby robins that just hatched
wouldn’t have gone out and been digging doing this repetitive meditative task, if you didn’t go out in the garden
feel hopeful
even in an urban setting
start to garden
open that door to have an experiential relationship with the natural world
that some of these big challenges we are experienceing culturaly right now may have a big of a crack in them
opening
solutions overwhelming and complex as they sometimes seem but they are actually small and simple
each of us can participate in them in a way that is fun and joyful
sense of satisfaction in our lives!
TOTALLY! The question I want to know, you said in the beginning, what are some of those decisions you made like having one cow?
this is our 7th year of growing here on our homestead before that we were growing a sizable field on our friends place, that was kind of a beginning, so this is 8th year of attempting
don’t grow and raise 100% of my own food
occassionally we will get a pizza or go out to dinner
not super hardcore
more of a balance between that experiment and participating in modern life
size of the place we have to work with and number of people to work the land are huge considerations along with budget in terms of the number of things
One cow, she’s a jersey cow, produces way more milk then we need!
late lactation, she hasn’t had a calf this year, she had a calf last spring, we have since slaughtered him
meat is in our freezer
gallon and half of milk
first freshens, term you use for a dairy animal after having a baby, they will have a baby, they call it the first freshen. she will make over 4 gallons of milk
Wait can I just ask the maybe silliest question but the baby doesn’t need to drink the 4 gallons of milk?
plenty of butter
She makes more then 4 gallons of milk, basically
when we are drinking the milk from the other species but dairy breeds have been bred to produce more milk their babies need, if they didn’t they wouldn’t be able to power a whole industry
baby in commercial dairies
babies are taken away before the mother sees or licks them
if you let them bond they become distressed, either way they become distessed
most commercial
raise the calf
on milk from the baby or from the mother
replacer
less then 4 gallons
bunch of different things
baby gets some, still get to spend time together
works better with goats
wanting a break from milking
calf didn’t need to keep milking but he was
slaughtered the calf
started milking
so thats where the gallon and a half come from lots of different ways to do it
I knew cows were taking away at the dairy but not all of that i guess.
so continuing to answer your questions bout size and scale
how much of each to grow
field corn or dried corn
grow that to make tortillas
sometimes we make cornbread or
tamales
grow enough corn in a year to last us a year or two so we alternate
sweet potatoes we often grow more then we need
sometimes sell them
playing the
storage is a issue, it’s not just a question of how many you’ll eat
what kind of set up you have for storing them and how long
I was goona ask about the corn, but I suppose you could
dry as whole kernels so we can store at room temperature
So you just take the kernels off the cob? Still easier, less space, then saving ears of corn taking up less space?
Then what about the goats?
yeah do you have specific questions? How many?
Do you have goats for milk?
we milk
about 1/2 gallon of milk
depends on the breed
Mostly we make
- kefir
- shev
- feta cheese
with the cow milk we sell a lot of cow milk and yogurt so that’s a nice way to pay for the cow itself.
I love feta cheese and it’s so expensive! So I hardly ever buy it. I have a friend who makes her own mozzarella cheese is so amazing! I even bought rennet to try to make it the woman near us who had a cow.
You can make mozzarrella with store bought milk.
Is there something you guys are excited to try this year that you haven’t tried before?
let me think, yes! we have
my partner really spearhead this, but we have sown different kinds of heirloom wheat
We have this dairy cow so we have a lot of homemade butter
don’t eat a lot of wheat or gluten containing
sourdough bread or things like that
see how that its looking really good in the field obviously it’s gonna be a ordeal to process to harvest and clean and turn
My husband is interested in growing wheat too, he is a big baker, Mike is getting closer to being able to grow as much of our produce, but we also have the storage issue. I never thought about growing corn to make a corn meal. corn is one of those crops it’s hard to find good quality corn. Mike has a hard time cause our growing season is short. In Eureka, we are 6 miles south of town, it’s much easier to get corn there because they have 3 weeks on each of our ends of the season.
northern adapted varieties of flint corn
when I say dry field corn it’s different then sweet corn
you can’t just use sweet corn and let it dry to use for corn tortillas etc.
need to grow varieties to be harvested in their dry mature corn
There are 3 kinds of corn
- flint
- flour
- dense?
corn
flint tend to be shorter in their growing season, the native people of the north east, all the way into Canada developed corn to grow in a short season.
You know Mike and I joined a couple of Maine gardening groups, because were looking at a place in Maine, but again, at our property we struggle. Our last frost date is usually about the first week in June, and the first frost in the fall is about the first week in Sept but we have had a frost on August 8th.
Mike is growing more food this year then ever as we are worried about a food shortage this fall.
what lesson have you learned form this experiment about growing your own food?
how long have you been doing it
dairy? One cow
goats?
food forest
Hope to grow those fears to
from panic to empowerment
sure
if you are interested in connecting with me
there is a navigation bar
homepage
onsite classes
blog
Which I write for, but I have been busy these last couple of months but I will be diving back into that soon
newsletter
share tips and how too
recipes
tidbits
youtube channel
active on social media
Facebook and Instagram
wild abundance
southern Appalachians
look forward to connecting with some of your listeners.
Just at least for me to find you I had to go to the instructor page, staff and instructors!
Thanks so much for sharing! Your website is awesome keep on doing these great things. Thanks for changing!
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