Modular Chicken Tunnels help direct chickens to improve garden beds

Although allowing your chickens to free-range a great idea, getting them to just stay on the grass and not destroy your garden is not an easy thing to do. They don’t seem to listen and wander about blissfully digging up your garden, making mounds in your vegetable patch, spraying dirt all over the place as they go hunting for bugs, worms and insects.

In a previous post we mention creating a series of wire “tunnels” that emerge from the chicken coop and direct chickens to work zones around the garden.

The tunnels are like a road network system that chickens are allowed to navigate through and then emerge at their designated “work zone” in the garden, usually an area covered in weeds or an old garden bed that needs some attention.

These old parts of the garden are a chicken paradise. Because its been neglected, there’s usually tasty critters hidden under the soil just waiting for the chickens to scratch up a treat. In return the chickens deposit a little fertilizer and do a lot of the physical work of turning the soil over preparing the garden bed for you. Keeping the system modular allows for flexibility in directing the chickens to where you want them to garden and also keeps them off sensitive parts of the garden.

Bruce Morgan the Chicken Tunnel guy explains his system in this YouTube video clip. You’ll get a better idea how light and easy to construct his tunnels are from watching the clip.

Bruce Morgan's Chicken Tunnel system

Concrete reinforcment mesh bent into a hoop can be used for the tunnel

We’ve had a few people email asking where do you buy Chicken Tunnels.
As far as we’re aware no such thing exists although a cunning entrepreneur can probably see the potential!

Bruce likes to make his tunnel sections modular and easy to carry. He makes his tunnels from anything found around the house including wire trays from refrigerators now used as doors for his tunnel system.

They should be stack-able when not in use and preferably made from easy to find materials.

One suggestion was to use concrete reinforcement mesh to make a number of interlocking hoops that connect to the “work zone” where the chickens are allowed to assemble and scratch away. Although heavy these hoops are solid construction and prevent predators from attacking your birds in the open.

The “road sections” of the tunnels need not be very large and limited by the height of the chickens and wide enough to allow two birds to pass by one another easily. Bruce Morgan’s chicken system will be featured in our Permaculture Chickens DVD currently in production where clever people use unusual techniques to get the most out of their poultry.

A while back we posted a story about Penny Pyett’s straw-bale chicken house that was specifically designed to muffle the sounds of roosters crowing. Raising roosters in the city is always was a problem with the noise. How do you keep the peace with the neighbors from all that early morning crowing? Lets face it – city roosters like to start their crowing at first light, well before the morning rush hour even begins.

Well, Permaculture teacher Penny Pyett from Sydney knew the frustration of raising hens without roosters. Hens will lay eggs without a rooster but because the eggs are not fertilized, you have no chance of raising baby chickens.

So Penny decided the solution was to overcome the rooster noise problem. She overcame the problem and built the solution with a majestic straw-bale construction that muffles the sound of early rooster crowing. Her chicken house was warm in winter and cool in summer. It was designed to meet the needs of the chicken with a high roosting platform for the hens to escape predators like foxes. But will it pass the noise test?

We got Permaculture guru Geoff Lawton – who is also a dab hand at rooster crowing to test out her chicken coop. Lets see what he has to say?

You can try and overcome the problem of roosters annoying your neighbours by sound proofing your chicken coop. Some people have stapled egg cartons to the inside of the chicken coop to dramatically dampen the noise level with limited success. If you have the patience and are prepared to build a straw-bale chicken coop, this construction by Penny Pyett is a beautiful example to try and emulate. Penny’s coop sits inside a food forest garden where the lucky roosters are able to lead the hens into the forest, make merry with them and live a long and happy life far from the torments of their inner city neighbors!

This clip is part of the Urban Permaculture DVD which is over 90 minutes long and jam packed with terrific solutions to practical problems of wanting to live the Permaculture lifestyle but on a limited space and size constraint – The Urban backyard. There’s a surprising lot you can do with small space constraints. The limit is just with your imagination. You can grow a lot of food in a limited space, providing you have availability to some sunshine and electricity. The solutions are at hand…

We thought we’d give a plug to our good friends at Milkwood Permaculture and Regen Agriculture who have brought out to Australia some great innovative thinkers and farmers doing things outside the square – empowering people to independent action and making a success of their localized community endeavors.

Who is Joel Salatin?
Joel Salatin is an American farmer, author and lecturer. He uses holistic and unique methods of animal husbandry to sell his products to the consumer by cutting out the middleman. Joel is coming out to Australia in August and will do an intensive one day series of workshops to explain his system.

Salatin’s 550-acre Polyface farm is featured prominently in Michael Pollan’s book The Omnivore’s Dilemma (2006) and the documentary films, Food, Inc. and Fresh. His unconventional farming practices have drawn attention from the alternative agriculture community especially those interested in sustainable livestock management. For example, Pollan became interested in Salatin because of his refusal to send food to locations not within a four-hour drive of his farm, i.e. outside his local “foodshed.”

“We want [prospective customers] to find farms in their areas and keep the money in their own community,” said Salatin. “We think there is strength in decentralization and spreading out rather than in being concentrated and centralized.”

Salatin’s philosophy of farming emphasizes healthy grass on which animals can thrive in a symbiotic cycle of chemical-free feeding. Cows are moved from one pasture to another rather than being centrally corn fed. Then chickens in portable coops are moved in behind them, where they dig through the cow dung to eat protein-rich fly larvae while further fertilizing the field with their droppings.

What will you learn?
This one day workshop will cover PolyFace Farms animal systems, including pastured poultry, salad bar beef, forested pigerator pork and the main-frame design of the farm.

Also covered will be PolyFace’s ‘relationship marketing’ techniques where the farm interfaces directly with consumers, cutting out the middle men and keeping things clean, honest and real.

Joel will also cover how his farm approaches their internship program, providing young people with a chance to learn PolyFace’s techniques, while providing the Salatin family with an enthusiastic labor force which further benefits the farm.

Workshop Dates
Aug.02.2011 Joel Salatin Workshop Jamberoo NSW
Aug.04.2011 Joel Salatin Workshop Nome, Townsville QLD
Aug.05.2011 Joel Salatin Workshop Beerwah QLD
Aug.06.2011 Joel Salatin Workshop Brunswick East Victoria

Where to Book?

Regen Agriculture Website Booking and Workshop Details

Keeping chickens in an Urban environment is something a lot of people would like to have, but when it comes to roosters – people baulk at the idea knowing their neighbors wont like it. After all, who can blame them when they’re trying to get some sleep? Roosters are known to crow loudly early morning so most people dismiss roosters from the Urban chicken coop.

But not Permaculture teacher Penny Pyett.

The problem is the solution

For every problem there is a solution. In this case it was building a strawbale chicken coop with enough insulation to muffle the early morning crowing.

Penny’s chicken coop stands in the food forest garden looking like a rocket ship.
Four tall cement pillars allow access to a wheelbarrow to slide under the coop and any manure can be scraped through a large “nutrient hole” positioned centrally on the concrete slab.
Penny advocates using lots of deep litter like straw mulch or wood shavings to absorb any chicken waste.

The main access doorway is split into two smaller wooden doors that can be shut securely or allow air to circulate. On either side of her coop sit two nesting boxes so any eggs laid can be easily retrieved.
Any rooster crowing is muffled by the thick sound proofing of the strawbales. The bales also keep the coop cool in summer and warm in winter.

Chicken Roost

Chicken roosts are placed high in this coop up near the roofline but away from the walls so chicken nutrient at night does not mark the sides of the inner walls. The roof also collects all the rainwater needed to keep the chickens happy over summer.

In the morning, the doors are opened, the chickens are free to wander about in the extended food forest garden, picking off bugs and fertilizing the field.  During daylight hours the roosters are allowed to crow outdoors. But come nighttime – its back into the insulated chicken coop and peace and quiet for the neighbours. Penny was keen to tell us that this particular chicken coop design meets all the needs of a chicken. They feel protected from predators and enjoy living in a beautiful strawbale chicken house that is also easy to clean and maintain. A terrific idea that not only looks aesthetically great and works very well too.

Penny’s insulated chicken coop will be featured in the Urban Permaculture DVD produced by Ecofilms.

The notion of Victory Gardens sounds rather quaint these days and conjures up ideas of thrift and service for the war effort. Used throughout the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada and other places, the Victory Garden was a symbol of pride that helped take pressure off the country’s food production effort during times of crisis like World War One and Two.

One idea that was born in that period and mentioned by Geoff Lawton recently whilst we were filming The Urban Permaculture DVD was just how the domestic chicken coop was pressed into action in a slightly unusual way. Visiting a domestic chicken coop Geoff commented how the floor of the yard was bone dry. The chickens have scratched the ground completely of top soil leaving the tree roots exposed. In general, this is not a good idea as there is no place for the chickens to take a dust bath as chickens love to scratch up sand and dirt and get rid of any stray mites that may be hidden in their feathers. The owner of this property had decided to screen off part of the yard from a neighbours boundary and placed large pot plants with trees in the yard. The pot plants had stayed in the yard for quite some time and the chickens decided the soil in the pot plant would make an excellent place for a dust bath. Whilst discussing the virtues of converting this chicken coop into a deep litter system, Geoff mentioned the possibilities of turning this long chicken run into a Double Run Chicken System. He said such a system was employed in England during the war as a Victory Garden.

The Double Run Chicken System

Geoff suggested that this chicken coop which had a generous run could be more productive if the owner would fence off half the yard – effectively splitting it into two chicken runs. Splitting the chicken coop into two runs or yards meant that the chickens could scratch and fertilize one area whilst the other zone was used to grow a main crop of vegetables. The chickens of course would have no access to this area until the produce was harvested and ready to be processed again. Then the chickens would be switched over to the second zone and allowed to dig through and fertilize this side of the coop. Adding any organic matter, tree branches, mulch and weeds helps the chickens build a rich mulch that will eventually break down and be used to build up the soil and replanted with vegetables. Look at it as a two-stroke food production engine. One area remains fallow, having the chickens fertilize it and matter break down and the other area is actively producing food. By rotating the crops and running the chickens from one spot to another – your chickens remain healthy and active.

The old chicken yard would be dug over and a fresh crop of seedlings planted. Because the chickens have fertilized the area and compacted the soil slightly any dirt that is moist in this spot will have a number of earth worms thriving in the ground below it. The chickens can’t get at the worms, but using a spade or a fork we can easily lift the compacted garden bed and aerate the soil. Those heavy ammonia smelling chicken coops you sometimes smell tell you that the soil is anaerobic caused by bacteria that can thrive without oxygen. Aerating the chicken bed speeds up the decomposition of the soil and allows the chickens to scratch for bugs, enjoy an occasional dust bath and if you decide to move the chickens elsewhere, be a perfect spot for a vegetable garden. In such a system because of the added Carbon, you are actively building soil into your garden and working on a solid foundation of sustainability. Its also a great way to maximize your garden space.

Siting your Chicken Coop in your backyard may be no big deal, but to place it at the highest point of your garden – well isn’t that usually reserved for your house as the premier spot?

Not necessarily so if you talk with Permaculture teacher Geoff Lawton.

The Problem

Before and After: Nutrient Flow distributed across garden bed with slotted agriculture pipe

Recently whilst filming the Urban Permaculture DVD we came across a home with already an established garden and a chicken coop on the highest point of the slope.

The chicken coop was positioned higher than the main house. The garden separated the gap between the home and the coop.

The problem for the owner was that when it rained substantially – the water would run through the center of the chicken coop in a torrent and flood the kitchen located in the center of the house.

So how do you solve a problem like this?

For Geoff Lawton, building swales in the Middle East or erecting large scale earth work dams on miles of open space might be easy to achieve, but the challenge now was of the micro scale. A suburban back yard with a problem.

Geoff’s solution proved to be quite easy. Slow down the flow of water running through the chicken coop gate and direct it to where it was needed. The garden bed.

Filming with Geoff Lawton you realize that he has an uncanny ability to notice little details that escape the average punter.

Geoff will point out some odd shaped bit of fungi growing on a log or pick up a leaf and show you that it has a bit of dried bird crap attached to it! Noticing little insignificant details like this is what separates the Permaculturalist from the rest of us.

“Whats the point of knowing all this detail?” I would ask him? Survival. He says he first needed to notice these important little things whilst working in the deserts of the Middle East.

Clues in the sand are hard to find and Geoff says he had to look very hard to find the solutions – the clues to solve every day problems in the barren landscape.

Geoff Lawton showing the Nutrient Flow under the Chicken coop

The Solution

So back to this garden. Whilst we were filming with Geoff he walked around the chicken coop and pointed out for the camera where the rain was forming a channel in the coop. Right under the gate to the chicken coop. Noticing little details like this is important to making the correct decisions. The problem is the solution. So what are we to do to fix this growing problem?

Building massive swales in a domestic garden were out of the question – right? So how to solve this water flow issue and stop the flood in the client’s kitchen every time it rained?

Geoff thought of the answer instantly.

Slotted drainage irrigation pipe. Just go down to your hardware shop and buy a roll.

Duh! There we were looking for a cosmic answer and the solution was pretty basic.

Dig a shallow trench the length of the chicken coop and fill it with irrigation pipe. Add drainage gravel and now every time it rains the water runs down the hill, enters the chicken coop, collects all the nutrient chicken poop runoff and deposits it into the trench and slowly allows the water to equally seep in and distribute the length of the drainage pipe and run down equally into the garden to fertilize all the plants rather than depositing it all in the kitchen. No need for pumps or additional fertilization. Let Nature do it for you with a little Permaculture help.

Small trench with slotted agriculture pipe and drainage gravel

Clever design.

Great idea huh?

Locating a chicken coop above your garden helps nature collect and distribute the poop evenly throughout the garden. Thats a good example of Permaculture design in action.

A simple idea that most people don’t think or act upon.

Solution. Happy Chickens. Happy Garden. Happy Owner.

The Urban Permaculture DVD loaded with great ideas like this one comes out towards the end of the year. Look out for it.

Modular Chicken Tunnels help direct chickens to improve garden beds

While filming a segment on backyard chickens, we came across a novel approach to improving your garden beds when we visited the garden of Bruce Morgan in Nambour, Queensland.

Bruce has been doing Permaculture now for many years and has even taught the “pros” a thing or two over the years. A builder by trade, Bruce has managed to build an impressive terraced garden with a little ingenuity.

You see, Bruce has created a modular system where he links a series of wired chicken “tunnels” together to direct his chickens to areas in his garden that needs some serious work. The chickens go through the tunnels to the weed infested area and over the course of a few weeks, scratch and dig and fertilize the spot and get it ready for his vegetable seedlings.

The added bonus is that chickens can run back to the main chicken coop for a drink or to lay an egg before its back to work on the building site or the garden patch, scratching out a chook existence – catching that early worm. The pay is just Chicken feed but the birds don’t complain. They love it.

Bruce has a series of terraced gardens and swears he never needs to dig or weed if he directs the series of tunnels to the effected area. “Its all in the Permaculure 2 manual.” he shrugs like it was no big deal. He claims he is 80% self sufficient in food. “Occasionally I like to buy some lamb from the shops.” he says but he doesn’t eat much meat.

Each chicken tunnel can have a sort of a “sluice gate” (recycled fridge shelf) to isolate and area or direct chicken traffic to a certain location. One of the great features located at the bottom of Bruce’s garden is a small creek and Bruce has a plan to grow rice in this area. He tried it once before but in the recent Queensland floods the torrent of water tore some of his chicken tunnels and crushed them down stream. Fortunately the chickens ran home for cover. Now Bruce is planning to turn this damp patch back into a rice-paddy.

“When the chooks see me walking around with a wire tunnel.” he says. “They all get excited – ready for work.”

But the recent rain has resulted in a patch of grass right up to your waist. Is Bruce going to attack this spot with a mattock? No way! Its the lazy Permaculture approach for Bruce. Unleash the Chooks. Bruce estimates you can’t do this kind of work with one or two chickens (unless they have very muscular thighs.)

You need around 10 Chickens of active service age to make a dent in the undergrowth. (The older chickens – or the draft dodgers go into a pressure cooker for lunch.)

Bruce prefers to use Australian Australorp Chickens – a heavy black bird suitable for tunnel digging. You can’t help think of WWII War films like “The Great Escape” when you see the series of wire tunnels in his backyard and the gritty determination on the haggard beaks of the chickens.

But it all seems to work okay for Bruce. His terraced garden looks like an oasis of Permaculture paradise. Predator dogs if they attack his tunnel cage aren’t strong enough to get at his ‘workers” and the chickens can make a dash for home and safety if the going gets tough.

Bruce has stuck with his Australorps but has admitted to breeding his own birds suitable for the task – “The Sumo Wrestlers of the Chicken world with muscular thighs and gnarled claws able to kick trees and sheds down.

Okay, we’re exaggerating a bit – but you get the idea.

Bruce Morgan and his novel chickens will be featured in the “The Permaculture Backyard Chickens DVD” released later in the year.

Anne Wensley in her Deep Litter Chicken Coop

Trying to see Anne Wensley’s chicken coop is hard to spot at first. Thats because it doesn’t really look like a traditional chicken coop. Anne has a mass of vines and creepers covering her chicken run in her suburban backyard. A choko vine covered in fruit drips off the sides of the chicken wire mesh that enclose her chicken or chook pen.

Nothing is as it seems in her garden. A large metal compost tumbler has found a new life as a makeshift chicken nesting box. Anne has no need for a compost tumbler as the floor of the chicken coop is her compost processing centre.

We are here filming with Elisabeth Fekonia the start of our Permaculture Chickens DVD and Elisabeth was quick to point out Anne’s great system that we had to see and film.

Everything is draped in dappled sunlight. Her suburban backyard is covered with vegetable plants and her chicken coop is placed center stage in the backyard, perched higher on a slope overlooking her home which is  less than 30 feet away.

When you enter her coop, the chickens are hard to spot at first and are well hidden amongst the foliage. Your feet sink into the deep brown composted soil and you forget that you are standing in a chicken coop. For a moment you feel guilty that you are stepping into a heavily mulched rich garden bed. This coop doesn’t resemble the traditional hard compacted pan-baked soil you normally find in most backyard chicken coops.

Anne is a committed to Permaculture and its only when you spend a little time with her that she explains the reasons she has various plants growing inside the chicken coop.

Fresh Fruit and Grain

Plan map of Anne Wensley's Chicken CoopFresh Fruit and Grain for the Chickens

She points out an Acerola cherry tree in the middle of the yard. I don’t get the significance at first, until she points out that Acerola cherrys are loaded with vitamin C, in fact they have the highest concentration of vitamin C of any fruit.

The fallen fruit is eaten by the chickens and benefit the eggs they produce.  Its these little details that most people don’t notice at first that are mentioned by experienced Permaculturalists who able to point out the plant and animal associations. Sometimes it takes a while for the penny to drop and you begin to appreciate more how these subtle systems works so well in the backyard to enrich the living systems.

Anne points out a purple looking weed growing rampant on the outside of the chook yard wire fence. I hardly notice it at first, but Anne points out it’s significance.

“Thats Amaranth!” she gestures to it, “My chooks love it.”

A quick check on the health benefits of Amaranth and you realise why Anne’s chickens look so healthy.  There’s more energy, protein, calcium and magnesium in a quarter cup of Amaranth grain than other grains such as wheat, rice,  sweetcorn or potato.

In fact Anne nonchalantly mentions that store bought grain, the kind supplied for most backyard chickens is the last thing her chickens will want to eat, preferring to graze on the fresh grain surrounding the coop.

Other forms of grain grasses grow in the perimeter of her chicken coop. The chickens graze and prune the weeds as well.

Anne explains some of her methods for deep litter composting.

Amaranth growing outside Anne Wensley's Chicken Coop

Deep Litter Chicken Coops

For a start she throws all her kitchen scraps into the coop. Shredded newspaper, weeds, anything organic goes through the chicken’s inspection lines first as they scratch and peck and turn the top layer over.

Anne likes to leave a mountain of weeds in her coop for a few weeks to rot down and then with a fork turn the whole thing over pretty much like a compost heap.

The chickens race into the center of this upturned mess that is now exposed and covered in scurrying bugs. The chickens swoop on the bugs,  feasting on small insects and soil creatures that abound in the bottom layer of topsoil.

You will need to leave the heap undisturbed for at least two weeks or longer before the bugs re-assemble.

This compost tumbler is now out of work as the chickens take over

Anne picks up her garden fork and regularly turns the soil over, composting it in the process. It looks brown and friable, resembling fine potting mix.

Anne lifts a handful of the stuff up to her face and smells it. “Its beautiful.” she says, “Its a really rich earthy smell. Its lovely. It doesn’t smell of chook poo or anything like that.”

The floor of the chicken coop acts as a compost system. Adding carbon in the form of old pine shavings or shredded cardboard, old leaves and paper will speed up the decomposition process.

Anne claims that turning the compost over repeatedly with a garden fork will de-compact the soil and allow the chickens to also take ‘dust baths’ and scratch around for seeds and bugs as they manure the soil.

She has had very little problem with mites or parasites infecting her chickens using this method.

We’re planning a number of exciting new titles to be released in 2011.

Urban Permaculture DVD

One of the complaints we often get from people living in the city is that we focus a little heavily on Permaculture titles that require a large scale farm to get the most benefit from practicing Permaculture.

So we are happy to announce that in 2011 we will be working on the Urban Permaculture DVD with Geoff Lawton.

Actually we really started shooting a lot of footage already that we were going to include in the Permaculture Soils DVD that we completed, but for various logistic reasons we found the segments would work best in a video that focuses in detail on adopting Permaculture techniques in small scale domestic environments.

From courtyards to backyards to places where you thought you could never do anything with, we want to make this DVD a Permaculture techniques DVD where people can be inspired by what is really possible.

Here’s an example of the kind of thing we mean:

A sneak preview of Geoff Lawton visiting a beautiful Mandala garden in an urban Permaculture garden. It shows Permculture can be aesthetically pleasing to the eye with a richness of patterns as well as a productive food source.

Along with the Urban Permaculture theme, we’re going to focus on one of the creatures that most Permaculture people can’t live without in their backyard – the humble Chook or Chicken as it’s known to our overseas friends.

Backyard Chickens DVD

If you’ve ever been interested in raising chickens from incubating your own fertile eggs, or raising baby chicks to adult hens and want the details on what breed to choose, meat or egg layers, how many to fit into your suburban backyard, what to feed them, how to house them, how many eggs to expect, and how to cure them if they get sick – then Permaculture Cheese-maker and now Chicken wrangler Elisabeth Fekonia will guide you through the whole process. From building a perfect coop for your backyard or a sleek mobile chicken enclosure, this DVD is going to drill right down in great detail and show you everything you need to know to guarantee success.

We’ll also investigate Permaculture Chickens. Does such a breed exist and why would you want to choose heirloom chicken breeds in the first place? Chickens do in fact make great pets if you manage to handle them and tame them, they end up being very inquisitive birds. You’ll meet some of the people that love them as they share their experiences in raising these fascinating productive animals.

This is an intensive DVD designed to get a newcomer up to speed on keeping chickens in a suburban environment. Even if you’ve never kept a chicken before and are curious to start from scratch, you’ll get a lot out of this title as we will cram a lot of helpful knowledge, practical tips, lessons and fun things on owning your own small flock of birds for egg laying purposes and err…meat processing. We’ll even show you how to pluck them and carve them -if you’re game enough to watch.

DIY Aquapoics DVD

Then there’s the DIY Aquaponics DVD thats been already announced elsewhere. Murray Hallam is eager to get this one out around February so check back here regularly to see what little clips and tips and short You Tube video’s we’ll continually add and blog and share with you.

We’ve enjoyed working with Murray and Geoff and Elisabeth over this last year. Its always been a pleasant and creative experience. Its never been tense or difficult. The odd thing is that we as filmmakers have learnt so much working with these creative and inspiring teachers that it kind of rubs off on you. We had no intention of getting into Aquaponics but when we saw how well it all worked -we were hooked. With Geoff, we have a modest sized food forest system planted where our front lawn should have been and now we also have four free ranging chickens digging holes in our backyard as well!  That’s the side benefit you get making films with these crazy Permaculture people – you end up with a lot more knowledge than you began with.

Oh, its not too late to add your thoughts and tell us what you’d like to see covered in any of these films, except the DIY Aquaponics video as its pretty well locked in and complete.

So ends 2010.

Joel Salatin

ABC Radio has an interesting interview with self styled “lunatic farmer” Joel Salatin who happens to also be in Australia courtesy of REGEN Agriculture talking about free-range farming in USA.

Joel says food has become over-regulated by US food safety bureaucrats who are destroying local production through unnecessary over-regulation.

Joel is a free range beef, pork and poultry producer from Virginia and is on a busy speaking tour of Australia, including a series of two-day workshops for farmers
Over the next ten days, he will be in Bendigo and Woodend in Victoria, Brisbane and Cairns in Qld, and Mudgee in NSW.

If you listen carefully to the radio interview and click on the link here, you’ll notice Joel advocates creating a mixed compost blend from a variety of animal manures to create a potent mix of super charged bacteria as outlined in Geoff Lawton’s Permaculture Soils DVD.

Even the method of grazing cows with chickens following behind in mobile caged tractors is explained by Geoff Lawton. Its nice to see all these similar threads intertwining whether you like to call it Permaculture or Organic Gardening or as Joel likes to describe his farming method, Beyond Organic.

Joel’s Farm: http://www.polyfacefarms.com/