Connections – Gallifrey Forest Farm

Farm Club

2018/05/06 Danielle 0

The first rule of farm club is.. please do in fact talk about farm club. Tell anyone you know who might be interested. Encourage other people to start their own versions – maybe we can make it into a movement. Farm club is a combination of a (hopefully) practical co-op for food sharing and an attempt at a real-world version of a gifting/barter economy. The idea is that members offer “shares” in whatever they produce, along with what they need back to keep producing the thing, and other members sign up for those shares. So in our case, we produce […]

self sufficiency and community

2016/11/28 Danielle 0

A friend of mine asked yesterday how long it would be before the farm was self sufficient. It’s not as simple a question to answer as you might think. One answer is: never. We aren’t planning to grow grain, and although I do have some tubs of potatoes and a sweet potato patch, and plans to put in chestnut trees, we aren’t really focusing on growing what the biodynamic gardening people call ‘calory crops’. Those are the foods which make up the majority of your diet – the carbohydrates that give you a baseline energy hit and leave you […]

June 28: tastes of the Blackwood

2016/06/28 Danielle 0

Last night we attended a Tastes of the Blackwood evening at Taste Budds cooking studio in Highgate, showcasing some of the produce of the Blackwood Ruver region in the South-West of WA. It was brilliant. Gorgeous food, talks from the producers, and a chance to ask questions both about their farms and farming practices and about their produce. The producers represented there were: The Cidery & Blackwood Valley Brewing Company, who brought along a soft cider (carbonated apple juice), a sweet cider, and a semi-dry cider, plus some bitters for us to try; Southern Forests Honey, who produce delicious varietal […]

June 26: belated weekend update

2016/06/27 Danielle 0

It was a busy weekend (although a good one!) so I’m a day late with this post. Saturday we attended the Less is More festival and I presented on keeping bees, then we had a mid-winter gathering at my mum’s place and caught up with friends and family there – and ate far too much delicious lamb tagine and roasted sweet potato. Sunday we headed out to the swan valley for breakfast at the Margaret River Chocolate Factory (which does a very nice breakfast), and then a day at the Swan Valley Cuddly Animal Farm. So many animals. Including Damara lambs, […]

June 25: Less is More 2016 (hosting a beehive)

2016/06/25 Danielle 0

Today I presented at the 2016 Less is More festival, on hosting a beehive in your back yard. Here are some of the points I covered, just in case you couldn’t make it to the talk, or need a little reminder of the content. 🙂 Why host a beehive? Well, it’s more a case of why wouldn’t you, really. It’s easy and safe, the bees will pollinate all your vegetables and your fruit trees, and produce honey as well. Plus, honeybees are under a lot of pressure from climate change, pollution, disease and the use of damaging pesticides such […]