WAGA - Future Vision for Western Region

I attended the 3rd ACF GreenHome Community workshop on Tuesday night.   It was a great evening, with many passionate people from Caroline Springs, Melton West, Melton South, Altona, Werribee, and Bacchus March all who want to make a difference to our local communities.

Terry White from Western Alliance for Greenhouse Action gave an inspiring presentation about some of the bigger actions that are possible in the Western region of Melbourne. 

I filmed the entire presentation and managed to cut it into two parts and place them on YouTube.  Terry's presentation was very inspirational, and well worth watching.

Please put your hands together for Terry!

Western Alliance for Greenhouse Action - Part 1

Western Alliance for Greenhouse Action - Part 2

P.S.  Terry only lives down the road from me so I gave him a lift home as well!

A Gender Question at the Co-op

My main post for today is over at the Simple, Green, Frugal Co-op, where I ask 'Why do Women get it, but Men don't'.

It was a subject may have been a touchy one if I didn't articulate it correctly, however I think I managed to pull it off.  There are so many fantastic comments, it makes for a very good read.  Please pop on over and check it out, comments and all.

Gav

Weekly Podcast - Designing My Food Garden

It has been a while in coming, so here is this weeks podcast which just features my good self, talking about what I considered before I designed my food garden.  I hope you enjoy my chattering.

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A Hectic Week

Yes folks, I have been away for an entire week from blog land, but all for good causes.  Sometimes life just gets in the way of wanting to write it all down for prosperity!

Tuesday night - ACF GreenHome Community Workshop - Caroline Springs

A great turnout of about 50 people who wanted to learn about growing their own food.  I even got a speaking part and managed to fit my story of how I made my garden into a 10 minute time slot.  How I fit it into 10 minutes, I do not know.  Soon after my talk, we heard from Vasili from Vasili's Garden.  He gave a great opening this week talking about how he learnt about growing food from his father in Coburg, which is actually the site of his garden centre!  He talked about the grow your own revolution that he has been experiencing over the last year, and urged those experienced gardeners in the crowd to help gardening newbies out as much as they can.  I had a ball and was in my element and answered lots of questions about vegetable gardening and chicken raising.

Wednesday night - Administrative work for Melton Sustainable Living Group.

Kim and I spend the night typing up the committee meeting minutes from the week before, and planning the next six months worth of workshops and events for the group.  It is going to be actioned packed with even a beer making workshop being held by yours truly.

Thurday night - Melton Sustainable Living Group Monthly meeting.

We had a presentation by the local representative of Tri-Nature who make all sorts of products (cleaning, cosmetics) that have no petrochemicals in them.  Each bottle has a cute picture of an Australian native animal on them, and Kim innocently asked if there were any animal products to which I replied, looking at the bottle with the Kookaburra on it, that it had essence of Kookaburra in it.  Well that started a running gag with all the products for the entire evening.  Essence of platypus, galah, and wombat.  Seriously though, there are no animal products in the Tri-Nature range, nor is it tested on animals.  A great evening was had by all of us.


Friday night - I surprised Kim and took us out to dinner.

When I got home from work, I was in such a great mood, that I told Kim to get her glad rags on and that we were going down to her favourite Chinese restaurant for a nosh up.  It was a great meal and we arrived home relaxed and happy.  I then remembered that I had to submit an Green Living tips article for the Caroline Springs Community update, so I worked on that until midnight and sent it off.

Saturday - Busy as a beaver

We took an early trip to the Neco Superstore on the other side of Melbourne, which were having a 60% store wide closing down sale!  We bought up big, as the picture shows, but who could resist a bargain of eco goodies. Kim and I talked to the owner, who gave the main reason for their closing down was that until there was a monetary incentive, for instance a price on carbon, the majority of people just are not interested in greening up their lives.  I piped up that we were some of the passionate few who did care, and he agreed that it was people like us were the only ones that kept his business running for so long.  Such a shame that the Government's inaction and poor policy is hurting small businesses like Neco.  Such a shame that they would rather fix up easy things, than tackle the real issues like climate change.  At this stage of our global awakening, Neco's business should be booming!

Anyway, we came home with this eco-booty all paid for with cash.

Ben loves his science kit, Kim loves her bamboo salad bowl and organic cotton quilt, and I managed to pick up a newspaper log maker, some watering sticks that you can turn a large PET bottle into a watering can, and a book by Richard Heinberg, called Peak Everything.  Oh, and of course our stationary needs for the next three years.

In the afternoon, I planted some more cherry tomatoes in the greenhouse and some rainbow chard in punnets.  The first lot of tomatoes are going gang busters and are about a metre tall already.  They should have flowers in a few weeks and hopefully set fruit.  I then weeded the garden beds, and watched the bricklayer fix up the two cracks in our 6' boundary wall.

Sunday - Happy Birthday Gavin!

Yes, today is my birthday and I rose early and did a gym session to keep the back strong.  Kim cooked me a full English breakfast which was very yummy and filling.  Then it was present time, and I got two books, lots of Fiskar gardening tools and a Bunnings voucher.  They all reckon that I am very hard to buy for because I reject consumerism except for sustainable products.  Oh well, I believe that it opens their eyes to how unsustainable our society has really become.

I then got stuck into the garden, swept the path to the shed, re-hydrated a big block of coconut coir and mulched the new citrus trees and the pony tail  palms I re-potted last weekend.  I then rescued a garlic plant that the bricklayer had dumped a ton of broken brick on, and tided up his mess around the garden in general.  This afternoon all the kids and I mucked around outside playing with a nerf ball for about an hour, while Kim made me a coffee and walnut cake with candles, and some salads for the BBQ that I cooked later on.

Other than that, there was time for a Nana nap after lunch and that was about it.  Now is the first time this week that I have had some spare time to myself.  I am looking forward to posting more this week, and am hoping to put up a couple of podcasts now that I have paid my podbean site fees so I can have additional capacity to host the episodes on.

All the best, Gav

Paying Down Our Debt!

Back on New Years Day, I articulated this goal besides a few others in 2010;

Pay Down Outstanding Debt.  This is so no-one has any outstanding claims on my work or my time.  I find that in many ways, debt is slavery in another guise, so it is time to throw off the shackles as quickly as possible before Peak Oil hits hard.  We have planned to pay down the rest of the loan I took out for the Solar PV by the end of April (approx A$7500), and then start whacking over 60% of my wage into the mortgage with a view of paying it off in 5 years.  This is certainly achievable and Kim and I have calculated it down the dollar.

 It is now mid May, and guess what?  Today we have just paid off the last of the $30,000 personal loan that we took out over 5 years, in just 3!  We saved swags of interest by paying it down early, and now will be putting the amount we had allocated in our budget for the personal loan straight on to our Mortgage.  With only $2000 on our credit card due to my medical expenses, we also expect to have that paid off in a few of months.  Once that is at zero, every single spare (within reason) cent will be going into our home loan.   No more debt in 6ish years = a free and very happy man!

Oh, BTW.  I now own this, which makes the air clean, with no electricity bill to worry about ever again.  Even more savings to pay down debt!

 I am so proud that Kim and I have achieved this goal, roughly on time.  Paying down debt quickly is a very tangible benefit of a frugal and sustainable lifestyle.

Printer Cartridge Recycling

Did I mention that I might just do a bit of recycling?

Well, after two years of keeping printer cartridges, I had enough to warrant a trip to the newsagent to recycle them.  I visited a great site that Kim found called "Recycling Near You", created by Planet Ark so I could find my nearest cartridge recycling centre.  It is now so easy to find a recycling station near you in Australia, not only for printer cartridges, but for all stuff that has the potential to be recycled. 

As we use a lot of ink due to the Sustainable Living Group stationary demands (how ironic), here is what I ended up with after two years of collection.  A big bag full of plastic ink cartridges. 

They went to the newsagents and into a bin similar to this.

Another bag full of cardboard boxes.  These went into the normal recycling bin at home.

Here is an example of the types of printer cartridges that you could recycle.  Anything from laser printer toner, to inkjet cartridges like mine.

The only thing that I couldn't recycle was the little plastic bags that came in the inkjet boxes.

They didn't have an identification number on them, so I really wasn't sure if I could recycle them.  Not wanting to contaminate my recycling bin, I was forced to put them into landfill which broke my heart.

So, if you have the need to dispose of your next toner cartridge, please think twice before throwing it into the normal bin.

Look for this logo, or organise a workplace collection by visiting the Cartridges 4 Planet Ark website.   Diverting waste from landfill just makes common sense.  If you want to know what happens to your old printer consumables, have a look at the recycling methods and products.  You may be sitting on some in your local park!

Weekly Podcast Delay

For the regular listeners of my podcast, I apologise profusely.  I have just found out that I have run out of storage space on my podcast site, and now have to fork out some money to expand storage and bandwidth for it.

Little did I realise that it would be so popular, so when I sell a few more eggs, I will pay for more space and resume normal transmission.

Once again, sorry.

Gavin

P.S.  If anyone has any topics they would like me to cover or special guests to interview, please let me know via comment.   Kim has asked if she can be interviewed again, but I need a subject to talk about!

Seed Raising Mix at the Co-op

Today's main post is over at the Simple Green Frugal Co-op.  Look for my post titled, Making Seed Raising Mix.

Day 129 - Guava & Amy

For Mothers Day, I took Kim, Adam and Ben to visit our daughter Amy in Ballarat.  On the way through, we stopped off at Bacchus Marsh and picked up some local apples, persimmons, potatoes and onions from Jeff Jones produce.

Here are a few shots of her small veggie patch and pet dwarf rabbit that fertilises it for her.  She is growing bush beans, peas, carrots and potatoes.  She has a bit of weeding to do, me thinks, but at least she is giving it a go.

After lunch we went out into the back yard, where Amy showed me a Guava tree that was overhanging into her yard from the neighbours house.  It was one massive tree fully laden with fruit.

The fruit is a bit difficult to make out as it is the same colour as the leaves of the tree.  Suffice to say, there are lot of them, and they were all over the ground as well.

Kim and I had never eaten Guava before, so we tried one of the larger ones that had fallen off the tree.  It was delicious, so we collected about 4 kilograms of fruit that was laying around Amy's yard.  Besides eating them raw, which is a treat in itself, I am looking for some jam recipes that I can use quite a few more in.  Ballarat is well within our local zone, so no problems there.

I also took some cuttings from the tree and wrapped the branches in a wet cloth so that they would survive the trip home.  When we got home, I trimmed up 8 decent sized cuttings and dipped them in root hormone powder and put them in tube stock pots with some good potting mix.  I am hoping they will take and if so, I will give some away as gifts and plant a few in extra large pots to add to our orchard.  I don't know how many years they will take to bare fruit, but it is all in the fun of trying to grow it.

Once again, local fruit is such a great find, and when it is free, you really have to abuse the privilege of knowing someone who has access to a neglected backyard fruit tree.  Thanks Amy for letting us collect as much as we wanted.  I promise to bring you a jar of Guava jam next time we visit!

Replace Hazelwood Rally

Yesterday, as I mentioned, I attended the Replace Hazelwood Rally on the steps of Parliament.

Oh, and by the way, I like my hat just the way it is thanks Sis!  It keeps my head warm.

Anyway, here is the official statement;

Over 250 people gathered on Thursday May 6, 2010 for a protest on the steps of the Victorian Parliament calling for the closure of the Hazelwood coal fired Power Station by 2012.

Hazelwood is Australia's dirtiest power station, using brown coal, which produces almost 15 percent of Victoria's greenhouse pollution - 3 per cent of Australia's total carbon emissions. It pumps out more than 16 million tonnes of greenhouse pollution each year and is also a massive user of water (27 billion litres a year) and emitter of dangerous pollutants. It is the single largest source of dioxin pollution in Australia, as well as emitting 7800 tonnes of hydrochloric acid each year.

It is possible to replace Hazelwood with a combination of renewable energy, energy efficiency and peaking gas plants. The jobs in construction and operation of these power stations would far exceed the 500 jobs that currently exist at Hazelwood, though effort would need to be taken to ensure that new jobs were created in the Latrobe Valley.

As you can see, the Replace Hazelwood campaign is not about people loosing their jobs at the power plant, or stopping people using electricity.  It is about closing down one of the most polluting (in terms of GHG) power plants in the developed world, and replacing it with green and clean jobs, and renewable energy solutions.  For more information about solutions, please visit the Replace Hazelwood site.


I took so much video of the rally, that I had to cut a fair bit out.  Here are most of the proceeding in two parts.










We were loud, and vocal, but how much of a difference it will make is anyone's guess, but it felt really good to be a part of! 

If individuals do not feel that they have the opportunity to voice their opinion and demonstrate about the big issues that face us, then democracy in this great country might as well be dead.

I for one believe that we must keep our leaders accountable, however also believe that individual actions can make a huge difference.  Power to the people.

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever does” - Margaret Mead

Where's Gavin? - Solution

For all of those who had a go, here is the solution.  Click to enlarge.

Now that was fun wasn't it?  A bit like Where's Wally or Waldo.  Drumroll please.......

The winner of the giveaway is Cat J B with the first correct single guess.  Also a special thanks to dixiebelle for being such a good sport.  Maybe next time dixiebelle!

Cat, if you could email me your details, I will send your prize in the mail on Monday.  Thanks to everyone who played.  More on the reason and the events of the rally in a separate post.

Gav

Where's Gavin?

Today, I had the privilege of attending the Replace Hazelwood rally on the steps of the Victorian State Parliament.  We yelled, we talked, and hopefully some of our politicans listened.

I have some video footage of the event that I am processing at the moment, but until I get that up on YouTube, here is a little game with a prize for the winning comment.

All you have to do is be the first person with a comment accurately indicating where I am in the photograph below and what I am wearing.  The first correct answer will win a copy of the book, The Tipping Point, by Malcolm Gladwell.  Unfortunately, I can only afford to send it within Australia, but don't let that stop you from playing.

Remember that you can enlarge the image by clicking on it!

What are you waiting for?  Start looking!

Old Phones = More Trees

As I have mentioned before about the electronic waste problems that are mounting at this post here, I mentioned that mobile phones are able to be recycled in Australia.  However the problem is that many phone owners do not know what to do with them or how to dispose of them once they have out lived their usefulness.

Here is a great idea and campaign details that have been sent to me by my friends at MobileMuster (thanks Victoria!).

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MobileMuster is Australia’s official not-for-profit mobile phone recycling program. Over the weekend, MobileMuster launched its annual campaign, ‘Old Phones, More Trees’ in partnership with Landcare Australia. 2010 is the fourth year MobileMuster and Landcare Australia have partnered together for the campaign, and to date they have collected over 90,000 kilograms of phones and planted over 200,000 trees.

This year, the aim is to collect 30,000 kilograms of mobiles (approximately 100,000 handset with their batteries and accessories) for 30,000 trees. For every kilogram of mobile phones and accessories recycled through MobileMuster between 1 May and World Environment Day on 5 June, a tree will be planted in one of four Landcare Australia projects.

The four key projects that will benefit from ‘Old Phones, More Trees’ are:

QLD – Myola Basin: Kuranda Envirocare will be planting as many as 7,500 different species of trees as part of the Envirolink Corridor to conserve and repair degraded rainforests in this ecological haven. The area acts as a critical buffer for the Wet Tropics World Heritage Area and is home to the endangered Kuranda Tree Frog and Southern Cassowary.

NSW/VIC– Barmah-Millewa Forest: The Barmah-Millewa Forest is one of Australia’s most unique wetland areas and is home to the iconic River Red Gum and endangered Superb Parrot. The project will be overseen by the Superb Parrot Project Group who will be planting as many as 7,500 trees including the majestic river red gums to create future foraging sites for the Superb Parrot and contribute to the overall health of the Murray River.

SA – Lower Lakes: The Lower Lakes area is home to rare native fish, birds and plants. The Goolwa to Wellington Local Action Planning Board will work with local communities to plant as many as 7,500 trees that will help protect and restore the biodiversity and improve the sustainability of the lower lakes area.

WA – Wallatin and O’Brien Catchments: Wallatin Wildlife and Landcare Group will be planting as many as 7,500 mallee trees to tackle the loss of biodiversity, declining water quality and rising soil salinity of the state’s central-eastern wheatbelt. The wheatbelt provides approximately 65 per cent of the states grain supply.

Recycling your old mobile phone with MobileMuster this month will achieve three significant environmental outcomes:

1) Restoring native vegetation and protecting the habitat of endangered species, such as the Superb Parrot

2) Improving the sustainability of one of the Nation’s key food growing areas, the Murray River

3) Recovering and reusing the materials in your old mobile

Mobile phones are not biodegradable, but are 90 per cent recyclable. The material recovered from the recycled mobiles can be used to make stainless steel items, plastic fence posts, jewellery and even new batteries.

With an estimated 14 to 16 million old and unused phones stashed away in cupboards and drawers at home and work in Australia alone, there is a massive opportunity to recycle and get more trees into the ground to sequester CO2.

Recycling an old mobile phone is free and easy, simply:

1. Drop them off at your mobile phone retailer / local collection point - to find out where go to www.mobilemuster.com.au or call 1300 730 070
2. Post them in by picking up a free MobileMuster recycling satchel from Australia Post
3. Post them in by printing off a reply paid mailing label from www.mobilemuster.com.au

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So what are you waiting for?  Dig out those old handsets and chargers and send them in for recycling before June 5th, and get a tree planted by the project.  I am sure there is a kilo of old handsets laying around somewhere!

Day 122 - 160km Diet

I know, I know.  I haven't posted about our 160km (100 mile) diet since day 38, but you will be glad to know that it still continues even though a few things have come up in that time.

I estimate that we eat about 70% of local produce now that Summer has past.  At the end of summer I had the percentage up well over 90, however as the veggie patch died down for the season and new crops went in, there was a bit of a gap in production.  Add to that my health issues, I could not keep up continuous cropping.

So, what are we still eating now?  Well for starters, we still go down to the produce store in Bacchus Marsh every fortnight to buy whatever fruit and veg they have in season.  The new seasons apples and pears are just so tasty, as is the broccoli and cabbage.  We only buy local flour, milk, and cheese, and if we have to buy tinned goods, only purchase Australian produce.  I cannot remember when we last bought imported food stuffs, except for the Moccona coffee that is our only foreign food vice that we can't seem to shake.  At least I gave up Nescafe instant when I learnt about Nestle and their unsustainable use of palm oil.

We also buy Belmore Biodynamic Meats who source their products from Victoria for the few meals that we still eat meat a week, and we buy MSC Fish but only occasionally.   We make our own yoghurt which I now have to eat every day, and I am still making cheese about once a month.

From our own garden I have been harvesting celery, spring onions, rainbow chard, limes, lemons, and eggs.

In the garden beds, we are currently growing garlic, brown and red onions, beetroot, leeks, broad beans, cabbages, broccoli, and snow peas.  In the greenhouse, we are growing tomatoes, chilli, capsicums in big pots, with spinach and more broccoli seedlings being raised for the garden beds.  I have cayenne peppers drying in the garage, which should be ready in a few weeks.

We have been eating preserved apples, cucumbers and apricot jam.

For instance, today Kim made two tasty Vienna style loaves and we made Welsh rarebit from yoghurt and cheese that I made.  It fed the entire family and except for the two teaspoons of Worcestershire sauce, it what all local fare.  Lunch was egg and bacon pie, all local as well.  My only non local meal is usually wheatbix, as I find that it is a cereal that does not hurt my condition later on in the day.

So we are still being true to the challenge that we set upon at the start of the year, I am just not verbosely reporting it every week.  I found that it was getting a bit repetitive, not only for me, but probably for you as well.

I will continue to report on local sources of food when I can find it, like I did when I found the fig tree at the medical clinic, as I really enjoy sharing that sort of thing with locals.  We have found that once you take the effort to look for local food in the early stages of the challenge, it certainly helps in the long run for the rest of the year.  It has become second nature to us, and even though we haven't reached that magical 100%, I believe that because of the way the modern industrial food complex is set up, it is a very difficult goal to reach.  So all we can do is stay true to our values, and remain on the path we continue to travel.

After all, the only real vote for the sustainable food industry we have is each dollar we spend, so wisely we must spend it.