Our past eco-camping was the perfect place to give the chance to our volunteers to have a rural and farming experience, based in the permaculture principles. Volunteers shared different activities, like taking care of the animals or the garden, plants and trees, or work in the infrastructre with some eco-building or other sustainable activities. And some of them they also chose these activities as personal projects, so they could go deeper and gain more experience on taking care of an eco-place. Always learning by doing 🙂
We had: 3 dogs (Kayla, Hiroo and Snoopy), 4 cats (Isis, Fifi, Mimi and Isidore), 2 donkeys (Manon and Pipotine), 2 poneys (Houla-Hop and Sarabi), 2 pigs (Loulou and Boubou), 8 chickens (Cocotte, Booty, Tâche, NoName, Big Mamma, Velociraptor, Cocotte 2 and Cocotte 3), 1 rooster (RuPaul), 3 sheep (Mama Grita, Grita Jr. and Baby Grita), 1 australian calopsyte (Kiku), some fishes and LOTS of wild animals and insects.
Besides feeding them, giving them water and taking care of their spaces, we encourage volunteers to take some time to connect with them, to observe and discover ways on improving their wellbeing. Also, as part of the community, they accomplish their role, like helping in the garden and the “eco-paturage” and in the food-waste management.
We had also a bio vegetable garden (that we are preparing now in our new land), that has been growing and growing since some years ago. Although we didn’t had a big production, volunteers had the chance to learn and experiment how to sow (in which season and how to do it well), prepare the land for planting, watering and taking care of the plants while they grow. And of course, during summer we have the harvesting season 🙂 We usually have: different kind of tomatoes, purple potatoes, lettuces, chard, persil, eggplants, peppers, basil, pumpkins, zuccinis, cucumbers, physalis, carrots, spring onions, fava beand and green peas. Then we have our Herb Spiral, with rosemary, sage, lavander, oregan and mint.
When learning how to live in nature, we also have to have in mind the awareness and respect that we should have when working with everything around us. Wether they are plants, animals or other human beings, respect and harmony are always taken in count.
