hello! my name is spencer, ive been interested in permaculture since i first discovered it back in 2011 when i started studying at the university of california, santa cruz. i studied environmental studies with a focus on sustainable agriculture and agroecology. I spent two years traveling and wwoofing in europe before i finally found myself here on the big island. ive been growing food here for 3 years now. ive run into a small hiccup, we could say, by living in leilani estates next to the current eruption of Kilauea. i no longer can work my garden due to volcanic emissions but i am still growing food and still planting trees on the island! currently trying to figure out whats next. but i do have access to check up on my plantings and i am able to grab cuttings and propagation materials to start over in a new location, if needed. ive been blogging about tropical vegetables for two years now and i wanted to share my newest blog post on here relating directly to my situation and the volcano. the blog entry is titled Rapid Resilient Food Systems! please check it out! tropicalselfsufficiency.wordpress.com
Aloha Spencer and welcome! What a great blog/website you've built! Your detailed explanations and excellent photography are invaluable to those seeking tropical information. Sorry to hear you've been temporarily removed from your property, but is sounds like you've picked-up elsewhere in the interim. Looking forward to hearing more!
i'm glad you are able to recover and i'm also glad to see that things have moderated with the eruption/flows, but it is so hard to tell if that may change or not.
thank you two for the kind words! the lava has stalled for a few months now and ive been busy planting and mulching. feels great to have my hands in the soil at home! plenty more blog entries on the way!
since im on the south/eastern edge of the big island our latitude is around 19 degrees. so technically we are tropical. lots of books and things say hawaii is subtropical. but they may not be taking into account the wet side of the big island where our average temps are 80 degrees F and we get 140 inches of rain. wintertime cools here around 62 degrees. i can easily grow 'truly tropical' plants as well. and i live slightly up a mountain so as you near the coast temps are 5-10 degrees warmer
i'm envious of any place that can grow coffee and chocolate, let alone all the other fruits and nuts. i hope you have an abundant harvest in all regards there. are you familiar with the Sadhana Forest project in Haiti? they are using some tree nut for giving more protien to the diet of the people there, but i am not remembering the species name, but the common name is Maya nut.
i know its pretty amazing what grows here. my mind was blown when i moved. and i didnt really know any tropical plants before i came here. i really dont want to go anywhere else because i enjoy watching the plants grow too much. i can literally watch a tree grow in a day, some of my little ice cream beans grow 15' in a year the first few years. amazing what nature will do with an almost endless supply of rain. were up to 250 inches since january 1st! and no ive never heard of the Sadhana Forest project. im going to check into it though, and ive never heard of that nut either! so humbling to learn new staple food plants regularly! i hope they are growing lots of moringa as well for extra nourishment. carefree tree that is extremely nutritious, possibly the most nutritious plant on the planet!