One of our beds and the forest garden.

Beginnings

Ever since I was a small child I wanted to farm. Growing up with the mystique of James Herriot along with my father’s stories of the family farm in England had made my long for the mixed farm of my childhood stories. Alas whenever I begged my parents to move to the country they refused.

Like many little girls I fell in love with horses. Having been placed on a horse around the age of 4 and then starting camps at five,  started regular lessons at age six. It wasn’t just the horses though. It was the barn, the land, the fields, and the feeling of peace when being around that atmosphere. At age twelve I got a horse. By sixteen I no longer had a horse and I moved away from farming, the outdoors, and most of what i held dear during childhood.

Moving forward many years I find myself in school for animal care, or animal nurse assistant. I had to do a work placement to graduate. there were many choices from zoo’s to dog groomers. I chose a vet and farm. It was on the few days at Whole Circle Farm in Acton that I realized that I still loved farming.

Being older I was not fixated on only horses. This is mainly due to the fact that Whole Circle Farm had no horses and is a mixed Biodynamic farm. The amount that a good farmer has to know about the surrounding world and how it interacts fascinated me.

To make a long story short, Tim liked the  idea and thought it was a great way to live. So we embarked on finding our farm. We were committed.

Tim told his boss he was leaving and I continued to learn as much as I could about mixed farming with nature. the on-line real estate listings were e-mailed back and forth between us. We talked to others, went to classes, and found out about soil, breeds, crop rotations, and anything else that people would tell us.

Cheap land was scrutinized all over the country. Did it have enough water? What were the laws like? What was the soil like? Winds? Fires? Cities? Markets? Jobs? the questions went on and on. We looked all across Canada. We then drove out to Eastern Canada, it had some of the cheapest land in the country.

After driving around the east we settled on New Brunswick. it was everything we wanted and beautiful to boot. We spent thousands going back and forth looking at properties. We went out three times looking for land and tried to buy three places. None of them were finalized. There was always something really wrong with each place.

One had a poisoned well. The other the vendors were off fishing, and the third had zoning problems. The houses we liked were mysteriously gone when we were ready to see them.

So, we decided to go home to Ontario and see what we could find. Our dreams of a large farm were dashed. So that summer I took a permaculture course. Once again I had an epiphany that this was the way the world should be living.

All Sorts Acre

All Sorts Acre is where I now live with my husband, six cats, a dog, a turtle and many outdoor critters in the garden. My name is Jennifer Osborn and I am a Permaculture Designer. I finished up my certificate in the summer of 2008 with Gregoire Lamoureux in Orangeville, Ontario. My introduction to Permaculture was more of a fluke than planned. Both of us had an interest in farming and growing our own food. On my search for information I saw some interesting books in the Goodwill shop in Guelph. One was Toby Heminway’s Gaia’s Garden and the other was the Permaculture Principles by Bill Mollison. Each book was two dollars. I had no idea that those books would change the course of our lives.

I have a background in art and design as well as animal care and training. My gardening knowledge is largely self taught through observation and curiosity. My husband went to school for environmental engineering and is a compost specialist.

We are based 5km outside of Guelph, Ontario. on 1.18 acres. As we had to make sure we could pay for all this my wonderful husband kept his day job. I continue to work from home doing graphic and web design as well as illustration but another large part of my days is spent planting, digging, and learning how the systems around me work.

We moved in in November so we thought it would be good to do as little as possible and just see  what the land told us the first year. We have learned much from just watching and waiting to see what happens.Everyday shows us something we are in awe about. We are working at starting a sub-urban micro farm and learning centre. It will take time and both my husband and I agree that we must have practical experience here before we can advise others on what to do. Reading is great, but nature has taught me so much more than a book ever could. I hope to impart some of the things we learn here and to learn from the experience of others.

VISION
There is a plan to our farm albeit a loose one. These are some of the components we are looking at for our farm:

• a small CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program
• produce stand
• bee hives
• small livestock including chickens, sheep, ducks, possilby goats and rabbits
• forest gardens (currently have several producing fruit trees)
• berries and nuts (currently have producing berry trees and neighbour have nut trees)
• pasture rotation program
• art produced from and inspired by farm in some manner
• teaching and education
• composting
• grain crops
• dyeing gardens
• lost life skills

Which ones will come to the forefront remain to be seen.