During one of our walks we stumbled upon someone who offered us a place to stay. We had planned on camping out at an RV park, but instead we took him up on his offer and camped out at his permaculture farm in Bouse, AZ. This farmer, Mark Moody, founder of the Arizona Mesquite Company is committed to revitalizing utilization of a long-forgotten species of native desert tree know as Mesquite. To his knowledge, he is the only farmer that cultivates and harvests pods from this tree and has been entirely self-sufficient at doing so. A few of us toured his farm where he showed us the hammer mill he constructed for grinding the pods into flour and the hoop house he built to grow young trees. He emphasized the extremely high protein content of mesquite and said with certainty that he could feed an entire village solely from the mesquite products from his farm.
The work that Mark and countless others are doing is extremely admirable. I know from taking a permaculture design class how important it is to work with nature to create a self-sustaining system of agriculture. Such a system will be critical in the face of climate change when brutal, unpredictable conditions make continued industrial production of cash crops impossible. Given that climate change is already upon us, we need an adaptive, resilient form of agriculture if we are to survive. Permaculture is exactly that and the great thing about it is that it encourages innovation. Using permacultural techniques is like cooking without a recipe book, there are a few key concepts but a lot of actions are done by trial-and-error until the best one is found and perfected.
Permaculture exemplified Chris's values in so many ways since it is the perfect cross-section of his minimal impact philosophy and ideals for creative agricultural solutions to climate change and poverty. Thus Jamie had the idea to build a permaculture garden behind the 660 Cooperative as a memorial for Chris. In addition to this garden being a haven for people who knew Chris to spend time and remember him in a tranquil space, our hope is for it to also provide present and future 660 residents with healthy, local food from their own backyard. We also hope it will bolster community not only within the coop itself but for passersby for which its gates will also be open.
To learn more about Mark's Mesquite Farm, check out his website at http://www.arizonamesquitecompany.com
To learn more about or donate to the Chris Dennis Memorial Permaculture Garden go to http://jpj46.peaksmaker.com/?campaign=1457
