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permaculture

ESC volunteering 2024

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ESC volunteering 2024

Permaculture volunteering opportunities in 2024 with Boodaville - the call is open for European Solidarity Corps volunteers!

BOODAVILLE CASERES

(Scroll down to read about Boodaville Barcelona)
APPLY HERE!
WHO?

This is a placement for participants with a maximum age of 30 as it is funded by the European Solidarity Corps. We are looking for people who are highly motivated to learn and apply Permaculture, who are responsible and have an interest in nature and outdoor activities and education projects with young children. Applicants should have good communication skills and be ready to live in a small community. They should be prepared for quiet village life, and be ready to explore the area by bicycle.

We also invite participants with fewer opportunities.

WHERE?

For 24 hours a week volunteers will be at Boodaville Kindergarten, a developing family permaculture centre in the Matarranya region of Spain. Visitors learn about this permaculture education project applying, effective & sustainable design techniques in a place with challenging climate conditions.

Boodaville started in 2008 with the purchase of 1.5 hectares of olive terraces and pine forests in a stunning, tranquil location. Over the years, many people in an ever-growing international community have become involved and we’ve learned about, and applied, permaculture design during the development of the original site and the site of the new family project.

The long term goal is to create a working example of permaculture principles in action and create an eco-education centre with plenty of space for workshops and courses.

Volunteers will live in a fully-equipped caravan at the family project during the week, and have a room in rented accommodation in the small village of Caseres available for weekends and for 6 hours of online work related to the ESC program (youthpass diaries, writing up reports, organising and sharing dissemintion material).

Caseres is a rural village about 3 km from the demonstration site of Boodaville, and 6km from the family permaculture site. It is a small village of about 300 people located next to the Algars River where you can bathe. 

See more about Caseres here : http://www.caseres.altanet.org/

WHAT?

The volunteer will have the role of assisting the Boodaville Kindergarten during the school time (from 9.00 to 15.00), and occasionally he/she will have the option to work in the permaculture project belonging to the school families, or the Boodaville Finca, nr Caseres – In which the main activities are Regenerative Agriculture and taking care of 4Ha of olives, almond trees and a vegetable garden. The permaculture and educational practice, meetings and other activities take place during 30 hours per week.

There are three main activities within the volunteer project:

1) Training in natural environment education, creating and developing activities focused on nature pedagogy and outdoor education.

2) Learn practical permaculture skills, communication, group cohesion, sharing ideas, facilitation and developing self-confidence. 

3) Reflection work, write blog posts, post photos.

WHY?

This European Solidarity Corps program is an opportunity to make something for you and for the world. All basic living expenses are covered as well as the expenses to travel to Caseres, and you receive monthly pocket money. 

You will be living and learning ethical design, as well as experiencing life in a rural Spanish village. There are all sorts of possible day to day activities, please read the infopack for more information  and if you are eligible you can start the application process by filling in this form.

APPLY HERE!
WHEN?

From the 10/01/2024 to the 10/07/2024

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BOODAVILLE BARCELONA

WHO?

This is a placement for participants with a maximum age of 30 as it is funded by the European Solidarity Corps. We are looking for people who want to support our management of European Projects, who have a passion for social media, and are highly motivated to learn and apply Urban Permaculture. The ideal candidate is responsible and has an interest in ecosocial transition. Applicants should have good communication skills in Spanish as there will be networking and social media tasks. They should be prepared to come to the Poble Sec neighbourhood to work at least three days a week.

WHERE?

Volunteers will live in, or close to, Barcelona and will work in the Poble Sec neighbourhood to create regenerative projects. They will work in a variety of locations including co-working spaces, the offices of collaborating organisations, urban gardens and outdoor public spaces. 

WHAT?

Volunteers will work on three two main tasks 1) Support with online work – mainly Instagram/Website/Project Management  2) Working in the neighbourhood implementing ecosocial design in the Poble Sec neighbourhood.

The volunteers will help Boodaville Association grow by engaging young people and sharing opportunities, both online, and in person in the neighbourhood.

Volunteers can choose independent work, or take part collaborating with exisiting groups. There are also opportunities to be involved with permaculure networks across the city and at a regional, national and international level.

Volunteers will work closely with Anna Louise Gurney the coordinator and Emma Riboli the mentor for this project.

WHY?

This European Solidarity Corps project is an opportunity to engage in promoting ecosocial design with long-term effects in a city neighbourhood. All basic living expenses are covered as well as the expenses to travel to Barcelona, and you receive monthly pocket money. 

You will be living and learning ethical design, as well as experiencing life in an urban neighbourhood. There are all sorts of possible day to day activities, please read the infopack for more information  and if you are eligible you can start the application process by filling in the google form.

WHEN?

From the 10/07/2024 to the 10/06/2024

Interviews for shortlisted applicants will be held via zoom with Anna Louise, project coordinator

1) Training in natural environment education, creating and developing activities
focused on nature pedagogy and outdoor education.

Let’s Connect and Regenerate!

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Categories
permaculture Rovira Regenerativa

Syntropic experiment 1, and wishing you a Happy 2023 (On Fridays I write)

Planting Mulberry cuttings in Boodaville Food Forest

Syntropic experiment 1, and wishing you a Happy 2023 (On Fridays I write)

Happy 2023! Lou is back with details of our syntropic agriculture experiment and updates on other activities over holidays.

I’m back! and catching up after the long Spanish holiday. With King’s Day on the 6th January, the first day back in the office (read : kids back at school) was 9th January! Alex has moved in to Boodaville Caseres, the cats have mostly moved out, and the place is looking tidier than ever after some intense days clearing out the yearly build up of random stuff. 

The children are healthy, energies are restored and I’m even feeling in many ways “back to normal” and my motivation is similar to the good old days. On Monday we are meeting to put projects and objectives into a plan for the year. Any input / ideas are welcome over the weekend. 

pooless

Before I say any more about the syntropic agriculture experiment, first I have to make the kind of comment i don’t usually make.

“Never mind what I’m doing with that stick, look at my hair! Doesn’t it look amazing!!” 

That was my first thought when I saw the above photo and now I can share with the world that I haven’t washed my hair with shampoo since June 2021. Inspired to action by Paul Wheaton and Shaun Klassen-Koop’s book “Building a better world in your backyard” and the fact I was pregnant and not going to be going out very much, I stopped washing. It took 15 months, but now I never need shampoo again. I use a comb to clean my hair, a nailbrush to clean the comb, and it really does look and feel great. Hooray for reducing the number of chemicals in my house, reducing costs, going the natural way. Not to mention savings by avoiding packaging, transport and prodcution embedded energy, water, fossil fuels and quite probably buying from a huge multi-national company participating in a degenerative economic and financial system. But mainly – it’s easy and it works!

syntropic seeding experiment 1

“Plants grow in community, just like the human beings in villages, and the ground seeks to protect itself from the sun, just like a person at noon wants the shadow of a tree.” – Emilio

We seeded a forest! The theory is that nature decides, based on incredible wisdom and ecosystem knowledge, when the seeds will germinate.

The different species are ready to fill roles in the natural succesion, soil restoration and ecosystem of plants growing together. We are creating conditions for life and more life. The more science based element of the experiment is to see what two adjacent fields will look like in ten years – one with all species planted from seed (although we did put some tree cuttings in there) and the other with the “normal” method of planting trees from a nursery.

The theory is that growing from seed, in company, gives the bushes and trees such an advantage that they will “overtake” the bigger trees next door within ten years. I love learning about theories that are so deeply based in designing as nature with a holistic approach to ecosystems of soil, plants and all living beings. Not only is it beautiful, and regenerative, but we hope to demonstrate how effective these ideas are in practice. 

We have a googledoc with exact details of what we introduced. See the titles of the photos and the map below that show what we did.

This was a joint project with seeds and cuttings donated from Sam Miller, Jessica, and Anna Louise at Boodaville. As always we are infinitely grateful to Sam for his brilliantness and generostiy. We did most of the work on 29th December 2022, and will continue to add seeds to the area as they are in season, and whenever we can. On the 4th January we added more seed balls with various species of edible plants thanks to Jack and Jacqueline.

ants

We’ll keep you updated on whether ants take the seeds or not! so far not.. but you don’t see so many of them around on these dark days of winter. 

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permaculture

Boodaville Caseres Site Manager and Volunteer Mentor 2023

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Boodaville Caseres Site Manager and Volunteer Mentor 2023

Apply for Boodaville Caseres Site Manager opportunity 2023

UPDATE

Site Manager – we have the site manager role covered until August 2023 with Alex currently in the role, and Sara ready to take over if he moves on before then. We are looking for applications for the role of Site Manager and Volunteer Mentor starting in September 2023. We will make a new appointment based on the best person for the role between all the applicants. If you are interested in coming to live and work and manage Boodaville Caseres please get in touch to organise visits and training before August to see if you role is for you!

 

We are seeking a Site Manager and Volunteer Mentor to live onsite at Boodaville Caseres for the 2 year period of Jan 2023- Dec 2024. This is a volunteer position without a salary, all expenses will be covered. The Site Manager will be able to claim expenses for living, running the Boodaville site and general expenses including “pocket money”.

The day to day tasks include, maintaining the food forest and small scale regenerative agriculture project, maintaining buildings and spaces, running a nursery and managing the volunteers weekly timetable. This includes meeting with volunteers and assigning tasks for the volunteers to work 4-5hours from Monday to Friday. Please see the links (below) to the Infopack for the project to know the volunteers roles and expectations as well as the website and Instagram.

Ideally the person who will take this role will visit Boodaville for several days to a week in 2022 to get to know the space and project and meet with Anna Louise, the project coordinator, online or in person..

Links:

 

Essential Skills: Driving license, over 25 years old, Spanish and English speaking to conversational level, PDC 

Highly desirable: Bilingual Spanish/English, passionate about sharing knowledge and skills, excellent communication skills (via whatsapp), able to efficiently manage the weekly timetable for the volunteers, enjoy nature immersion, interest in community and cultural activities of the Matarranya region, work within a budget and keep all receipts in order for expenses claims, proactive and takes initiative to make events and exciting things happen, self-care skills and practices, effective leadership skills and self-motivation and encouraging the volunteer team, practical experience in agriculture, plant nurseries, bio-construction and water management, recognition of the importance of reflection and evaluation, over 30 years old, peace-making skills, flexibility and keenness to learn from the experience through rough and smooth, accountability for job list, able to give and receive feedback in a constructive manner, a comfortable and flowing relationship with Anna Louise, project coordinator.

APPLY HERE

 

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Food forest and thyme terrace (On Friday’s I write)

Spot the plants in this picture : quince, cherry, almond, olive, apple, sugar cane,

Food forest and thyme terrace (On Friday’s I write)

Lou has been at the Boodaville Caseres project all week and this week gives updates from Boodaville's food forest and thyme terrace in July 2022

This week I am able to write because Vianna our wonderful Boodaville Barcelona volunteer has already uploaded the photos I sent her a few days ago. In my 15 minute window between taking some cuttings and planting some seeds at the Boodaville finca, and going to pick up Kira and Joanna from their respective child care I will add captions to the photos to explain what is working well and not so well with our design. 

We were lucky – or not so lucky – to have a huge 48mm storm 8 days ago, so the ground is still humid to a decent level (this is why we are planting cover crop seeds in july !! – to start gettting some life into the new medicinal herb garden the volunteers have created)

I say not so lucky because the day before the storm a farmer here in town commented to our volunteer Fran “If it didn’t rain again all summer I’d be happy”, and because along with the storm was intense hail which has destroyed all of Marc Boldo’s vineyards (and many other people’s farms as well), that’s 15000 euros of income gone, plus the fact that he’s put an incredible amount of labour already into those fields.

These extreme storms, heatwaves are exactly what models predicted climate breakdown would look like. We are living it, and also living under a crazy system where the media are spreading propaganda and taking us towards catastrophe. This week we’ve seen media continuing to support the Tory party – when internationally Britain is basically seen as a failed state right now; we’ve seen the reality behind the destruction of the Podemos party by the media in Spain uncovered (See Pablo Iglesias on twitter – you won’t find it in MSM!) and we’ve seen media ignoring hugely important news about climate (again!)

Anyway, here’s the food forest update, hooray for solutions to desertification and regenerating soil and LIFE!

Sadly the Robinia has died, we are investigating but there may have been 1) a map error and it didn’t appear combined with 2) a lack of a “sponsor” ie noone on site who deeply loved this tree!!!

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Maranya Fest 2022

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Maranya Fest 2022

Our little festival continues in 2022 when we returned to the farm at WildLab for an epic weekend of permaculture, nature and dancing!

Maranya 2022

 

On June 24th we were back on site at the incredible WildLab farm in Bigues i Riells, arriving in the heat, crammed into the back of Matteo’s party van to set up camp for Maranya 2022. 

 

At the heart of the weekend was our desire to share with you the opportunity to be in nature and to feel our connection with it whilst exploring living permaculture. We had the chance to spend a weekend experiencing community living, sharing and dancing each night in the dome. Beginning our days long after the rooster’s crows, stepping out into the warmth of the sun and sounds of the surrounding forest. 

We started Saturday morning with a yoga session which the chickens crept into, meditating and moving our bodies in the morning, and then exploring the offerings that our participants had to share.

The permaculture games hosted by Anna and Juanjo brought out our childlike joy, curiosity and wildly entertaining improv performances from everyone that took part.  The vital discussions about soil and food preservation that took place in Sam’s workshops inspired and moved us into new ways of thinking about how we understand and interact with our environment, how we manage our time to create freedom and how we can live in abundance.

We loved the organic flow of skillshares and pop up workshops brought to us: Vadim brought us tea tasting, and brewed pots of tea at just the right times.  A Contact Jam movement session from Yuri. Michela shared her passion for reflexology and holistic healing and the gift of healing massages. Valeria set the scene with a gentle, introspective and interactive self-care workshop to bring us home into ourselves on Sunday morning.

 

A huge special, sparkling shout out for the team of volunteers (Andreea, Ines, Valeria, Luca and Yuri) who supported the event and helped us hold the entire weekend together.

This year saw us running on very Spanish time with a few more obstacles than we could have planned for which had the team stretched whilst we worked to deliver delicious vegetarian meals to the people. We ate well, locally sourced and organic and had plenty of poolside chilling before the music started. 

My personal favourite part of Maranya is the music, the dancing and the annual appearance of my tiger suit. The line up was very HOT. Thank you so much to our dear Ines, bringing some feminine energy to the team of DJ’s and huge thanks and love to all the DJ’s who got us dancing for hours and hours: Conxenxa, Mathz, Palladium, Son B2B Raul Naro and Just Luca.

 

And of course, thank you to each and everyone who came to our little festival! I hope that the magic of Maranya carried into the following days and continues to ripple through our lives. 

 

Much love.

Let’s Connect and Regenerate!

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The Food Forest

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The Food Forest

Updates from the Food Forest at Boodaville in October 2021

Updates from the food forest in October 2021 –

We made and scattered bicochar seed balls to give opportunity for support plants In our seed balls there was..
Fenogreek to fix Nitrogen
Altramuz to fix Nitrogen
Kale to bring up nutrients
Caléndula to attract insects
Nabo (raddish) to decompact soil

Chop and drop, we cut alfalfa to leave the N+ in the soil and organic matter decomposing to create more soil

Creation of compost, a pile of organic matter made of various layers alternating consecutively coal and nitrogen.

The charcoal is provided by the dry part (branches) and nitrogen different layers between green branches, organic matter and fertilizer in different proportions. To maintain it you have to water it with plenty of water, wait two days and turn around completely like this every other day, always controlling the temperature for 18 days, and the compost is ready !

 

 

Comments from 29 March: the compost didn’t work as

“Compost needs a very specific mix of c/n and lots of water to start. Maybe a lack of manure or fresh greens? I don’t know what went into it. Fast compost is good for bacterial things like annuals but trees do much better with slow composting as it is much more fungal. We do both hot and cold here for different uses” – Nick

“It was a try to use up material but definitely there wasn’t enough water in it..and probably not enough nitrogen neither” – Chris (compost creator!)

“I’ll bring some raw biochar which we can soak and put in it and alfalfa. Hopefully that gives it enough moisture and nitrogen to wake it up” – Nick

We will try and wake up the compost and do another intervention in the next few weeks! At least we managed to post the information from October 2021 before the Spring 2022 intervention – even if it’s 5 months late! – Anna

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Zaï Composting

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Zaï Composting

A composting method to regenerate the soil at Boodaville

9th March 2018

The idea came from Yacouba Sawadogo via Alessandro Ardovini and was implemented by Marc Haetjens. We made 30cm circular holes in the ground, filled them with kitchen waste that would normally go on the compost heap, and let the combination of moist food, trapped rainwater, provide a nutritious place for plants to grow. We seeded green manure in each zaï and gave each one a heavy mulch of straw. The holes are about 20cm deep which means that there is enough decompacted healthy soil being made in this area to plant a squash garden. We are choosing to plant from the squash family as the area is in zone 2 and we want something low maintenance. When we left site in October 2017 we had filled about 30 zaïs and we will see what is growing there when we go back next week!!!

Here is a video about how to use a zaï!! Essential knowledge for anyone who comes to volunteer with us!!

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Living Permaculture Volunteer – Eirini

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Living Permaculture Volunteer – Eirini

Living Permaculture volunteer Eirini shares her experience volunteering in Boodaville during the winter of 2021.

My participation in the ESC project “Living Permaculture” is absolutely a life experience for me. Even though I volunteered in Boodaville only for two months, it was enough to receive a new perspective of how I see nature and how the humans can interact with the earth in a positive and creative way.

During the project I had the chance to use my knowledge as a Biologist in a practical way, but also to learn new things about the world of permaculture. Moreover, only by living so close to nature I found out something new every day about the earth and myself. Apart from that, living in such a small village during the winter is a unique experience that made me realize how distracting is the life in big cities and how significant is for me to live in a place where I can observe the season changes. Gradually the colors of the forest were changing and as the sky was getting greyer, our land was getting greener thanks to the seed bombs we offered to her.

One of the greatest things I learnt being a volunteer in Boodaville is the importance of communication and expression of our feelings. Living with three more women, two cats and a dog, and sharing with them a common goal, the improvement and maintenance of Boodaville land, made it clear that we need to communicate deeply with each other and find ways to avoid conflicts. I am so grateful I can take with me home these gained skills and use them to improve my relationships with my friends and family. By the end of my volunteering, I was surprised to find out that I can now express myself so easily even using words that are not on my mother language!

Overall, this project meant a lot to me. The whole experience of living in the nature and exchanging knowledge with these wonderful people that we share similar ideas and perspectives of the world really inspired me and made me feel grateful and connected to my mind and body. The feeling of being part of a community where everyone can contribute with their own personal skills and wisdom, and where solidarity is a protagonist, filled me with hope and made be believe more in myself and humanity. Moreover, after the project I am way more motivated to pursue my dreams of a sustainable way of living and to start my own projects.

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Living Permaculture Volunteer – Irene

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Living Permaculture Volunteer – Irene

Living Permaculture volunteer Irene shares her experience volunteering in Boodaville during the summer of 2021.

Arrival

Motivation: A change of scene, to grow as a person and learn from myself and the environment, to help the environment by contributing knowledge and to improve as much as possible and above all learn from experience.

Expectations: To enjoy nature, learn about Permaculture and other forms of sustainable farming. 

Fears: Some situations which may be out of my control

 

My Experience in Boodaville

Hi, I’m from a place in La Mancha whose name I don’t want to remember; I came here by chance, I did not have in mind to volunteer. Although I have always been interested in social, community projects, self-management, sustainable living, environmentalism and others, I had never had the opportunity. And this opportunity appeared at a decisive moment for me, giving me the opportunity to develop both individually and collectively, to learn from myself and from others, putting into practice my already acquired knowledge and learning from others on many levels. Not only in the areas most directly linked to my volunteer project, such as Permaculture, crop association, soil regeneration, but also in a more personal area such as coexistence and communication. I have met wonderful people the months I have been here.

This volunteering has been different than I expected, but that does not make it less enriching, on the contrary, it was full of new nuances that make it unique.

It has given me the opportunity to share with people with ideas similar to mine and a great desire to do things that are unique.

I haven’t had time to get bored, between the expected and the unexpected.

Unlike perhaps other volunteers, due to the circumstances, here we have had the opportunity to experience real self-management and see how, little by little, with the collaboration of all, it advances. And as with good energy and desire everything is possible.

Boodaville is sprouting from her seed right now, being reborn again. And it makes me happy to be a part of that.

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Boodaville Volunteers 2021 – Maria and Gloria

Cycling to Boodaville

Boodaville Volunteers 2021 – Maria and Gloria

Gloria and Maria share about their experience volunteering at Boodaville this summer. They were part of the European Solidarity Corps volunteering project "Living Permaculture"
Gloria

I wanted to live a different experience this summer, to be in contact with nature, not be so connected with the computer and mobile and work on something more physical and manual. I have lived just what I wanted and I have learned a lot. I am very grateful to have had this opportunity. I was unaware of many things about nature despite being born surrounded by it but, when you live such an experience, you realize that how the land is normally cultivated is not the best way to do it using pesticides and creating monocultures.

Participating in a project like this changes your mentality and you become much more aware of what you consume and how you do it. In addition, I have acquired many other values ​​of coexistence and care for people such as working in community and always being a team.
In my experience the feeling of self-improvement has increased a lot.
You don’t feel capable of picking up a drill until you pick it up and it starts to break the ground. You will not know if you will be able to transplant plants until you prepare everything and do it. Until you do, you don’t believe it.
For me, the biggest lesson has been learning the natural processes of the planet. We live in a society that goes too fast and does not give room for anything.
Living in a town of 200 inhabitants and working in a place like Boodaville, you learn to be more patient with all the cycles of nature, to work on empathy and to focus much more on the moment.
It has been a pride to work the land and take care of the animals together with other women and share our energy.

Maria

After a little more than 4 months in Boodaville I think I can already say that it is part of me. I started this experience without any kind of expectation or prejudice. I wanted to go with an open mind and receive all the information without having any prior idea.
That has been the key. The wide variety of tasks, activities and excursions that we have done have allowed me to learn things that I never thought I would learn. From chopping wood to planting tomatoes or taking care of 4 chickens, 1 rooster and 3 chicks.
On a practical level, each day has been different. And, on a personal level, the development has been unpredictable. An experience like this allows you to get to know yourself better and even find your goal in life.
I also appreciate the company, the conversations and the laughs with Gloria. Having been 2 volunteers this year, the relationship is close and communication has been essential. We have worked as a team and we have supported each other.
I recommend that anyone take a few months of their life, leave everything behind and get involved in a project or community. I feel stronger, more capable, freer and happier.

 

 

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