Project Bona Fide. Permaculture farm on a volcano, on an island, in a lake, in the heart of the tropics. Imagine one of those early fly over scenes from Jurassic Park and you’ll get the gist of it. As I’m writing this I’m watching the silhouetted volcano fade in front of a sky that’s literally traffic cone orange. The orangeness is just ridiculous. But so is everything about this island, in a description I would just say it gives off surreal vibes all around. And I’m not even a hippy dippy person but this place radiates.
Bona Fide is essentially a model farm that’s applying permaculture principles to explore possibilities in a changing climate. Seasonal behaviors here are becoming more and more inconsistent with what they used to be and the idea is that local farmers can see how this project has adjusted to the change and replicate it with assured success. I’ve been here for nearly a month and still learning new farm chores and the inter workings of the permaculture style systems everyday. So far I’ve worked with the chickens, chopped wood, handled plants in the nursery, done several forms of construction, started the early stages of a natural building project, fruit foraged throughout the property, and harvested lots of pigeon peas from all over the farm. I’ve also opted to spend a good amount of time cooking with the local Nica cooks on the farm who I’ve taught me a great deal about edible greens and Nica style cooking. All of the learning is moment to moment, super hands on and only requires asking the workers or coordinators your working with to understand. One of my favorite parts is asking about all the plants. What they are, where they’re from, when they fruit, what they fruit, which are medicinal, which plants are members of guilds, what’s it’s function in the guild, etc. And fantastically, you’re almost never left empty handed with a question – they know everything! And learning about all the little things, you start to form an idea around how sections of the property work (the farm as a whole is so complex I’ll never wrap my mind around it). The infrastructure of a permaculture farm is so sophisticated and interdependent it’s like its own civilization, many could potentially exist for thousands of years without human intervention. That’s pretty rad.
As an intern on this farm I’ve got the opportunity to design and implement a small scale system of my own here. I wish I could say what that is going to be, but I’m still working on it. For now, I’m happy hopping on any project that gets thrown my way. This week I learned about cob building and natural plasters, and spent the first couple days plastering the cob walls around one of our compost toilets. And there’s lots of work yet to be done all around so I’ll have my hands full for the next few months. And that’s all for my Bona Fide update.
— Jack Evans