Hangouts

It's been a little wet recently. So I haven't been down the plot. After all, I can't sieve mud. So I've been in my usual hangouts a bit. These are places I frequent on the Web. Places which have a good community of like minded people.

My first hangout is :

The Green Living Forum started life as a forum for discussing the TV program It's not easy being green. This followed the fortunes of a suburban family moving from the Midlands (Malvern) down to Cornwall to start a Green lifestyle. It rather hit home in a number of ways. Firstly, I used to work at the same place Dick Strawbridge used to work at in Malvern. Secondly, and more to the point, it's exactly what I want to do.

The second place I frequent is:

Backyard Aquaponics.

 Now Aquaponics is probably unfamiliar to you. What it is is using Fish to grow plants. The fish produce waste (Ammonia), which is broken down my bacteria into Nitrites and again into Nitrates, which is then consumed by plants as a fertiliser. The whole process is a circulatroy system using water as the main carrier. As such plants never need to be watered and benefit from the high availability of nutrients presented by the fish.
This has taken off big time in Australia. Mostly because it uses less water than conventional plant growing, yet is not as wasteful as hydroponics. And also because you can eat the fish as well as the veggies. There are a couple of companies here in the UK who have started doing this - most successfully too - such as Herbs from Wales.

The final place I hangout a lot is from a Dutch friend of mine:

JungleDragon is a photo forum dedicated to nature and wildlife. The photos that people upload are absolutely stunning. Don't believe me? have a look at some of their all-time greats.