Reskillience

I tell a story about my inability to change before chatting with a guy who's obsessed with changing everything! Dr Shane Simonsen of Recombination Nation is a biochemist, research scientist and experimental farmer who is shaking up agriculture-as-usual by breeding plants that require ZERO INPUTS. No fertiliser, no pest protection, no weeding, no watering! We talk about how to run your own kinky plant breeding experiments at home, as well as:
Why humans still have 50 million years left on the planet
Shane's POV on GMO
Low tech gene transfer you can do today!
Are we addicted to working harder not smarter?
Moving towards irrigation-free gardening
Yet another neurodivergent superpower
Being a plant snob
Cities versus country towns during collapse
Survival foods for the future
How & why to take on projects that will outlive you
CROSSING BRUSH TURKEYS & ASTRALORPS?
Impermaculture
Blessings on the internet
SOLID real estate advice
Where to buy crazy seeds
🧙‍♀️ LINKY POOS
Shane on Substack ~ Recombination Nation
Shane's podcast ~ Recombination Nation
Shane's book ~ Taming the apocalypse
Folklore Pictures' film with Shane ~ Seeds for the Future
Australian Grain Seed Bank
Central Vic seed grower we love ~ Greg Mueller of Useful Seeds
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Sound credit ~ cheers Nicholas Allan!

Planting guides and sow-what-when calendars are great and all, but what happens when the seasons don't play nice? When spring arrives earlier, frost hits later, or heatwaves burn your crops to a crisp? There's no controlling the weather, but with tools like phenology, you can make better predictions and grow more food!
Duncan Cocking (of Leaf, Root & Fruit) is an amazing gardener and educator from Kyneton in Southern Australia. He helps people tune into more-than-human patterns and cycles to build their own hyper-local and climate resilient gardening calendars, and has a wealth of wisdom about living more joyfully too.
In this convo:
Why spring is two weeks earlier this year
Duncan's early years immersed in nature and connected to country
Why he's not that interested in working hard
Mid-30s career change
Pattern recognition in the veggie patch
How to use phenology
Nature based indicators to tell you went to plant
The two most critical aspects of gardening!!!
Connection through failures
Why to RELAXXXXX about how to garden
Wood ducks tell you when you plant tomatoes
Crazy record keeping
How the hell to collate so much data
Habits of the highly observant
How do nature’s patterns work, NO LIKE, HOW?
Being conversant with the land
Duncan is an ostrich
Disconnecting from the World Wide Web
How to preserve your mental health with a hyper-focus on local
Getting kids into the garden
Give your kids scary tools
Garden gimmicks
How to grow avos in cold climates
Spring gardening to-dos RIGHT NOW
🧙‍♀ LINKY POOS
Duncan’s home on the web
Leaf, Root & Fruit on Substack
Leaf, Root & Fruit on Instagram
Andrew Turbill, the bird guy
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☕ Buy Me A Coffee (or an avo or a loaf of bread) ☕
Gratitude to the field recordist Romuald Mikusek, XC935811. Accessible at www.xeno-canto.org/935811.

NOTE: I’ve done breathwork every day since this interview and – you gaias! – it’s really helping me human.
Meet today’s guest Ella Maryska, who is responsible for getting me into this breathwork thing that I am the last person on the planet to know about.
Ella is 21 years old, wise as the hills, a certified breathwork instructor, and brings a fresh and youthful perspective to the pod which has been sorely absent to date (sorry sorry sorry).
In this sweet convo, you’ll hear about the geeky physiology of breathwork; how it rebalances our nervous system, changes circulation to our brain, oxygenates tissues and connects us to plants, as well as Ella’s own experience as a young person living through the polycrisis, navigating novel life paths as the old routes fall away.
I learned so much from Ella. Let me know if you’re on the breathwork bandwagon, a brilliant tool for staying steady in the tumult.
🧙‍♀️ LINKY POOS
Ella’s home on the web
Ella/Coming Home Breathwork on IG
Tuesday evening group class
Guided breathwork sesh on YouTube
[book] Atlas of the Heart ~ Brené Brown
Catie’s natto
Reskillience live recording at Words in Winter
The Australasian Permaculture Convergence
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Catie on Substack

“In a time of fracturing seasons, when everything’s going awry, there are still cycles that we can set our hearts by.”
It's Kirsten Bradley of Milkwood! She's writing a new book about the moon, penning love letters to parsley and currawongs on Substack, and here to share all about her daily rhythms in lutruwita, Tasmania. Oh, what a lovely conversation!
Within 🌙
AI or not to AI
Morning routines! Morning stargazing!
Tea choices
Moving to lutruwita/Tassie
Fish farm woes and responses
How to make decisions about where to move
When the body says no
Slow activism
“You can rest. The problems will be there when you get up again. And the solutions.”
Perimenopause rearrangements
Coming back to creativity after burnout
Wrapping knowledge in story
Learning injuries
Writing as a welcome
Cultural astronomies
Should we follow our interests?
What does activism look like for Kirsten now?
The Common Book of the Moon
🧙‍♀️ LINKY POOS
Kirsten on Substack
Kirsten + Milkwood
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BYO wheelbarrow to load up on Solomon’s wisdom, cos today we’re chatting with the grandaddy of beyond-organic gardening himself, Steve Solomon! If you don’t know Steve, he’s a bit of cult hero in food growing circles thanks to his deep research into soil remineralisation and why it is absolutely critical for human health.
In this convo:
How pre-industrial communities ate 4 x more nutrient-dense food
Why MINERALS are the key to healthy soil and healthy humans
Better nutrition… lower libido?
Why compost is really bloody complicated
…and how compost can ruin your soil if you’re not careful
How to calculate how much organic matter your soil actually needs
The ugly truth about commercial compost
COF ~ Complete Organic Fertiliser
Why Steve doesn’t recommend soil testing for everyone
EVIL GOVERNMENT EDICTS
Steve’s pact to intentionally follow his interests 100%
“THE PURPOSE OF MY LIFE IS TO DO WHATEVER IT IS I’M INTERESTED IN”
LINKY POOS 🧙‍♀️
Steve’s homepage
The Soil & Health Library
[book] The Intelligent Gardener ~ Steve Solomon
[just released!] Growing Nutrient-Dense Vegetables: A Cool Climate Guide~ Steve Solomon
Google: Steve Solomon gardening books
Nutrition and Physical Degeneration ~ Weston A. Price
Soil fertility and Animal Health ~ William Albrecht
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Words in Winter ~ Live podcast with Mara Ripani & Natasha Morgan
Return to the Village ~ Australasian Permaculture Convergence.