Revolutionary Ideas Part 20 - Cob houses and other natural buildings

So... I took a little break there from posting and was on the verge of wrapping up this whole series of posts with a generic "everyone just stop being greedy and shortsighted, share resources". But then I realized there are a pile more ideas.  

Meanwhile we've been getting ready for garden year 2.  I found my camera so should take some pics of art I've been making, seeds that I've started.

I've been rethinking whether or not the world of commercial art is for me after all, I'll write more about that later.   The same day I did all that thinking I stumbled across cob building, something that I looked at before.  But, in the past month I've discovered that the person who purchased the cabin that used to be part of our land has had it listed for sale on kijiji with a nice chunk of our land with it.  We wanted to buy it from her, for a place for guests, but then discovered it needs a lot of work and we actually own a really nice chunk of riverfront that the cabin owners had claimed as theirs.  Thank you, survey company.

So in looking into how we could perhaps save the bags of cash we were prepared to give these people, and put up our own cottage there, I rediscovered cob building and now I'm super excited.  Cob = earth + water + sand + clay and is a very old form of house building.  People make cob ovens, garden walls, benches, chicken coops and houses.

Here's an example of a pretty elaborate cob house I found online, sorry I forgot include a links to my sources but I will in the future:





And here's one that made me super excited in terms of being able to incorporate sculpture, though this one is a straw bale house in Somerset England with a cob facade:




There are other methods of natural building, but I think cob is for me, and makes sense with my background in clay.

In browsing the web about all things cob it was pointed out that it is a very earth-friendly way to build, not to mention cheap.   Apparently cob is cool in summer, warm in winter, and durable. A cottage is a bit ambitious to start with, so we're thinking of starting with a chicken coop, or even just a bench.

http://knoxvillepermacultureguild.ning.com/photo/chicken-house?xg_source=activity

In wanting to mark our territory down by the river, we looked around for a picnic table and paid for a 'picnic table kit' from Home Hardware.  When we picked it up, we discovered we'd been sold a bundle of lumber for $120 with no hardware, so we returned it.  Building materials are expensive!

And then I saw this on Facebook, so we're going to try and figure out a table using river rocks:

  

Anyways, ta da! Discouraged by high costs of building supplies? Get down to earth!

Revolutionary Ideas Part 19 - Ethical Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs)

Banks of Canada, large and small, this one is for you!

With interest rates on savings accounts having dwindled to miniscule I think more people with bags of cash are probably trying to figure out safe places to put it.  

WHAT IF a bank, or credit union, came up with an investment product which I would like to call "An Ethical Real Estate Investment Trust".  

You see, thinking more about the recent rash of small business closures, it occurred to me that people are starting to notice that the middle class is disappearing and swallowing up a lot of businesses with it.  Diverse shopping districts of independently run shops are being traded for strip malls of chain stores.  Commercial rental rates are getting raised to levels that are not practical for people wishing to take a run at being their own boss.

Now, in earlier posts we all learned that money is pretty much just made up debt anyways.  So how about a bank makes up some of that debt, to invest in affordable residential and business properties.   

This could include a mix of affordable rentals, as well as rent to own scenarios.  The fund could offer mentorship to business owners and long term tenants who wish to own their own buildings.  
If a bank does this, the investment fund could be used for Canadians that can afford to put money into RRSPs.  And this REIT could have a catchy name: "The Canadian Small Business REIT" or "The Ethical REIT" or "The Artists' Trust" (for a REIT that would specialize in helping artists).

The return could come from a combination of cash flow and building appreciation due to inflation and the selection of properties that are likely to go up in value.  A group of savvy real estate investors could help choose desirable properties, based on a few metrics and business sense.

The emphasis of this fund would be providing affordable  housing, as well as conserving Nova Scotian small business owners as though they were as endangered as the Blandings Turtle.  

Rather than building supercentres with insane lease rates that only serve to enslave business owners or cater to big chains, properties in rural communities could be bought and renovated.  

This would be a positive step towards bringing the Middle Class back from the brink of extinction, improving human and community health and wellness, and providing a reasonable return to investors.  

Something to think about.

Bankers reading this, if "The Ethical REIT" turns up in your portfolio I won't cry that someone stole my idea, but rather be very pleased providing that the fund was managed the way I think it should be.

Revolutionary Ideas Part 18 - "Sustainable Income Property"

Yes! three posts today.  This post is in direct reference to Part 16 - "Up with small businesses".  In this post I ponder if HGTV Canada's own Scott McGillivray would consider doing a special episode called benevolent income property.  I since changed the word 'benevolent' to 'sustainable' because I'm not actually a big believer in charity per se; I'm more of a 'teach a person to fish' type person.

So, and I'm not going to tweet at him again today because I don't want him thinking I'm some creepy weirdo stalker type, so I'll give it a week, but how about a new HGTV show!  I thought about offering to co-host but the truth is I don't really like leaving my property.  So I propose that Scott McGillivray and David Suzuki would co-host this awesome new show I just thought up.  Sustainable Income Property.  Income Property has already been expanded to a longer show where Scott takes people shopping for a  home to fix up into one or more rental suites.  What if, in "Sustainable Income Property" Scott and David Suzuki help match a team of eco-investors to a project that has the capability of creating sustainable homes and/or lifestyles for Canadians, while providing a pretty darn good place to park some cash.  This would be the first television series in the field of Human Conservation Biology which I just invented in my last post.  The show would illustrate my belief that you can make a decent profit at real estate investing, and help other humans at the same time.

So I'm working on this super top secret building proposal, maybe not so secret now that I'm hinting about it on the internet, but whatever.  anyways.  If David and Scott and HGTV are interested, I wouldn't mind at all if this would be filmed as the series pilot.  In the pilot, a team of 5 - 10 investors/joint venture partners would pool resources to build a building that cash flows, while providing habitat for humans who own small businesses, a mixed use commercial/residential building.  One big commercial space, and 2 residential spaces tailored to 'work from home' types.  Scott could design the floorplans of the building, while David narrates the whole scenario, a la "Nature of Things" and discusses the Human Conservation Biology implications of reducing human travel and creating healthy, sustainable, energy efficient workspaces.   Where we're building a place from scratch, I wouldn't mind getting Mike Holmes in there for a guest spot.  Where we're talking about sustainable finance, using a peer to peer model of investment, I wouldn't mind getting Kevin O'Leary to give the project numbers a once-over and maybe explain to the join venture partners how they could set up their own sustainable Real Estate Investment Trust.  

Anyways.  Something to think about!
 

Revolutionary Ideas Part 17 - "Human Conservation Biology"

Something clicked in me on Monday when someone asked me if I was still doing anything with my conservation biology background.  

Now, this is a big of a source of sadness for me, having spent 9 years in University to become a conservation biologist, and not lasting at it very long.  Technically, I have not worked as a conservation biologist since 2005.  And then, I realized something.  "Yes." I told the person, "Yes, I AM doing something with my background, but I've been focusing on conserving people."

And,  now I'm realizing that my obsession with real estate might be anchored in part in my background as a conservation biologist.  Because, really, we're animals.  And as before I would study protecting forests for birds, and rivers for fish, so too am I interested in protecting spaces for people to live and work.

Aha.  I had an "Aha" moment as Oprah would put it.

This entire series of blog posts has been because I worry over the future of people.  The other day it occurred to me that maybe I'm creating a new field of science.  Maybe this new field should be called "Human Conservation Biology".

My assertion is that to date, the field of Conservation Biology has existed without considering the fact that humans are animals.  And this is the limitation of this entire field of study.  Somehow, humans have been excluded from the whole study of the environment, even though we are part of it.  

So today I tried googling "Human Conservation Biology" and I don't think anyone has yet thought of the need for this study; the study of protecting humans.  Perhaps if we approached the conservation of human beings in the same manner that we approached conservation of other wildlife we would be a bit better off, socially and economically.

The best article that I came up with in my search is this one:

"Conservation Where People Live and Work"

http://www.docstoc.com/docs/116299902/Conservation-Where-People-Live

But, if you read it you'll see it doesn't speak of conserving humans, but conservation in general.

Interesting.  More interesting are all the quotes by Aldo Leopold, who is really one of the founders of wilderness protection and wildlife management.  

He is best known for his book "Sand County Almanac"

Somehow, I've managed to spend the years 1990 - 2005 studying or working in the field of wildlife/conservation biology without having ever read this book.  Well now I really want to read it, because just in the few quotes I've read today I think Aldo and I may have been on the same page in our philosophy of where humans fit into the landscape.

Here is my favourite quote:

"A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise."

Yes.  Yes!!! More thinking like this.  Where did we all go wrong?  Quick, someone hand Prime Minister Stephen Harper a copy of  this book!

So as of today that's a new label I've created for myself.  Human Conservation Biologist.   A conservation biologist whose area of concern includes the conservation of humans.  Our drinking water, homes, work places, air, societies, communities, families, surroundings, livestock, pets.  The whole works.  How about from now on instead of viewing ourselves as somehow being exempt from the landscape, we recognize the fact that we're ALL participants in one giant ecosystem, and that our personal actions and choices affect each other constantly.

Think about that.

I've started looking at my own household and its occupants as an ecosystem.  The dog knows I'm a messy eater so she follows me around when I'm feeding, looking for crumbs.  I let her lick out pots and pans to cut down on my work load.    The cat hunts rodents around our home, sometimes the dog pitches in.  We occupy a  structure that some other humans built back in the 1920's, a house, which contains our sleeping, feeding and working habitat.  The cat is working on figuring out how to use the toilet, the dog isn't quite so advanced... Right now the alpha male of the household is drinking beer and watching hockey night in Canada, a popular past time of many humans in this country.

I'll end this post with Aldo Leopold's essay, the Land Ethic. 

http://home2.btconnect.com/tipiglen/landethic.html 

Revolutionary Ideas Part 16 - Up With Small Businesses

Today's topic was one that came to mind immediately when I began this series of posts, and now it is especially timely.

So there's been quite a stir in Halifax over the past few weeks as a whole raft of local small businesses have been shutting down... I won't list off the list of names but I can't think of almost a dozen.  And when a business shuts down sometimes there will have been factors that the business can control, but there are other factors that maybe, we as a society can help with.  

Factor 1.  Everybody, let's all try to be a bit less cheap and lazy.  Yes, it is easier to shop at a big box store managed by a global corporation and the prices are often great.  But realize with every dollar you spend at one of these stores, that could have been spent elsewhere, you are casting a vote for the kind of world you want to see.  Do you want a world where there are no small mom and pop stores, where nobody with an inkling to take a run at being a business owner has a hope in hell? Where the youths of our nation are transformed into legions of uniformed zombies? Then, carry on! Shop at Wal-Mart!  Or, do you want a world made up of a diversity of interesting businesses, with healthy, independent, happy people and communities? Then Buy Local!!! This is a choice we must consider with each and every purchase.  Stop seeing your dollars as dollars but more as ballots being cast in a global election for one world or the other.  There is almost always a choice.

Factor 2.  Landlords and Governments, let's all try to be less stupid, short-sighted and greedy.  Yes, it is easier to let a few huge corporations buy up all the land around the city and turn it into high rent business developments with the promise of jobs, jobs, jobs, but when you do this remember that you are contributing to an epidemic of unsustainably high overhead expenses for those who would dare open a small business.   Rather, you are catering to larger franchaises and globally owned corporations.   Landlords, when your building has been paid off 20 times over, why not give your commercial tenants a break on the rent? 

Halifax Mayor Mike Savage, how about you cancel a certain crooked developer's permits (not naming any names) and instead design a mixed use building that would provide low rent to local small businesses? It seems to me that all these wonderful creative people get drawn into the allure of running a business, like a moth into a flame, only to burn up and go bankrupt leaving a landlord, developer or group of real estate investors holding the bag of money.  How about giving these people a hand up, with affordable rent, or rent to own opportunities.

Scott McGillivray of HGTV Canada's hit Canadian TV show Income Property, Why can you not use your good looks and power to encourage people, that, not only can they take cheques to the bank, they can use their wealth to help their fellow Canadians become wealthy? Why do all of your guests insist of charging top dollar for their rentals? Why can't you tell them about the wonderful feeling you can get from creating a beautiful home or business rental for someone, and then charging below market rent? To use your good fortune and wealth to create a happy, healthy, sustainable community? Why Scott? Why Why Why?????? Please tell me Why.

Scott, I'm a landlord/investor too and am scheming up a wonderful multi use project that would help A LOT of people (very top secret). My husband and I watch your show all the time and think it'd be great if we could get you to help us  design it.  Maybe we could have a special episode of your show called Sustainable Income Property.  Maybe you could help me realize my master plan of starting a philanthropic Real Estate Investment Trust where we help small business owners across Canada rent to own their own multi use buildings.  Maybe we could begin a revolution of good capitalism.  Maybe!!!!!!!  

Everybody watch episode 4 of season 7 of Income Property where they look at the potential of buying a commercial/residential space.  Everyone salivates over the high rent that the commercial tenant has enslaved herself into paying.  Everyone drools over the cash flow, while worrying over the issue of commercial vacancies. NOT ONCE does Scott or anyone else come up with the idea, hey, maybe we could charge the business less rent, so they have a chance to stay in business.  No. Nobody thinks like that.  Why? 

Aha, since posting this I tweeted my question at Scott and he replied:
have to be able to help yourself before you help others. I try to empower people so they don't have to rent.

This is a good answer, and actually we do have a few tenants at market rent which I feel guilty about but we've tried to give them nice homes, and I know that as we pay down the mortgages we won't keep raising their rents.    When I was doing my MSc in Vancouver I was lucky to have one of the best landlords ever, who didn't raise rents for years because he didn't have to, even though his house was in Kitsilano and he could have been charging double.  The world needs more of him, IMO.  And then, in contrast, was my landlord in Regina, a company who rented me a house after my house fire.  During the time I was there, the real estate market boomed, so when I moved out they more than doubled the rent for the next people.  Did they have to? No. They didn't. This house was probably paid off 100 times over.  They did it because they could, and to make profit for their company.

Here is the recent episode of Income Property that got me thinking:

http://www.hgtv.ca/incomeproperty/video/season+7/full+episodes/alison++deirdre/video.html?v=2336644301&p=1&s=dd#incomeproperty/video

And, back to Factor 1, Everybody watch this documentary about Wal-mart

Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Prices

Revolutionary Ideas Part 15 - Live within your means, retire early!

Okay, so my posting frequency is declining but that doesn't mean I'm not still full of ideas, just been distracted by a big one (more will be revealed).

One of my favourite shows is "Til Debt Do Us Part" hosted by Gail Vaz Oxlade on Slice TV (a Canadian station).  If, like us, you don't have cable, you can watch a link to watch episodes online here

Til Debt Do Us Part

Hopefully this works outside of Canada!

The thing I find surprising about this show is how many people with fat incomes don't realize they're spending a tonne of money; more than they earn in the cases on this show.  I think this is because having a job is expensive.  Unless you work from home, you have to get to it, and for a lot of people this means driving and all the associated costs of keeping a car.  And then, because you're away from home, it is harder to cook everything from scratch and shop less frequently.  Plus there's the whole temptation to go get fancy coffees, lunches, a drink after work, little rewards for renting the hours of your life to other people, it all adds up.

I remember the turning point for me when I realized I had to get out of my last "real job" working for a conservation organization in BC. I was so jaded from spending my days in a office, it was a very nice office but the windows didn't open, that I'd quit cycling to work regularly and would usually drive.  Then I began going through the McDonald's drive through on my way to work, for a McGriddle sandwich and, tasty as they are, it occurred to me that I was NOT being a very good "conservation biologist".   Rather I felt like I was living a lie, especially when I factored in that I didn't think my salary was sustainable, but I won't get into that.

That was just over 8 years ago, and now that I've finally moved to a chunk of land I feel a lot healthier and happier.  And I've realized, for me, the less I work (outside the home) the less I spend.

So on to today's topic, I found this amazing blog! Which makes me feel like I've found "My People".  What if we all make life changes that allowed us to have more free time?  Or less driving/consuming?  Maybe if we all let up on the earth a bit we wouldn't need to extract as much stuff from it.

Personally, I'm glad I don't have a mustache, but here it is:

Mr. Money Mustache

The fellow who writes this blog quit working a real job the same year as me! 2005, also in his thirties.  He seems quite a bit more organized though! 

There are so many amazing posts and tips on this blog! I'm still exploring the whole thing.  There's an excellent forum area full of like-minded people with interesting topics.

One of my favourites is this article:

The True Cost of Commuting

Maybe with the cheap cost of land in NS as well as being a target for Seniors, some of these Refugee Mustachians from other places would consider settling in this province and creating interesting communities.  More reason not to frack it up and ruin all our fresh water!!

Revolutionary Ideas Part 14 - Up With Aquaponics

Well it's Sunday but I took a few days off from blogging so here's today's idea.  Aquaponics.
There's been a lot of uproar about the open pen salmon farms that the NS govt has subsidized, and the potential environmental consequences, as well as the problem that people aren't so game on eating sick fish.  Personally having grown up on the west coast where wild pacific salmon was easy to get, I'm not a big fan of farmed Atlantic salmon.  My guess is the feed the fish get don't mimic their wild diet well enough.  Plus there's the issue of environmental impact.

Here's a site I found that lists off some of the hazards of open pen fish farms.  I was actually an at-sea fish observer on trawl boats on BC's west coast, from 1996 - 97, and have seen for myself that penned salmon do escape.  The fact in my short career as a fish observer I've seen escaped Atlantic salmon appear in trawl nets leads me to suspect that the potential for escapees is large.
http://www.farmedanddangerous.org/salmon-farming-problems/

Closed containment systems have been mentioned as an option, but my understanding is that these are much more expensive than open pen farms, as the fish are raised in pens on land.  What if, however, the money that went to open pen farms was used to develop aquaponics systems for Nova Scotia, to maximize profit off of moving tanks up on land?

Aquaponics is a combination of aquaculture and hydroponics, using plants to filter the fish water.  Thus a crop of vegetables, usually lettuce in current systems, can be harvested along with fish.  Here is a link I found to a commercial operation in Quebec that grows trout and lettuce:
http://www.cultures-aquaponiques.com/index.htm

With respect to the feed the fish get, there is so much potential here to produce 'wild feed' by attempting to cultivate the fish's natural food rather than feeding them GMO soy or corn.  I won't eat GMO soy or corn myself, so why would I eat fish that was raised eating it.  I think there's a good opportunity here to pair aquaponics with vermiculture (the rearing of worms).  The worm castings make an excellent compost for vegetable production and could be sold as such, and the worms could be incorporated into fish feed.

Setting up a worm bin is easy!  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QFCW2X9OZ8

here's a link to a video about a large scale vermicomposting operation, you could have something like this beside an aquaponics set up for fish feed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U27Aizi64Wg  I think the trick would be to make sure the worms are getting organic healthy food and bedding. I think with all the aquaculture happening, and the growing concern over GMO corn and soy and even over fish-based feed that depletes ocean stocks, the person who invents a cost effective worm-based-fish-feed will be on to something big.

According to this article  cold water species like trout and salmon do better on a high protein diet than on plant (corn) based feed.  We have a worm bin in our kitchen for scraps and its excellent, the worms seem happy and are reproducing regularly, and we have this handy source of high quality compost.  I'd love to try scaling up our worm bin in order to have extra worms to feed fish.

Currently Tilapia is a favourite fish for aquaponics, but unfortunately the ratio of Omega 3 and Omega 6 fatty acids in this fish mean it isn't as healthy as people would assume.  According to this article tilapia may actually be more inflammatory than hamburger, pork and doughnuts.  The other issue with raising a warm water fish is how to keep the water temperature sufficiently high.  That's why I think development of aquaponics in NS should focus on our native, cold water species, coupled with some plants that are relatively easy to grow.

I was very inspired by this video, although the fish in the system aren't being grown to eat:

 

We're planning on experiment with our own small scale aquaponics system in the next year or two.  We're going to 'borrow' a few trout from the river, and I'd like to grow these fish some delicious worms to eat. I feel excited about developing our land into a permaculture system.   It seems timely, given the need for safe food.  In googling around about aquaponics I found this article about a very unsustainable aquaculture fishery in Vietnam that has been affected Europe.  It is from 2008, so I'm not sure how widespread this fish currently is

http://www.dietmindspirit.org/2008/01/30/why-you-shouldnt-eat-this-fish-pangas-pangasius-vietnamese-river-cobbler-white-catfish-gray-sole/

Speaking of Safe Food, back to the fracking epidemic, there is now evidence that animals grazed in fracked area may be contaminated:

http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/1784382/livestock_falling_ill_in_fracking_regions_raising_concerns_about_food.html

If I were the premier of Nova Scotia I think instead of giving a bag of money to Cooke Aquaculture, to produce a pile of fish that people are hesitant to eat, I might have instead invested it in NS universities and govt to develop sustainable aquaponics infrastructure for the province.  Imagine. Instead of giving dough for some uncreative, environmentally insensitive jobs which in the end create more profit for a single corporation, to invest money in the creativity and ingenuity of some Nova Scotians with a long term vision of creating sustainable food and employment.   As the rest of the planet fracks up their fresh water thus contaminating their food supply, by rejecting fracking Nova Scotia would be poised to become an exporter of "safe organic food".  In doing so the province could become a haven of healthy, wealthy, sustainable living for all involved.  But that's just my opinion.

In googling about this topic, I found I'm not the first person to wonder if vegetables + worms + fish might be a solution.

Check out Food Abundance International 
and the selection of videos they posted on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/user/FoodAbundance?feature=watch 

Come on, Premier Dexter, in the words of young Iyanla Vanzant, "We can do this":