<div class="page plain article green CUST_font_112 pid_126146 page-126146"> <div class="background"> </div> <article> <header> <div class="container"> <h1> Obtain a Yield </h1> <div class="summary"> <p isrender="true"><strong>You gotta eat to live.</strong></p> </div> <p class="byline">Deb Hart-Serafini</p> </div><!--container--> </header> <section> <div class="container"> <img src="/uploads/5759aa193c3c8.jpg" class="main_image"> <p>"You can't work on an empty stomach"</p><p>Permaculture is not a hobby or merely a technique. It is a design intended to promote resilience and self-sufficiency. The more food we can produce, the less we rely on commercial sources that may be damaging to our environment. It is also an economic choice- many of us feel that we should eat organic when possible, but find it too expensive. Growing more of our own food empowers us to be more self-reliant and use less of our financial resources on food that supports our health and that of the earth.</p><p isrender="true">An important concept in permaculture is the stacking function. What does this mean? When we design, we do what ecosystems do; we try to design with complexity. So when we plant something, we look for multiple benefits- shade, food, mulch, dynamic accumulation, and weed suppression, to name a few. </p><p isrender="true">Mushroom cultivation is a way to obtain a yield that is well-suited to WNC with our resources of wood and rain. Mushrooms serve many purposes other than food; for example, their mycelium improve the productivity of the soil dramatically. </p><p>Here is a link to a educational video from Living Web Farms, located in Mills River, NC.</p><p isrender="true"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgEij2dx3f0&list=PLCeA6DzL9P4sC9FZa_iTkOGWkMhmxxS3K">Living Web Farms-Mushroom Cultivation</a><br></p><p isrender="true"><br></p> </div><!--container--> </section> </article> </div><!-- page-->