I am not usually one for petitions but the whole issue of Live Music and licensing has been bugging me. I believe our freedom to perform music is as intrinsic as our freedom of speech. It is part of our permanent culture; the impulse to create spontaneous, original, live music and share it with an audience. It is in deep contrast to the mediocre stream of canned music that assaults us whenever we go to 'plastic' shops and 'plastic' restaurants. Live music at a grassroots level has been badly eroded by the UK government.
Under the current Licensing Act, a performance by one musician in a bar, restaurant, school or hospital not licensed for live music could lead to a criminal prosecution of those organising the event. Even a piano may count as a licensable 'entertainment facility'. By contrast, amplified big screen broadcast entertainment is exempt. The government says the Act is necessary to control noise nuisance, crime, disorder and public safety, even though other laws already deal with those risks. Musicians warned the Act would harm small events. About 50% of bars and 75% of restaurants have no live music permission. Obtaining permission for the mildest live music remains costly and time-consuming. In May, the Culture, Media and Sport Committee recommended exemptions for venues up to 200 capacity and for unamplified performance by one or two musicians. The government said no. But those exemptions would restore some fairness in the regulation of live music and encourage grassroots venues.
The petition calling on the government to relax licensing laws for live music has attracted more than 1,500 signatures in its first week. The petition opposes the government’s decision to uphold live music licensing for small venues (with a capacity of up to 2000). Use the link below to add your name!
http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/livemusicevents
Maddy Harland
Permaculture Magazine www.permaculture.co.uk
Monday, 21 September 2009
Thursday, 10 September 2009
One Seed at a Time: Saving & Climate Change
Worth watching if you have a passion for biodiversity, rare varieties and seed saving is Cary Fowler's TED talk about the world's seed bank based in Norway. It's entertaining, yet very powerful.
Maddy Harland
Permaculture Magazine www.permaculture-magazine.co.uk
Maddy Harland
Permaculture Magazine www.permaculture-magazine.co.uk
Monday, 7 September 2009
The Age of the Edible
I am munching my way through a rare variety of apple from my forest garden, a Bardsey Island. The story of how I got hold of this unusual tree, which gives us sweet yellow apples tinged with red, is a good one.
For centuries pilgrims (Celts and later Christians), followed the setting sun to visit and often die on the remote island of Bardsey at the end of the Lleyn Peninsula, Wales. Indeed three trips to Bardsey were considered the equivalent of a pilgrimage to Rome.
Ian Sturrock wrote in 'Apple of the Dragon's Eye' in PM43 in 2005, "These days most pilgrims to Bardsey are tourists; popping over for a quick picnic and to take photos of the ruined medieval abbey, the seals and mainly, of course, themselves.
"Our feathered friends also visit the island and thousands of Manx Shearwaters nest there every year. Birds passing up and down the north Wales coast also use it as a handy ‘stop over’. With the birds come the twitchers and Bardsey has the oldest bird observatory in the UK. Of particular interest to the twitchers are the vagrants – birds that are occasionally blown across the Atlantic from northern America. Many are attracted, like moths, to the lighthouse beam. And like moths they spiral to their doom. Lost, starved and exhausted, they eventually head-butt the lighthouse and flutter to the ground to die a small and saintly death. If the bird is not DOA but merely concussed, then the twitchers can add it to their list."
He also told us about how his mate Andy Clarke, a twitcher, found an old, old tree growing up the side of one of the island's houses. Both the fruit and the tree were free from disease. A nibble revealed a delicious crisp apple with a lemony flavour. To cut a long story short, Andy brought back two apples for Ian, a nurseryman based in Bangor, who couldn't identify the tree from his extensive reference library but knew immediately that it was a potentially delicious variety. The National Fruit Collection bods also failed to identify it. The lone tree was unique. Ian was given permission to propagate the tree and thereby preserve it for posterity. He grafted several hundred trees to several different rootstocks and set about making them available to fruit growers all over Britain who would be willing to give him feedback.
On the island, the tree is lashed by gales most of the year, and often loses most of its leaves to salt and wind-burn. Consequently it only produces fruit occasionally. The tree is completely free of the diseases that flourish in the damper conditions of the mainland, particularly scab on the fruit, and canker in the wood. In 2005, nobody knew when the tree flowered and whether or not the blossoms were frost tolerant. (The island is frost free.) Did the tree produce a regular crop? The mother tree crops irregularly because spring’s salt laden gales often kill the blossom. When was the best time to harvest the fruit or how long it can be kept? These and many other questions remained a mystery.
Tim and I were very keen to trial the tree as we grow apples on chalk in the middle of the Hampshire Downs about 12 miles away from the coast. We have 23 varieties of earlies, mids and lates. The chalky soil isn't great for a number of our varieties and we have had canker and scab. Ian sent me a tree and we planted it in the winter of 2005.
It's a vigorous and healthy tree. Even in its first season in 2006 it even blossomed but to establish our precious charge we removed all of the flowers for three years and let the tree put its energy into its roots. This year we let it be. The tree blossomed in May and set its fruit successfully. It showed no signs of frailty in wind and heavy rain and began cropping in mid to late August. I can confirm that tree and fruit are scab resistant, and yes, the apples are really good: crisp, sweet, reasonably large and beautiful colours. The skin goes a little waxy after a week or so in normal temperatures but the apple remains crisp. I don't know how long they store for and I doubt I will find out this year. They are simply too good to save. I must be more scientific next year!
So thanks Andy for realising you had found a jewel and thanks Ian for your skill with grafting and generously letting us plant one of your trees. We love it. Its top of my list of apples. Now I want to go to Bardsey Island itself and meet its Mother!
And the moral of this story is that we are only just touching the tip of the iceberg of vegetables, fruits and nuts that can be grown on these islands. Think how many more undiscovered cool temperate edibles there are waiting to be discovered and planted. Let's herald in the Age of the Edible and celebrate the possibility of new discoveries.
Maddy Harland
Permaculture Magazine www.permaculture-magazine.co.uk
For centuries pilgrims (Celts and later Christians), followed the setting sun to visit and often die on the remote island of Bardsey at the end of the Lleyn Peninsula, Wales. Indeed three trips to Bardsey were considered the equivalent of a pilgrimage to Rome.
Ian Sturrock wrote in 'Apple of the Dragon's Eye' in PM43 in 2005, "These days most pilgrims to Bardsey are tourists; popping over for a quick picnic and to take photos of the ruined medieval abbey, the seals and mainly, of course, themselves.
"Our feathered friends also visit the island and thousands of Manx Shearwaters nest there every year. Birds passing up and down the north Wales coast also use it as a handy ‘stop over’. With the birds come the twitchers and Bardsey has the oldest bird observatory in the UK. Of particular interest to the twitchers are the vagrants – birds that are occasionally blown across the Atlantic from northern America. Many are attracted, like moths, to the lighthouse beam. And like moths they spiral to their doom. Lost, starved and exhausted, they eventually head-butt the lighthouse and flutter to the ground to die a small and saintly death. If the bird is not DOA but merely concussed, then the twitchers can add it to their list."
He also told us about how his mate Andy Clarke, a twitcher, found an old, old tree growing up the side of one of the island's houses. Both the fruit and the tree were free from disease. A nibble revealed a delicious crisp apple with a lemony flavour. To cut a long story short, Andy brought back two apples for Ian, a nurseryman based in Bangor, who couldn't identify the tree from his extensive reference library but knew immediately that it was a potentially delicious variety. The National Fruit Collection bods also failed to identify it. The lone tree was unique. Ian was given permission to propagate the tree and thereby preserve it for posterity. He grafted several hundred trees to several different rootstocks and set about making them available to fruit growers all over Britain who would be willing to give him feedback.
On the island, the tree is lashed by gales most of the year, and often loses most of its leaves to salt and wind-burn. Consequently it only produces fruit occasionally. The tree is completely free of the diseases that flourish in the damper conditions of the mainland, particularly scab on the fruit, and canker in the wood. In 2005, nobody knew when the tree flowered and whether or not the blossoms were frost tolerant. (The island is frost free.) Did the tree produce a regular crop? The mother tree crops irregularly because spring’s salt laden gales often kill the blossom. When was the best time to harvest the fruit or how long it can be kept? These and many other questions remained a mystery.
Tim and I were very keen to trial the tree as we grow apples on chalk in the middle of the Hampshire Downs about 12 miles away from the coast. We have 23 varieties of earlies, mids and lates. The chalky soil isn't great for a number of our varieties and we have had canker and scab. Ian sent me a tree and we planted it in the winter of 2005.
It's a vigorous and healthy tree. Even in its first season in 2006 it even blossomed but to establish our precious charge we removed all of the flowers for three years and let the tree put its energy into its roots. This year we let it be. The tree blossomed in May and set its fruit successfully. It showed no signs of frailty in wind and heavy rain and began cropping in mid to late August. I can confirm that tree and fruit are scab resistant, and yes, the apples are really good: crisp, sweet, reasonably large and beautiful colours. The skin goes a little waxy after a week or so in normal temperatures but the apple remains crisp. I don't know how long they store for and I doubt I will find out this year. They are simply too good to save. I must be more scientific next year!
So thanks Andy for realising you had found a jewel and thanks Ian for your skill with grafting and generously letting us plant one of your trees. We love it. Its top of my list of apples. Now I want to go to Bardsey Island itself and meet its Mother!
And the moral of this story is that we are only just touching the tip of the iceberg of vegetables, fruits and nuts that can be grown on these islands. Think how many more undiscovered cool temperate edibles there are waiting to be discovered and planted. Let's herald in the Age of the Edible and celebrate the possibility of new discoveries.
Maddy Harland
Permaculture Magazine www.permaculture-magazine.co.uk
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