Photo Gallery » Quail Springs Permaculture

Heidi putting the final touches on New Cuyama’s

Heidi putting the final touches on New Cuyama’s Family Resource Center Imagination Garden Mural! Saturday was community contribution day: several local folks came out, along with Quail Springs residents + staff and we collectively completed the mural with local plants and animals, along with landscape features. We’re so thankful to @handsomehandsigns for this incredible creation and for collaboration with the FRC and the Cuyama community! 🎨

WATER (Clip from Fall Fundraising Video) Our Cuy

WATER
(Clip from Fall Fundraising Video) Our Cuyama Valley has been recognized as one of the most critically overdrafted groundwater basins in California, and in response, Quail Springs has invested countless hours in local stakeholder engagement. We hold leadership roles in the Standing Advisory Committee to the Groundwater Sustainability Agency and are founding members of the Cuyama Valley Community Association. We advise groundwater policy, participate in public meetings and the formal public comment process, research the local hydrogeologic conditions, engage in activist networks, teach science and water awareness in the local schools, and create opportunities to inform and empower the community. We are dreaming of working with the community to create a multi-generational “stream team” to steward our region’s springs and seeps along with their groundwater dependent ecosystems into the sustainable future. See whole video! Follow link in bio or go to:
www.quailsprings.org/donate

Meet Aris (she, her, ella), our amazing Program Di

Meet Aris (she, her, ella), our amazing Program Director. Aris is a farmer at heart, who is creating and building our online programs. She is also currently collaborating with the Family Resource Center to create the Imagination Garden in New Cuyama. Human and non-human family brings her joy! She especially loves the native milkweed that grows in the Sespe wilderness and the desert toads that come out at night.🌿🌙 We are so grateful to have this special human on our team and in our community. You can look forward to meeting more of our team on Mondays and hearing about what brings us joy!

…when you forget your egg basket. #quailspring

…when you forget your egg basket. #quailspringspermaculture #SustainableLiving #climateresilience #offgrid #permaculture #QuailSprings #permaculturedesign #optoutside #ecoliving #climateresilience #ecofriendly #cuyamavalley

We start our Natural Building course live sessions

We start our Natural Building course live sessions with space for students to share some of the projects they’re working on. Last week we saw some of @beaubaconguis ‘s superadobe builds in The Philippines. The first few slides are from one of her projects. These earthbag roundhouses were built as sleeping quarters for farmers in the Climate Resiliency Field School in Gerona, Tarlac, a project Beau completed with the Rice Watch Action Network.
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Beau has visited us here at Quail Springs a few times in recent years, after meeting our instructors @earthenshelter and @nomadicbuilder at @calearthinstitute . She has worked on many natural building projects here, and joined our online class to get more experience building with cob.
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#quailspringspermaculture #onlineclass #ricewatchactionnetwork #superadobe #earthenhouse #naturalbuilding #earthbag #calearth #permaculture #onlinecourse

This Land-Based Living Course is designed to help

This Land-Based Living Course is designed to help you gather some of the skills needed to deepen your relationship to the land in which you live, and what sustains you from that land. It consists of a series of how to videos that explore small scale food production, how to process that food in the kitchen, how to ferment it for the winter, how to tend the animals that help sustain us, and an array of other skills that grow from a life connected to the land in which we live.
We understand that not everyone who desires living closer to land has the privilege of access to land, and many of these lessons are also applicable to apartment and city dwellers, and can still help deepen a relationship to the place you live.
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Link in bio and story to register or for more information.
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This course opens in December and is totally self paced, so you will have the option of watching the lessons whenever you want.
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In this course you will learn about water, earthworks, soils, gardening, animal systems, how to process various foods in the kitchen, what to do with your 'waste', and a bonus lesson on making sourdough bread. #quailspringspermaculture #SustainableLiving #climateresilience #offgrid #permaculture #QuailSprings #permaculturedesign #ecofriendly #organicfarming #drylandfarming #desertfarming #growyourfood #knowyourfood #goatmilk #topbarbeekeeping #cheesemaking #dairyfermentation #vegetablefermentation #fermentation

SHELTER (clip from Fall Fundraising video) Many

SHELTER
(clip from Fall Fundraising video) Many of us now ask when our homes and land will burn, not if. At Quail Springs, we build homes that are designed to last centuries, not decades. We build homes to withstand fire, to act as firebreaks rather than fuel. If our shelters do burn, we create homes that will not poison our neighbors downwind, and if they erode into the earth, they will not leave a toxic environment for our grandchildren. We continue our efforts to meld ancient building systems with current building codes and modern safety considerations. Earthen test walls we built this past spring are drying in preparation for rating by the American Society for Testing Materials (ASTM E119 fire rating). We are also conducting thermal tests that are currently in the lab. In all of this, we remember that our advocacy for earthen structures originates as much from our ecological need for fire-resistant, low-impact materials as from our societal need for affordable housing. See whole video: www.quailsprings.org/donate, or follow link in bio. We want to take a moment here also to recognize that many of our friends and neighbors are currently suffering through another wildfire season. Our thoughts and prayers are with them, as our conviction to create climate safe housing grows stronger.

This week Heidi @handsomehandsigns is painting a m

This week Heidi @handsomehandsigns is painting a mural at the Family Resource Center in New Cuyama for the Imagination Garden, a project Quail Springs is excited to be creating in collaboration with the FRC. This mural is intended to capture the spirit of the Cuyama Valley and to celebrate the wild, natural beauty of our surrounding high-desert environment. This project is possible through a grant that the FRC received to create a community mural. We’re so glad to have @handsomehandsigns staying with us and applying her talents to working on this beautiful fence-turned-art. Heidi is a full-time artist who grew up in Bakersfield and now resides in Northern California. She travels the country, creating custom artwork for businesses and organizations.
Thank you, Heidi! 🎨🖌

Harvest Feast. 😋 It’s getting cold here, fo

Harvest Feast. 😋 It’s getting cold here, folks! The night time temps have dropped into the 30s, so we’ve harvested the final flavors of summer. We made a scrumptious dinner last night, calling in abundance for the year to come. As we sat for dinner, we asked each other, “What are you harvesting in or from your heart?” Please join us in asking yourself that question. Our answers varied greatly, yet all answers brought us closer in togetherness. Wishing you all a steady, peaceful, abundant transition into autumn.

Now—>Then Today kicks off our Fall Fundraising C

Now—>Then
Today kicks off our Fall Fundraising Campaign:
BUILDING RESILIENCE We hope you’ll join us in raising $200K to support our work with… SHELTER.
WATER.
FOOD.
EDUCATION.
OUTREACH. Click our first link in bio to reach our donation page and view our beautiful new promotional video. Quail Springs relies in part on donations to do work in education, advocacy, and stewardship. But there are many ways to be involved! -Donate: every contribution of any amount makes all the difference
-Check out our website: www.quailsprings.org
-Like and share our IG and FB posts
-Take one of our online courses: Enrolling NOW for Land-Based Living! We appreciate you!

This adobe home near Quail Springs was built over

This adobe home near Quail Springs was built over 100 years ago. We don’t know how many decades have passed since it was abandoned, but we enjoy witnessing its slow return to nature. The majority of its damage occurred when the roof failed and was not maintained, funneling the rain into erosive channels along the walls. As the roof collapsed and stopped catching rain, the erosion slowed, and over the past decade, the only detectable change has been the growth of the Pepper trees.
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When maintained and cared for, earthen homes last for centuries. If we abandon that relationship, their return to the earth is slow and graceful. And yet, as architecture has “developed” in much of the world, we are now building homes with a much shorter lifespan. And when their time is up, the toxic materials used to build them must be added to the landfill. If you have the privilege to choose, please consider building naturally.
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#buildwithearth #naturalbuilding #adobe #firesafehousing #abandonedhouse #sustainablearchitecture #buildbetter

Quail Springs is now offering a Land Based Living

Quail Springs is now offering a Land Based Living Course! 🌱 This online land-based living course invites you to cultivate interconnectedness with what sustains you. A land-based life doesn’t have to be an all or nothing choice, but rather a process of connection that is cultivated over time. You may have a goal of residing on a few acres, or living vibrantly in your apartment complex or in the suburbs. This online course supports the many pathways to more skillful living no matter where you live. 💦
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The teachings in this course are shared by a dozen different instructors, and tied together by our core Quail Springs teaching team.
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This course opens in December, and is totally self paced, so you will have the option of watching the sections whenever you want.
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In this course you will learn about water, earthworks, soils, gardening, animal systems, how to process various foods in the kitchen, what to do with your 'waste', and a bonus lesson on making sourdough bread.
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Learn more on our website, link in bio and story.

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