Jenni Blackmore, Permaculture Author and Micro-Farmer
Name: Jenni Blackmore
Occupation: Writer, Artist, Micro-Farmer
Place of Residence: A tiny island east of Halifax, Nova Scotia
Background and Personal History: As a child, Jenni always wanted to be an artist, a writer or a farmer, depending on the day. She was also determined to live by a quiet ocean beach, which was quite a stretch for a kid growing up in the grimy industrial North of England.
However, today she is living on a small island just east of Halifax Nova Scotia, writing, painting and tending a micro-farm. Dreams really do come true! And she claims to always have been much better at daydreaming than at math, science, or social studies.
Jenni strives to inject a certain dreamlike quality into much of her writing — in her world, improbability does not necessarily equate with the impossible. Children’s fiction, adult short fiction, and poetry are her favourite genres, because they allow her to indulge this obsession with what might lurk just beneath the glaze of everyday — an alternate, more magical reality.
Paradoxically, Jenni’s other passion is grounded in the nitty-gritty everyday of permaculture and micro-farming. Jenni calls her place QuackaDoodle Farm for obvious reasons, even though the goats and rabbits complain they’re not getting fair billing.
Jenni is still (and hopes to always will be) amazed by the beauty and complexity of the natural world. Studying permaculture further heightened her awareness of how perfectly integrated and exquisitely balanced all things are. Her happy place is definitely out there in the mud, preferably with her fuzzy-butt assistant, Juno.
Her favourite permaculture statement is: “There are no problems, only creative solutions”. She thinks this sentiment opens the door to myriad possibilities. And in her previous lives as a starving artist and then as a single mom on a shoestring budget, she became really good at making something out of nothing.
Jenni finds that the economical solution often involves repurposing, and surely there’s enough stuff floating around that it’s seldom necessary to go out and purchase more stuff. Repurposing beats recycling, hands down.
Jenni’s book, Permaculture For the Rest of Usrecently publishedbyNew Society Publishers,has led to all kinds of new ways to spread the word about permaculture. Even though it might seem complex at first glance, permaculture is a simple and beautiful way to integrate with our wonderful planet and she really enjoys explaining just how easy it really is.
Other Fun Facts: Jenni just finished setting up a hotbox in a well used tractor tire that washed up on the beach this winter.If all goes according to plan, it will produce the earliest spring green crop ever. (Read Jenni’s first MOTHER EARTH NEWS posts, Build a Hotbox For Cool-Weather Gardening.)
More Places to Find Jenni on the Web:
