Ever had one of those months that you hoped would never end? Not only is our community garden work getting exponential support from the neighborhood but my permaculture IQ is in another tax bracket.

After spending time with Dominick Giordano, Charleston Permaculture Guild's co-leader (with Chris Carnevale) and the perennial food forest ninja from Urban PolyCultures, I'm ready to rework our homestead.

Things that make me go Hmm...

• It's possible to improve soil without the back pain of adding compost.
• Planting perennial herbs around fruit trees have the power to drop kick garden pests.
• It doesn't take long to figure out that annual vegetable gardens are the high maintenance step sister of the incredible edible fruit orchard.

Tonight's permie group meeting was our first taste of applying some of the concepts Chris and Dom teach. We'll help develop an ethically designed outdoor eating experience for Butcher & Bee Charleston.

Problem is the food is so good that hubby and I will be regulars as early as tomorrow evening. After biting my fingers polishing off a chorizo, chimichurri and manchego cheese today, we're really looking forward to tomorrow...Can you say Vietnamese Pho?

If you're interested in low maintenance food production, now s the time to check out our Permaculture group.

Long time no blog. We've been blessed with another super busy month of community garden fun, permaculture discoveries, homestead garden work and alas, more dereliction of e-book duties. You can also check out our community garden Facebook page to see what's been up over there. Saturday is the community workday and it's gearing up to be pretty amazing. Come out and lend a hand if you live in North Charleston.

Along with stalking our salsa garden, I made a new cheap city chick discovery. Diluted hydrogen peroxide (3%) - 2 tablespoons per quart of water - does something fierce to plants.  Bill Munro wrote an article about it way back in January 2003. Here's yet another article from the Dirt Doctor website that details the benefits and hazards of using hydrogen peroxide in the garden and around the house.

Just remember that too much of anything is bad for you and your plants. Unless there's some fungal disease outbreak, I'm going stick with soaking my seeds in the solution for a few hours (been soaking them overnight) and otherwise limit use to once every three months or less.

Happy gardening!