Dreaded Sunday Comin Round

Hunting season has opened again 🙁

It’s Sunday and I’m hearing gunshots around. Something in the air is not nice about it. I don’t know why, but I just don’t like it. Am I discriminating against a culture / sub-culture? I guess I am. Of course, I know that views will differ. I ask myself if I should be more accepting of this. Of course, I am, but as well, I am also accepting of the fact that I don’t like it, and since I have the capacity to do so then I figure why not make efforts to deter this kind of behaviour from happening around my farm and my ‘earth neighbourhood‘. I reckon that’s fair.

A previous Portuguese neighbour who was around here, didn’t like it either yet he was able to speak in terms they understood clearly with regards to how he felt about them being around his land 🙂 … I respected him for that. I always do the same also, but try and keep it diplomatic, however I have run into incidences where my dogs clash with their dogs and although the agression is not very nice I do feel comforted to know  that there are guardians around to protect the territory.

My first neighbour also argued that if hunters want to hunt and they do it all through an association then why don’t they as an association invest in their own large piece of land somewhere where they can do it without disturbing others? I thought that was a reasonable argument.

Personally, I have my own plans I’m going to work on in order to deter them in my own creative manner. Not that all of the the following points are designed specifically for deterring hunters, rather a side effect, but since we’re on the topic of hunters …

1. Bring more people here! As more dwellings become active and new ones start dotting around the landscape the less likely that hunters will come around here. I have certain good spots around the land that I’m now opening up to people interested in permanent positions here on an exchange basis (I’m still working on writing that up. Soon come!)
2. Connecting more people to land around me. This is my own particular Earth Neighbour project within the Earth Neighbours initiative. Up until last year this was very challenging due to certain issues with a challenging neighbour, but I’ve overcome this challenge now, and through the process have discovered the owners of most of all the bits of land that are around me. Now it’s just a process of finding people that resonate with what I’m trying to do here and then guide them through the process of them becoming lawful custodians of the land. My first Earth Neighbour is Claus! He’s just spent the last 20 years teaching in Namibia and doing some interesting things. (More news on Claus later). I haven’t posted all the images of the other surrounding bits of land that are around here and the price that the owner might be likely to ask for (most of them really cheap though). I’ve not done that mainly due to the fact that so far I’ve felt that it’s better to just meet people first and then go from there. I think that once the whole area has been reoccupied with new people we could apply through the local camara to prohibit hunting within the bounds of the neighbourhood.
3. I plan to have a perimeter boundary at least 10m wide around the boundary of my land. It will serve primarily as a fire break. May need fencing on both sides until the hedge on both sides is developed. The outer side will be hedged with fire retardant species (going to experiment with Oleander and Tagasaste) and the inner edge will be hedged with the more edible variety for goats and sheep (things like Blackberries, Oaks, Ash, Robinia, Willow). Goats and sheep will have a constant flow around this ‘boundary corridor’ of the farm. I believe that there is some restriction with regards to how close hunters can come to farm animals, so that’s one mark towards the positive, even if you don’t like goats!
4. Along this ‘boundary corridor’ I’d also like to have various different types of natural hives placed carefully in suitable places where they could be comfortable (It would be interesting to see also what effect it might have on the grazing patterns of the animals). I believe also that there is a law that says that hunters must keep within a certain distance from bee hives. Someone told me it’s 50m. Someone else told me it’s 100m. Harald, my beekeeper, passed me this (see Artigo 53.º – Áreas de protecção) which seems to indicate 100m for hives (any updates to that law of 2004 should be posted here on the ICNF site). I would guess then that means that one hive should cover you for 1ha of land. Under current circumstances the hives at my place are in one location and it’s still a good reason to ask them to respect the greater space.
5. I have various signs getting made up, that this time will last a lot longer than the previous ones! Chiselled and wood burnt! The first one was started by Mundo when he was here and kindly finished off by my workaway sistren …

   

6. Also posting various other ‘well made’ signs around the land with some kind of ‘no hunting’ message. I think that this could definitely have some effect with the hunters.
7. This last idea I’m not sure how effective it would be but I like it anyway and it would be fun. I call it Dreaded Sunday! One Sunday a month of LOUD AND POSITIVE VIBES! A Roots Reggae Sunday! A day of SunDance! This is my Ubuntu Sound System below. I’ve been playing around in certain places and trying to use it as a way to raise funds and awareness of the project. I call myself Selecta Mycelium (cos I’m working with the roots ;-). If there is anyone out there that wants to hire me out feel free . I’m available for birthdays, weddings and bar mitzvahs … but I do prefer Wild Man Parties where the intention is less talk and more dance 😉

   

For anyone expecting to see more updates on the blog then I apologise. I don’t really feel like I’m writing so much, even though I’d love to be. I’ve been putting more effort into working on raising funds for the project. For now, I need to be the energy source for my farm project. As of late I’ve been putting most of my energy into helping people connect to land. I need to balance that out with developing the farm systems and the online work related to Quinta das Moitas and Earth Neighbours. There’s never enough time to do everything, nor can I cope at times, but at least I’ve reached a point where I’m knowing my limits and knowing that I can’t do everything! Patience doesn’t seem to matter any more. I just take one day at a time.

Funny that as I end this writing, the gun shots have subsided and I recognise a distinct difference between how it used to be a few years ago and how it is now. Looks like simple diplomacy does have it’s merits.

Peace Everybody. Until next time.