Permaculture
A Tribute to Masanobu Fukuoka
Consider this post a sort of bonus and tribute to the late Masanobu Fukuoka (February 2, 1913 – August 16, 2008). Fukuoka-sensei came from a well-to-do family and was educated as an agricultural microbiologist. He worked initially as research scientist in plant pathology. In his mid-20s, he was hospitalized with pneumonia; and, like St. Francis of Assisi hundreds of years earlier, Fukuoka-sensei had a profound inner experience that led him to cultivate simplicity over sophistication. He came to question modern agricultural methods, quit his job, and returned to the family farm on the island of Shikoku. It is never possible to get completely inside the mind of another person, but it might be fair to say that he became an deep observer of Nature, and this caused him to distance himself more and more from human interventions.
When I first came across the work of Fukuoka-sensei, I was immediately enchanted. He felt a little eccentric to me, like a Zen master who teaches by awakening people. They come to trust themselves and to realize what “is” instead of parroting what they have studied. When a student has this experience, the student becomes more confident of his or her own ability to observe and interpret experience. I embraced Fukuoka-sensei’s ideas and discussed them on landscapingrevolution.com. There had been baby steps before the advent of Fukuoka-sensei, but there had not been a quantum leap. It’s been roughly 20 years now since I began both implementing his ideas and observing what happens when Nature is allowed to be itself. The timing was good for me. I had not been in the Pacific Northwest for very long, and this was my third major gardening endeavor once fledging from family influences. Each of my three adventures took place in radically different environments: the Big Island of Hawaii, the high desert of Santa Fe, New Mexico, and the sea level and endless rain of this part of the world. One of my first observations was that the intensity of the colors of flowers is much deeper here, but one truly has to understand the terrain and climate to create a garden paradise.
Enjoy the videos! The first one is an interview with the grandson!
There are many videos of Masanobu Fukuoka’s work. He traveled around the world, to places like India, Greece, and lands where there was severe desertification. One of my favorite videos is an hour, but worth the time. YouTube prevents it from being posted, but the link works.
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