TOURS   EVENTS   ADVICE   PRODUCE

We have paused our courses after 6 years of delivery. However we are promoting the excellent Agroforestry Book which we have printed copies of for $10 (plus postage), also available for people doing the tours.

Jim Hodgetts has farmed on the Sunshine Coast for over 30 years, and delivered fresh organic veggies to many locals. He and his partner Julia Peddie have a small demonstration Syntropic farm in Woombye, on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland. 

Jim travelled to Brazil in 2014 where he explored the agroforestry revolution. He is passionate about teaching young people and helping landholders adopt this methodology for growing food, to help food security for future generations.

Garden Tours are available by appointment for $50 per head - 2 hours walk and talk plus refreshments. Group bookings encouraged. 
Future Tour Dates soon to be published.

We are currently offering a Patch to Plate service and will provide a delicious organic lunch following the tour for $15 per head. 

Benefits of Syntropics

High yields – improved soil, increases the abundance of life and the transfer of nutrients, producing healthy and productive plants

Water retention – a dense mycelium network increases water efficiency, and buried log lines act like an underground sponge. Dense and diverse planting maintains cool conditions and decreases evaporation.

Pest control – Improved soil, dense and diverse planting and the inclusion of trees, encourages more predator bugs and birds to balance the ecosystem, unlike monocropped planting and conventional farming which enables a single species of pest to overpopulate.

Syntropics is Permaculture 
The term Syntropics was coined by Swiss farmer and researcher Ernst Gotsch in Brazil (www.agendagotsch.com) to describe a carbon intensive form of agriculture practiced by the indigenous people of the Amazon. Also referred to as dynamic agroforestry due to its focus on incorporating trees as an essential part of the ecosystem, Syntropics is a design principle that seeks to integrate humans and their food cycle into a natural system. We can therefore say Syntropics is Permaculture. 

There’s no such thing as Poor Soil
In Syntropic Farming we re-create the forest, assisting Mother Nature to do her job. As organising beings, we help speed up the process of building soil. By systematically and intensively accumulating carbon, planting treelines and not compacting the soil, we encourage fungi to build a complex mycelium network. Fungi allow more life to flourish by decomposing organic matter and recycling essential nutrients back to the plants.

Syntropics is regenerative, restoring the balance to the ecosystem by building black soil rapidly. What a natural forest creates in 100 years, an established Syntropic system can do in one year. A system of abundance naturally takes hold, as life creates more life. 
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Syntropic Courses
Jim and Julia run hands-on short courses, tours, talks and offer free family & community farm days. 

Their Syntropic Farming Level 1 course is an introduction One Day Intensive and includes Compost, Soil, Worms, Seeds, Seedlings, Building a Syntropic system, Chainsaw and Tree management, Planning & Mapping for Succession & Strata Planting.
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Jim and Julia are passionate about engaging children of all ages in the food growing process and encourage parents to involve them at every stage. Our future food security depends on them.