Miraculous Abundance: One Quarter Acre, Two French Farmers, and Enough Food to Feed the World

261 Pages·2016·10.4 MB·English

by  Perrine Hervé-Gruyer

PRAISE FOR MIRACULOUS ABUNDANCE
“Miraculous Abundance offers one of the most readable, visceral blueprints for
earth-healing abundance I’ve ever seen. Absolutely captivating. Only true-blue
practitioners, hands in the soil, can offer the kind of eclectic synthesis—
combining the best of all the earth-healing traditions and technologies—
discovered on this permaculture microfarm. A fantastic book with iconic
potential. I couldn’t put it down.”
– , owner, Polyface Farm; author of Fields of Farmers
JOEL SALATIN
“Miraculous Abundance is a true marvel! Like Perrine and Charles Hervé-
Gruyer’s amazing farm, their book blends science and anthropology, but it also
mixes memoir and travelogue to create a beautiful whole that will inspire the
next generation of farmers.”
– , author of Farm City; coauthor of The Essential Urban
NOVELLA CARPENTER
Farmer
“Miraculous Abundance is a dynamic combination of permaculture,
biointensive, four season, natural farming, and Amazonian farming approaches
with exciting practical goals to pattern after. The book is about healing ourselves
and the Earth in a post-carbon era. Worth reading for inner growth and outer
growing of food, compost materials, income, and soil!”
– , author; biologically intensive farming specialist
JOHN JEAVONS
“Miraculous Abundance tells the story of a pioneering permaculture market
garden in France. Small, highly diverse, highly productive microfarms are a
critical part of climate-change mitigation; their ‘agroecological intensification’
means we can grow more on less land and reduce deforestation at the same time.
Perrine and Charles Hervé-Gruyer’s book covers more than the logistics of their
operation—it delves into their philosophy and historical roots in French market
garden history. A powerful case study of an intensive, commercial permaculture
production system.”
– , author of The Carbon Farming Solution and Paradise Lot
ERIC TOENSMEIER
“In this lovely, hopeful book, an unlikely couple creates an astonishingly
productive edible landscape in Normandy, weaving together the insights,
materials, and techniques of dozens of acknowledged predecessors. Miraculous
Abundance is a modestly written song of defiance, a demonstration that the
world can readily feed its projected 9 billion with an agriculture that restores the
biosphere.”
– , author of Growing, Older and This Organic Life
JOAN GUSSOW
“‘Dare to imagine the new,’ Perrine and Charles Hervé-Gruyer tell us. ‘Take the
best of the many traditions of humanity, and the best of modernity, to shape a
world that has never existed.’ These authors synthesize the best from multiple
indigenous cultures with successful patterns of modern small-scale farming to
create a soaring example and vision of a future—one in which human beings are
an essential and positive force helping to preserve the biosphere, and even a
quarter acre can be a full-fledged and productive farm yielding amazing
agricultural bounty.”
– , author of The Tao of Vegetable Gardening and The Resilient
CAROL DEPPE
Gardener
“Miraculous Abundance is absolutely the right book for right now. I don’t know
when I have been more encouraged about the future. . . . They are combining
biointensive farming and permaculture to make a viable, diversified microfarm
on test plots that are little more than two acres with the possibility of reducing
that size down to as small as one fourth acre. . . . They use hardly any fossil-fuel
energy at all, calling what they do the ‘agriculture of the sun.’ Along the way
they provide solid evidence from sources all over the world to back up the
conclusions they are drawing from their work, including achieving more
healthful food, food security for the coming population increases, more jobs,
effective sequestration of CO , and indeed a whole new world order that would
2
insure better social stability out of the chaos we presently face.”
– , author of A Sanctuary of Trees and The Contrary Farmer
GENE LOGSDON
“Can farming a tiny quarter-acre piece of land be sustainable, economic, and
fulfilling? In Miraculous Abundance, Perrine and Charles Hervé-Gruyer tackle
that very questions and answer it positively in the affirmative. This fascinating
book describes the evolution of their farm from its beginnings in 2004, when the
authors knew little, over the next ten years as they discovered biointensive
agriculture, permaculture, forest gardens, and more. The authors are passionate
about small, human-scale farming and the role it can play in the future, and they
envisage a future with numerous small farms, enabling many more people to live
on the land and lessening the effects of climate change. Their farm in France
now attracts farmers, chefs, and scientists and also hosts a school to teach how a
diverse edible landscape can be created to both earn a living and make a
beautiful space and a fulfilling life.”
– , author of Trees for Gardens, Orchards and Permaculture
MARTIN CRAWFORD
“This book will be a source of inspiration and guidance for those striving toward
an agriculture that is not merely sustainable but also regenerative and rewarding.
Charles and Perrine are trailblazers, courageous visionaries who have drawn
inspiration from sources as varied as 19th century Parisian market gardeners and
Amazonian tribes people. As their method is a fusion, so too is the book;
practical, historical, and philosophical in tone, it shows us how practicing
agriculture as part of the ecosystem is not only economically viable but also
spiritually fulfilling. We need people like the Hervé-Gruyers to show us what is
possible in reality rather than just theory, and in sharing their journey, they tell
an important story for the future of humankind.”
– , permaculture teacher and consultant at Patrick Whitefield
CAROLINE AITKEN
Associates; coauthor of Food from Your Forest Garden
“At their farm in Normandy, France, Perrine and Charles Hervé-Gruyer have
created an inspiring example of how it is possible to intensively farm a small
plot of land and produce an abundance of food while at the same time enriching
the fertility of the soil and the health of the people, plants, and animals that live
there.”
– , author of One-Straw Revolutionary; editor of Masanobu Fukuoka’s
LARRY KORN
The One-Straw Revolution and Sowing Seeds in the Desert

Copyright © 2014 by Actes Sud.
Originally published in French as Permaculture. Guérir la terre, nourrir les homes, by Actes Sud.
Unless otherwise noted, all photographs and illustrations copyright © 2016 by Perrine and Charles Hervé-
Gruyer.
English translation copyright © 2016 by Chelsea Green Publishing.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form by any means without permission in
writing from the publisher.
Editor: Joni Praded
Project Manager: Angela Boyle
Copy Editor: Laura Jorstad
Proofreader: Helen Walden
Indexer: Lee Lawton
Designer: Melissa Jacobson
Printed in the United States of America.
First printing March, 2016.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 16 17 18 19 20
Our Commitment to Green Publishing
Chelsea Green sees publishing as a tool for cultural change and ecological stewardship. We strive to align
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Abundance was printed on paper supplied by Thomson-Shore that contains 100% postconsumer recycled
fiber.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Hervé-Gruyer, Perrine, author. | Hervé-Gruyer, Charles, author.
Title: Miraculous abundance : one quarter acre, two French farmers, and enough food to feed the world /
Perrine and Charles Hervé-Gruyer ; translated by John F. Reynolds.
Other titles: One quarter acre, two French farmers, and enough food to feed the world
Description: White River Junction, Vermont : Chelsea Green Publishing, [2016] | Includes bibliographical
references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015045172| ISBN 9781603586429 (pbk.) | ISBN 9781603586436 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Permaculture. | Organic farming.
Classification: LCC S494.5.P47 H47 2016 | DDC 631.5/8--dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015045172
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For our children, Lila, Rose, Shanti, and Fénoua, and for all the children
of the world
For Eliot Coleman, Philippe Desbrosses, François Léger, and François
Lemarchand
You think you can stamp on that caterpillar?
All right, you’ve done it. It wasn’t difficult.
And now, make the caterpillar again.
—Lanza del Vasto1
CONTENTS
Praise for Miraculous Abundance
Foreword
Introduction
1. Pupoli’s Canoe
2. Around the World
3. From Dream to Reality
4. The Amazon
5. We Are What We Eat
6. Draw Me a Farm
7. New Farmers
8. Discovering Permaculture
9. Biointensive Microagriculture
10. Eliot Coleman
11. The Parisian Market Gardeners of the Nineteenth Century
12. Exotic Influence
13. Genesis of a Method
14. Launch of a Research Program
15. The Forest Garden
16. Agriculture of the Sun
17. Working by Hand
18. To Be Small
19. Microfarms
20. Microagriculture, Society, Planet
21. The Earth Is an Adventure
22. Bio-Abundance
Afterword