Thick Skull Profile

Course : Farming — Ancient Art Meets Modern World
Taught by: Britta Riley

My preferences for the Thick Skull Profile

Strong Preference

• Scalability: I like to share my ideas with other farmers and grow high quality crops from each others’ learnings and experiences.
• Immediately Implementable: I like to be surrounded by plants so I prefer making something which is immediately implementable than futuristic.
• Grown by Hand: I’m a maker and I enjoy the gratification of successfully growing something with my hands.
• Personal: I prefer growing food for mine and my family’s needs. And I’m not very interested in commercialization as of yet.
• Close contact with crops: I aspire to form a psychological bond with my plants. Hence, I like to be in close contact with them.
• Fruit/Veg/Grain of Primary Interest: I’m a vegetarian by birth. And I don’t like cruelty towards conscious living beings.
• Low Environmental Impact: I’m trying to avoid practices that have hazardous effects on environment.
• Tastes Good: I want my produce to taste really good.

Slight Preference

• Self-Grown: Though I like growing things by myself, sometimes I prefer eating foods growing by specialists in a local form.
• Modular: I lean towards modularity because it helps me plan and be more efficient.
• Observed: Just to be in constant contact with nature, I try to make my crops observed. But sometimes, it is better to seek some help from technology.
• Low Budget/ Unabashed: I consider myself beginner in farming so I try to optimize my costs and keep it low budget.
• Crop Diversity: Though in a limited number, I like growing a variety of crops. But if a specific plant is growing/not-growing very well, I’d definitely focus on that.
• Inputs & Outputs Ok: Like I said before, I like to spend time with nature, so definitely I’d love to respond to the plant’s needs and also stay healthy by eating fresh produce.
• NO GMO: I feel it is sometimes not really good to eat genetically modified food without knowing their implications well.
• Organic Growing Methods: I prefer using organic growing methods than using chemicals/ other techniques just to increase yield.
• For Art / Education / Activism or Pleasure: My interests fit in all the four categories. I see myself creating gardens/ sculptures for pleasure / education.

Either Way

• Engaging: I like growing cacti ( requires less engagement )/ bonsai ( requires more engagement ) equally. So, I should say, I don’t have any special preference to grow only engaging plants.
• Nutrient Density: I think it actually depends on the need, I don’t have any specific focus on nutrient density right now.
• Fair Trade/ Labor Vs Standard Practice: I have little idea about this so I don’t have any preference right now.