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Findhorn Gardens

Recently I read a book that challenged my thinking. It is "The Findhorn Garden: Pioneering A New Vision of Humanity and Nature in Cooperation" by The Findhorn Community" (Findhorn Press, 1975). I already knew a little about Findhorn, as I had visited a garden that was run on the principles of the Findhorn gardens when working on an organic croft on Mull, in the Hebrides.

A key tenet of the Findhorn Gardens is that there are spirits connected with a higher being that affect how our gardens grow. The founders of the original Findhorn garden knew next to nothing about gardening and started a garden in a trailer park that had horrible soil and a difficult climate. Yet, by listening to the "devas" or angels or spirits, they were able to learn how to grow well and succeed.

Even within their community not everyone was able to communicate with the devas, only a few who, apparently, got very specific advise from them. According to what I saw in the Hebrides and what I read, the Findhorn gardens are most remarkable in the results they get.

Many of the practices described in the book are common sense for organic gardeners. First, the Findhorn gardeners "refrain from using things which destroy life" -even when their crops were threatened. They also recognize that improving the soil improves "life force" and produces better, stronger, more productive plants. They used animal manures, compost and wood ashes to improve the soil, but also believed that the devas worked with them, adding energy to their crops. In their second year of gardening they got 40-pound red cabbages!

Another way of increasing the total positive energy of their gardens, they maintain, is to grow as many different varieties and species of vegetables, flowers and fruits. This also makes sense to me. Early in the season beneficial insects sometimes feed on the nectar of flowers, for example, and then later in the season they eat insects.

Growing the right plant in the right place is important for the Findhorn gardeners. Someone would ask the devas if they should plant tomatoes or lettuce or carrots in a particular part of the garden, and they would plant accordingly.

I pay attention to my plants and my garden, but I have never heard a peep out of a deva or a garden spirit. But I don't discount them. And I know there are many ways to communicate with the spirit world, something I learned while living in rural Africa as a Peace Corps volunteer. I know that my science degree doesn't give me answers to many of life's mysteries.

After reading the book I called Jim Linn of Canaan, NH, an instructor in dowsing techniques, to see if he ever used his dowsing pendulum to make decisions in garden. He said he did, and offered to teach me how to do so.

I also talked to Eliza Bergeson, a kinesiologist practicing in Cornish Flat, as I understood that kinesiology and dowsing both depend on interacting with energy fields. Eliza explained that, "We live in a sea of energy made up of all the information that ever was. If you know how, you can access the information. It's like tuning the knob on a radio to get a specific frequency. The information is there for you to use."

So I made a pendulum, and headed out to Canaan to learn from Jim Linn. He explained that the dowsing instrument interfaces with a higher power. Questions need to be answered with a simple yes or no. For example, "Can I plant corn here and be successful?" or "Do I need to add more compost?" I watched Jim ask questions to a gently swinging pendulum, and then watched it start to change direction on its own, answering the questions. Jim warned me that, "You gotta go with your answers". And, he said, "You don't always get the answers you want."

So I learned to work with a pendulum. Jim explained that it takes practice: the more you have worked with a pendulum, the more pronounced the movement of it becomes. Last summer he successfully dowsed a well two thousand miles away by using his pendulum and a map - a fairly complicated and difficult procedure.

If you would like to learn how to work with a pendulum to connect with the garden spirits or the energy of the natural world and information that flows though living things, you might want to attend the American Society of Dowsers annual convention that happens in Vermont each summer. This year is will be held at the Killington Grand Hotel and Conference Center in Killington, Vermont from August 7-13. For more information go to www.dowers.org.

Surely I will never understand how the energy of living things flows through plants and animals. But I do accept that there is mystery in the garden, and that I should be open to all theories of how that happens. And I hope I will be listening if a deva speaks to me.

Henry Homeyer is the Vermont/NH associate editor of People, Places and Plants magazine. His web site is www.Gardening-Guy.com