Johanna Paungger & Thomas Poppe
My Moonstruck Garden
The Ancient and Timeless Art of Gardening
and Plant Care in Harmony with Natural
and Lunar Rhythms
A Wisdom Keeper Publication
My Moonstruck Garden
1st English language edition
© 2022 Johanna Paungger &
Thomas Poppe
Wisdom Keeper Books
First published in the German language under the title
“Der lebendige Garten”
© Wilhelm Goldmann Publishers, Munich,
Penguin Random House GmbH
Cover design: Thomas Poppe
Cover illustration: Reinhild Hofmann, Munich
Illustrations: Reinhild Hofmann, Munich,
except p.12: Martina Poppe
Translation & Editing: Martina Poppe
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 9798403990448
So far as may be legally effectively be provided no liability of any kind or nature whatsoever, whether in negligence, under statute, or otherwise, is accepted by the authors, publishers, webmasters or the web hosts for the accuracy or safety of any of the information or advice contained in, or in any way relating to any part of the content, of this book.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission from the publisher, except by reviewers who may quote brief excerpts in connection with a review in a newspaper, magazine, or electronic publication; nor may any part of this book be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or other, without written permission from the publisher.
Further English language books by
Johanna Paungger & Thomas Poppe:
Moon Time (Penguin Random House, UK)
The Code (Beyond Words Publishing, USA)
The Power of Timing (Amazon KDP)
My Moonstruck Garden
This book is dedicated to all people of good will. To all people who respect nature, water, the earth, every living thing. We all belong together.
Johanna’s grandfather, Josef Koller (1879 – 1968) His love for the earth and all things living made this book possible. He was the best and most patient of teachers, always teaching by his own example
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CONTENTS
Preface to the English language edition 13
On Our Behalf – by Johanna Paungger 14
On Our Behalf – by Thomas Poppe 17
A “Slug-Gish” Preface 20
Part I
Ten Keys to a Living Garden 27
1. The Small Decision for the Good 27
What, then, are “small decisions for the good”? 28
2. Choosing the Right Time 33
A Small Piece of Paper 33
In the Beginning, there was Experience 37
The Seven Moons 45
It’s Time for In-Formation 54
A Lunar Calendar - The Most Important Gardening Tool 57
3. The Tools for the Living Garden 65
Wood and its Communicating Power 65
A Short Lesson About Metal 69
Your Gardening Team 74
Harmony in Movement - Work Without Effort 84
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4. The Garden - A Friendly Welcome to your Home 91
Step by Step 92
Places in the Sun - Places in the Shade 94
Where does your water come from? 99
Where to Store Tools and Planters, Soil and Wood? 101
Living Stones in a Living Garden 102
Stairway to Heaven 105
Fences 107
Living Walls 108
Field Walls 112
The Garden Pond 113
A Garden for Kids 115
5. Choosing Your Garden Family 119
The Good Stuff Grows Close By 120
Alpha and Omega - Nutritional Types and
your Plant Family 124
Herbs – Nature’s Power Plants 131
Of Flowers and Hedges 148
6. Sowing, Setting, and Planting – Timeless Rules 153
Baby Steps 153
From the Very Beginning – The Moon 163
Healthy Community - Healthy Succession 172
“What do you want from me?”, said the Dandelion 176
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7. Nutrition for your Plant Family 183
Compost -The Living Garden’s Engine 187
The Art of Fertilizing 193
The Reason for Mulching 201
Watering and Irrigation - The Correct Use of Water 203
8. Care in Times of Growth – Natural Protection 210
Maintaining the Planting Bed 210
To Prune or not to Prune? 212
Hedge Maintenance 214
The “Secret” of Fruit Tree Pruning 215
The Right Time to Graft 219
Repotting Balcony and Potted Plants 220
From Competition to Cooperation - Understanding 224
Pests and Weeds
The Secrets of Pest and Weed Control 226
From Weed Control to the Right Timing 235
Plant protection via animal welfare 238
9. A Joyful Reward - Proper Harvesting and Storage 247
Harvesting 248
The Wisdom of Ancient Plants 253
10. What Is Beauty? 255
Your Very Own Feeling 256
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Part II
A Colorful Garden Basket 265
Leafy Greens and Vegetables 273
Leafy Greens 273 - Kohlrabi 275 - Beans 277 - Tomatoes 281
Lentils 287 - Cauliflower 288 - Celery 289 - Onions 291
Beet 293 - Rhubarb 295 - Carrots 296 - Potatoes 298
Peas 301 - White cabbage 302 - Cucumbers 304 - Spinach 306
Fruit 307
Plums and prunes 309 - Apricots 310 - Cherries 312
Apples 314 - Pears 316 - Raspberries 318 - Strawberries 319
Blackberries 321 - Currants 323 - Gooseberries 325
Flowers and Ornamental Plants 327
Asters 328 - Clematis 329 – Dahlias 330 - Foxgloves 331
Hydrangeas 331 - Cornflowers 332 - Impatiens 332
Geraniums 333 - Daisies 334 - Petunias 334 - Calendula 335
Larkspur 335 - Roses 336 - Sunflowers 337 - Coneflowers 338
Marigold 338 - Tulips 339
Part III
The Signs of the Zodiac 341
Aries 341 - Taurus 342 - Gemini 343
Cancer 344 - Leo 346 – Virgo 347
Libra 348 - Scorpio 349 – Sagittarius 350
Capricorn 352 - Aquarius 353 - Pisces 354
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An Epilogue – Not Just for Gardeners 356
Appendix: The Paungger-Poppe Workshop 358
Download the Current Lunar Calendar! 362
Index 363
About the Authors 367
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Preface to the English language edition
For thousands of years the knowledge of the influence of lunar rhythms has been an established tool that is available to all who are willing to accept it. Countless people in numerous occupations had used that knowledge until a little while ago as an indispensable element in their work—from physicians to farmers, carpenters to architects, hairdressers to foresters.
After falling into disuse for a few decades many people all over the world today have once again remembered this immensely valuable inheritance from our forefathers. We are very happy that we are now able to pass on this knowledge also on to our English language readers worldwide. Countless gardeners, farmers, and indefatigable “patio farmers” in the cities have gathered firsthand experience of the great value of living in harmony with the lunar rhythms. They have seen that it is possible to forget pesticides and fertilizers and stop wasting valuable drinking water and still harvest the same or a greater yield at a much higher quality of their crops and herbs. That’s what true life-containing food is made of!
Physicians and dentists have seen from our book “Moon Time” 1how working in accordance with the position of the moon proved to be a
1 “Moon Time” by Johanna Paungger & Thomas Poppe (Penguin Random House UK)
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blessing for their patients and have used this knowledge to explain a great many strange phenomena surrounding therapy and healing processes.
There isn’t a single gardener, farmer, forester or carpenter in our home countries of Germany and Austria who hasn’t heard of this knowledge and put it to good use again. Millions today know firsthand what a great little helper the knowledge of the lunar cycles can be, and at no cost—except for a little investment in patience!
Our books were and still are ushering in a minor revolution. May the knowledge contained in this book bring you just as much usefulness and satisfaction as it has brought to us and many others.
Johanna Paungger-Poppe
Thomas Poppe
On Our Behalf – By Johanna Paungger-Poppe
With this book, I would like to give you a gift, the same gift that our garden and the fruit trees on our farm gave me in my childhood. The garden had never experienced artificial fertilizers or pesticides, was never watered. We sowed and planted a variety of vegetables and herbs at the proper time, we rejoiced in the growth, in butterflies, the bees and birds, and we harvested the abundance at the right time as well - without much effort, and with much gratitude. And we were never sad about any shortage, any vegetable, any berry which could not give
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us as rich of a harvest in a certain year, because the reason was familiar to us. Nature moves in waves, just as we develop in waves - with mountains and valleys, with highs and lows.
At harvest time, the apple trees glowed red or yellow, the plum trees were blue, our apricot trees were orange, the pear trees were yellow. Everything shone and was so full and heavily laden with fruit that you could hardly make out the green leaves.
The fruit came year after year, sometimes fewer on one tree, but more on another, without chemical fertilizer and without any pruning. If the branches bent to the ground under their weight, nothing had to be done. If they hung heavily in the air, then we might have supported them sometimes. The supports were stored in the shed in all sizes. Despite huge amounts of snow in winter, no one worried about branches breaking, because branches of trees that were not fertilized or pruned did not break.
The trees and their fruits were there for us, and our harvest festivals were not just hollow customs. These trees kept a feeling alive that has not left me to this day: That the bounty of nature and its wisdom is limitless. And that even the severity and ruthlessness that seem to emanate from it have a deep meaning, one that is not difficult to fathom when we dare to observe and feel.
When I started going to school, the picture looked a little different. My family had apparently been missing out on the newest “advancements.” There were close neighbors who had begun cultivating according to new methods, who used artificial fertilizers and pesticides, and who also harvested the bigger apples. But instead, they were watery and had no taste whatsoever. We were made to
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think that progress would even be stalled if we did not use artificial fertilizers, pesticides, and machinery. But every child wants to do better than their parents, wants to prove to them that it is good and that it will amount to something in life. I also had this desire, and that is why I sometimes felt caught between a rock and a hard place.
In school, we were told: “Of course, there are still some isolated, primitive farmers who reject all of this and maybe even live by the lunar calendar. Then they go around telling people that artificial fertilizers and pesticides are poison, but that’s just to disguise the fact that they don't want to spend money on progress.” This move was especially unfair because on the one hand, obtaining these chemicals and machines was supported by the state by up to half of the purchase value, and on the other, there were truly good reasons to defy this “progress.”
Nearly everyone stuck together: teachers, mayor, farmer’s warehouse, bank, local government. A “work alliance.” Namely, for the work of chemists and doctors who would soon make a handsome profit with all the missing-nutrients-related diseases that we farmers helped prepare.
Then came my move to the big city, to Munich. Of course, back then, as a young girl on my way to the metropolis, I also got a little annoyed at my “stubborn” parents when they went on about “unhealthy cola and canned food.” A can of ravioli is quickly prepared, the labels says it has “everything you need”, it tastes good. After all, it’ll take a while for you to feel the damage it does. But then you are already addicted, running after the addictive substances contained in certain canned and ready-made food.
So many of my peers were seduced by the promises of convenience and advertising slogans. My good fortune was my great curiosity and the memory of my grandfather, who had always calmly shown me the interrelatedness of all aspects of nature. Of course, at
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first, I believed the nice words in the big city bustle, the progress slogans, I gulped down the sweet disguises around the bitter ulterior motives. Only gradually did I gain the strength to follow my own path and become immune to the seductive arts of industry and science - the strength to form a clear opinion about the difference between true progress and illusionary advancement. The sense of following the right path finally became more important to me than the pain of being an outsider.
With this book, I would like to encourage you to follow this path a well, and to grow and harvest as much food as possible in your garden, to take care of as many potted herbs and planters as possible. That would be the medicine we all need! The gift that all these plants and trees, fruits and berries from my childhood offer to me and to you lies in the promise that all this abundance will always be there for us, without us having to do nearly anything. Tending to a moonstruck, living garden is one of the easiest things in the world.
One joyful day, we will all realize that the true pharmacies are our organic markets, that the true environmentalists are our organic farmers. Join us on the journey to that joyful day.
On Our Behalf - By Thomas Poppe
“I write the way she thinks and feels, and she speaks the way I think and feel” - this was the answer I recently gave to a journalist's question about what the secret was to our success and the great cooperation between me and my wife. It was a very spontaneous answer, and only sometime later did it occur to me that in it also lay an answer to the question of why I had hesitated for so long to write a book about gardening with Johanna. Unlike the city dweller that I am, the mountain farmer's daughter simply has such a tremendous
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amount of experience in the field of gardening and agriculture that it almost felt pretentious to agree so easily to a Paungger-Poppe book on the subject. And in neither my past nor my future do I see myself as a mere ghostwriter.
During my regular visits to bookstores, I was always overwhelmed by the range of products in the gardening section. I can't believe how many books there are on the subject, how colorful, complex, thick and heavy, how “scientifically grounded” and wide-ranging the offer is. For every single aspect of gardening, from composting to earthworm farming, for everything there is at least one book on the unique subject, usually as many as ten to a hundred. So why write another one?
The rhubarb was to blame.
It came in the mail, leaving us with no clue of what was in the parcel. A little plant, wrapped in damp paper, sent to us - almost as if an accompanying letter had said, “This is his last chance.” We soon planted it in a somewhat neglected corner of the vegetable garden - watered it, gave it a few good wishes, and done. No compost, no fertilizer, nothing. A few positive thoughts, that was it.
Years have passed since then. During this time, we’ve stuck to the good thoughts. No garden hose, no fertilizer, no compost, no manure in the fall, nothing. But what a sight! Every year, the rhubarb grew and thrived as if there were prizes to be won. With its gigantic leaves, it now occupies an area of four square meters and provides us with abundant gifts every single year – compotes, jams, pies, whatever we want. Healthy and rich in vitamins – without us lifting a single finger to care for or nurture it. Nothing but our good thoughts – that must be it, then.
Then, recently, I was leafing through a thick standard reference on the subject of “gardening” in a bookstore and stumbled across the
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keyword “rhubarb.” And what did it say? A whole four pages on the subject of “rhubarb and its care!” A chapter resembling a scholarly essay. After reading, I was convinced that one must have studied chemistry and physics and horticulture and geology just to dare successfully plant a rhubarb. Impressive, competent, and detailed. In other words: what a disaster!
Through the lens of an amateur, I then began to browse through other gardening books and my horror grew. I got the impression that the publishers and authors spent not a single thought on whether their works are even suitable for everyday use. In other words, if beginners read this book, they will be discouraged. If the expert reads them, they learn nothing new, or they learn something so exotic that it becomes impractical or insanely expensive. Many beautiful pictures – hardly any practical value.
In the end, nearly all these books just seemed like operating instructions for running a turbo garden - a highly complicated machine created by human hands that will stand still and decay without the intervention of experts. Provided, however, that we invest enough time, effort, money, and manpower, that we approach this machine with the help of a special knowledge – only then can the result of our efforts be “seen.” Only then is the effort worthwhile and the yield acceptable.
To be seen by whom? And for what? I found these books to be a great burden for the gardening novice. Over time, I started to understand what Johanna had meant when she insisted our book be written in a simple language. After all, throughout all my years with Johanna, I got some practice in the garden and never felt as though there was anything complicated about it.
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Throughout my entire life since my childhood, I knew with certainty in my heart that nature is perfect, and that we merely have to see this perfection - instead of blindly grasping only one small aspect at a time, shaping it according to our limited ideas of “aesthetics” and “yield,” and sterilizing it in the process.
Our decision was obvious: We wanted to show people that things can be different. And our wish - to fulfill this decision with the help of this book - has now become reality. You may not learn how to grow roses, how to plant ornamental beds, or how to fertilize begonias or water tomatoes. Instead, you will learn how to sow, plant, and harvest at the right time, how to leave nature in peace so that it can do what it was created for - namely, to be there for us in the most wonderful and diverse of ways, so that we may find our way, strengthened in both body and soul.
And now you know who you have to thank for this book: A small rhubarb plant that has developed into a splendid specimen, despite all the science and all the seeming unsuitability of its environment. Plopped into the soil at the right time, watered, a few good thoughts – that’s it. For six years, rich growth in the leanest, loamiest soil, soil that gets as hard as concrete in a drought. We thank this little plant for the inspiration for this book. May it become useful to you and a faithful companion on your way to a brighter future for all of us.
A ”Slug-Gish” Preface
With this book, we give you the ultimate tools to get rid of that plague of slugs and snails in your garden. There are only two small things you need to achieve: first, there is something you must
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stop doing from now on, and second, there’s one thing you must understand.
But first, an anecdote: Our home was once located in a very dry region with little precipitation, lots of heat, lots of wind, and even the odd desert-dry spell in the summer. “Without regular watering and irrigation, I wouldn’t be able to grow anything here.” When we moved in, this impression was not only delivered by every gardener around us, but also by the number of automatic sprinkler and irrigation systems we saw. After the construction of our house, oodles of garden soil had to be brought in, and our newly laid lawn also looked like it was dying of thirst every day. So, we allowed ourselves to be persuaded, grabbed the watering can and garden hose, and got to work. It almost seemed to us now that the more we watered, the more the earth dried out.
The morning after one of our rare rainy nights, we woke up, checked the mailbox - and spotted hundreds, if not thousands, of slugs everywhere! On the paths, in front of the garage, on wooden stairs, and worst of all: hundreds, it seemed to us, had climbed up the walls of our house overnight! On all four sides! That’s how the people in the movie The Birds by Alfred Hitchcock must have felt at the sight of the flock of crows! “That’s it. This far and no further!” we thought and stopped watering and irrigating - as we had always done before. We decided we'd rather do without a garden than have one under such circumstances. Lots of work, lots of watering, lots of slugs. “Enough!” we thought. No more watering - as we had done in the past in Johanna's homeland.
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This decision had consequences:
Today, we once again harvest tomatoes which, after the initial watering of seedlings, don’t receive a drop of water until the last harvest in November! We prepare tea with the leaves of sage, lemon balm, and many other good herbs from our garden which have never tasted tap water. We harvest kohlrabi2 way into the winter, dug out from under the snow, wonderfully juicy, never woody, never having seen the watering can. True, our lawn turns a little brown when there's a drought, but just hours after the rain it's back to a fresh green. Lettuce, spinach, cauliflower, fruits, berries, vegetables - all from loamy soil, rock-hard in the drought, without watering and irrigation. And without slugs! And now you know about the first tool to help you get rid of your slugs. Further back in the book you will learn about the contexts in more detail.
The second condition requires only a little insight on your part: you must understand with all your heart, it must become second nature to you, that all fighting in this world is futile from the beginning. From the beginning and without any exception.
What happens when a tyrant attacks the neighboring people, nearly wiping them out, and then driving them from their ancestral land? The first generation of the oppressed people is still surprised, stunned, and perhaps “defeated.” The second generation stands up, the third generation becomes strong, seemingly “immune” to the pain, and strikes back. For open eyes and ears, for rational beings and for those with love in their hearts, this law of nature can be observed everywhere:
What happens when people of different religions, skin colors, party affiliations, status fight each other instead of understanding one
2 Also called: Turnip Cabbage
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another and fostering togetherness? These “different” people will always fight back until the fight is over.
What happens when a disease is fought instead of being eliminated, such as cancer, heart disease, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's? I will never succeed in eliminating them, unless I understand the causes: a diet rich in meat, sugar, and white flour, empty food, perhaps the long-term consequences of medications, poor water quality, natural radiation, cell phone radiation, electro smog.
What happens when bacteria and viruses are fought instead of considering the true cause behind their excessive multiplication? The bacteria and viruses gradually become resistant to remedies and come back stronger than ever before.
What happens when we excessively heat our homes in the winter and fight the effects of climate change with air conditioning in summer? Nature will use even stronger signals to draw attention to its distress. Evident everywhere, but apparently not amongst the politicians responsible, who live and work in their air-conditioned rooms. If only these politicians and their children had to spend one month in overcrowded subways, in overheated schoolrooms, in non-air-conditioned vehicles, in alpine valleys polluted by heavy traffic - we would have different laws.
What happens when the “unpredictable” behavior of a watercourse is fought by straightening the river instead of observing nature and its wisdom? We reap floods.
What happens when “pests” and “weeds” are fought instead of trying to understand natural cycles and the reason behind a wild plant and insect boom? We harvest vegetables and fruits that poison us all.
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Now, what happens when you fight slugs instead of understanding why they’ve come? You poison yourself with the vegetables you harvest and invite the slugs to invade your garden in masses.
The principle can be put so simply: What I fight, I invite – to return with greater strength and power than when the fight began. Only through the understanding of contexts and causes can things be turned around for the better - in small and large ways.
Think about it: Wild herbs, wildflowers, everything that grows and thrives in nature in lushness and beauty without human intervention, without a sprinkler or watering can - all this would have disappeared long ago, eaten by slugs and then some, if the same laws prevailed that we supposedly “must” apply in our gardens.
It is truly hard to believe everything written in gardening books, in planting calendars, on the instruction labels for seeds and plants - up to the crazy suggestion to generously water overwintering plants. All this madness is accepted like a shoe fashion trend. Except that no harm is done by the shoes, while the prevailing trends for gardening bring great harm to people, animals, and our planet.
Other than polluting it with chemicals: Try to take a moment to question what a salad does to your body, when you have “bought” its growth with the poisoning and elimination of countless snails, countless living beings? What does a stolen chocolate bar taste like?
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How does it feel to live in a house that the previous owner had to foreclose on due to a hardship? How does it feel to live as a wealthy person whose wealth is built on exploitation of their employees? How does one enjoy success that came about through lies and insincerity?
A moment taken to ponder these questions, and the slug problem in your garden is solved. And, along the way, many other problems and difficulties that life holds and will hold for you.
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Part I Ten Keys to a Living Garden
Key #1 – The Small Decision for the Good
In which we explain how that “small decision for the good,”
that small step, that barely noticeable little change in the everyday life
of an individual, that imperceptible movement - that these “small things” lie at the root of everything grand and are therefore of greater consequence
than any event which finds its way into the newspapers.
The first key to building your personal living garden paradise lies in a belief, in a deep-seated feeling which you may or may not have already. If you have it, you are probably a happy person or well on your way to becoming one! If not, then we hope to offer you the courage needed to develop this feeling, this belief. It would only take a tiny step.
The feeling we are talking about is the feeling that every single small decision in your life is a decision of great significance, not only for yourself in your everyday life and “close circle,” but for the whole world, indeed for the whole universe! Your decisions move the world.
You don't buy that? We understand.
The decision to remove the Iron Curtain, to build the tunnel between France and England, or to seal the European Union - such
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acts seem infinitely greater and more significant to all of us than, for example, your personal decision to use or not to use a pesticide.
Yet: It only appears that way. What really moves our world happens behind the scenes of what can be observed in the media. Sparked by seemingly insignificant trifles, such as the decision for or against a cigarette.
The neighbor who reconciles with the neighbor, the boss who guides his employees respectfully and does not exploit them, the craftsman who does not allow condescending onlookers take away his pride in the work he has done. The person who, unrecognized and “unrewarded,” performs an act of kindness. And you, who perhaps after reading this book chooses to have a living garden - you are preventing wars, natural disasters, and epidemics.
What, then, are “small decisions for the good”?
Perhaps you have never been interested in the origin of the apples you buy. As long as they are cheap and taste good. More or less. One day, you decide to stop buying apples that come from overseas because you wish to promote local fruits, with the result that again a few farmers decide to switch to organic.
Maybe you've been routinely throwing gum wrappers out the window while driving for as long as you can remember. One day you hesitate and decide to throw the paper into the recycling bin at home. Without you noticing, hundreds of people follow suit.
For decades, you may have expected to walk around the house in shorts and a T-shirt thanks to your heater, even when it's snowing leopards and huskies outside. One day, you decide to turn the temperature down a notch and put on a sweater. As more people
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become inspired by your decision, vast amounts of greenhouse gases no longer pollute the environment.
In the stillness of your heart, you decide to finally forgive someone who had wronged you a long time ago. You feel better now, but simultaneously some leader in distant lands allows his heart to stir, and he makes a decision that grants his people a new freedom.
You decide to use wood instead of plastic wherever possible. You decide to eat much less meat or no meat at all from now on. Both decisions save the lives of several species of animals.
Choosing a pound of organic tomatoes from your local organic farmer over greenhouse tomatoes from faraway lands? A decision of greater significance than any politician's speech.
You used to watch humilitainment TV shows, whose success is based on schadenfreude, and laughed along without thinking much about how you might feel if you yourself were there on TV, just barely escaping various broken bones. Then you remember that the TV has a remote and decide to stop contributing to the success of such shows.
One of the mega-decisions that would catapult our world into a future of paradise: You decide to talk to, and above all, listen to each of your family members at least twice as much as before, starting immediately. Now such a decision is the stuff on which a better future for us all is founded.
If you have read this far, you have nearly turned the first key to the living garden. This effort, this reflection has already sparked something of which you can be rightly proud. Everywhere, always, it is such small movements, the tiny steps, the small people who trigger and move the big things. The “small decision for the good” is what saves the world. But as long as neighbors fight over who owns the apples that fall from the neighbor's tree, there will be wars.
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An Eternal Circle
Observe nature along with its wonderful, ingenious cycles. Being and passing, being and passing. Winter, spring, summer, and fall. Activity for all, rest for all, food for all, water for all, air for all. And this infinitely patient service to man, the “crown of creation”. Sometimes, a sigh escapes us at this thought: “Oh, how nice it would be if he would finally put on this crown...” Because then man will learn what responsibilities are connected with it, what communal service, what joy, and what peaceful coexistence of all living things, of all people.
You think all this is just a beautiful pipe dream? No, it is an immediately tangible reality for every human being once they first find peace within themselves and take responsibility instead of complaining or placing their hands on their lap. From now on, remember the “power of the small decision”!
By regularly reading the daily newspaper, one could fall into despair. But this despair is a pure luxury, because everything written there can be changed - with your personal everyday small decisions! Acquire the confidence and certainty that this is a fact. Then, you will have taken a gigantic step towards a bright future - for all of us and for yourself! With our books, we can help you along this joyful adventure. With this book as well.
Your intuition will show you the way, if only you listen to it.
Johanna Paungger: “As a child, my intuition told me that my parents' ways are better: the fruit tastes better, the trees are hardier, the people and animals are healthier. But every day came this drumfire of advertising slogans declaring that the old ways were outdated. Then, after some years, the larger pears, the larger tomatoes did come on the market. Now, if you don't like these pears or tomatoes, they tell you there’s something wrong with your tastebuds. Until decades after this
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insanity, an organic tomato actually tastes too “intense” because you've accepted the taste of the industrial tomato as “normal”. So, not only are you outdated and live under a rock, but you also suffer from sensory deception and lack of taste.”
After all, the damage to our health and environment cannot be detected right away. How would a child then be able to assert itself with the mere intuition that something is not right? Before asbestos was banned, numerous scientific studies proved that it was harmless.
To experience the difference between a nourishing diet and a normal diet, between an organic tomato and a watery greenhouse blob, you first need sensitivity, and then the willpower to choose a different path. Both are systematically numbed and weakened by our normal diet, reinforced by various other methods, school curricula, modern culture, trends, advertising, by adding fluoride3 to drinking water and salt, and so on.
Acknowledging this situation, these vicious circles is one thing. Breaking them is another. When you fight them with anger, rant about them, feel sorry for yourself: you won’t change a thing, but you can see yourself become bitter. That is how our universe is set up. We are always under its protection, but we have been given our free will for a reason. Knowledge and information first bring responsibility into our lives. Only then follow opportunities.
The best advice saved for last: Make it easy on yourself and let your small decisions for the good be guided by that one force which makes everything light and lucid and transparent: love.
3 Fluoride is a powerful nerve toxin, which over the years undermines your will power. That it is presumably good for your teeth is a fairytale, invented by industries, where fluoride is a waste product. They had found a „solution“ for the question, how to avoid sky-high disposal expenses.
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The great deeds of men, are not the ones that make a noise. The great happens so discreetly, like the trickling of water, the flow of the air, the growth of the grain. (Adalbert Stifter)
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Key #2 Choosing the Right Time
In which you will learn about the importance of the position
of the moon in the zodiac as well as its influence on our Earth.
Until shortly before the World War I, nearly every calendar displayed
the moon’s position in the Zodiac.
This chapter will show you the reason why.
A Small Piece of Paper
It just takes a piece of paper, and everything around you could change. With this piece of paper on the wall, you can make your life much easier, you can live happier and healthier. You can save money - a lot of money, in fact, over the years - and you can contribute to the protection our environment, the impact of which you can hardly dream of. All it takes is some paper, and we could all take a giant leap towards a bright future for everyone.
No, it's not about a calendar with a lot of numbers on it. It's about a lunar calendar - a calendar that, in addition to the usual information, also shows the phases of the moon and the position of the moon in the zodiac.
This calendar is the second and perhaps even the most important key to a truly living garden. The fact that this calendar is
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once again available today - for all who wish to be kind to themselves and the world around them - is an astonishing step forward.
In the fall of 1991, our first book, The Power of Timing4, was published. The book that paved the way for the rediscovery of the knowledge of lunar rhythms was translated into thirty languages and is still on the bestseller lists today. After a short century of oblivion, the millennia-old knowledge of the right timing, of the influences of lunar rhythms, is now well on its way to reclaiming its rightful place in our daily lives. Its rediscovery and application everywhere greatly contribute to our own physical and mental wholeness and healing - and thus to the healing of our earth.
Perhaps the lunar knowledge cannot yet intervene on a “grand scale” and spare us the droughts and floods due to overexploitation and short-sightedness, or the folly of genetic engineering, but when it later comes to cleaning up and healing, to reforesting and recovering, then its grandest hour will come. Whether you wish to participate in it, is up to you.
Like Fish in the Water
Of course, this may be the first time you have ever heard that the moon has such a far-reaching influence on our lives. It wouldn’t be fair to force you to read our earlier books first in order to understand the context. We would therefore like to provide you with a short introduction about the relationships and interplay between moon phases, the moon’s travel through the zodiac, and the many processes of our everyday life. You will then know what to expect in this book, as you will encounter the second key to the living garden many times.
4 “The Power of Timing“ by Johanna Paungger & Thomas Poppe (Amazon KDP). In the space of eight years after publication the number of farmers switching from industrial to organic farming rose tenfold in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
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It is really astonishing: For thousands of years, humans practice an art, an art as natural to them as a life in water is for fish. An art as valuable, effective, and successful as any skill could possibly be to ensure humanity’s survival and shape their world. And then - measured by a historical clock almost overnight - in a few years this art falls first into disuse, then into oblivion. It was as if overnight, the fish had forgotten how to swim and, on top of that, decided to declare the art of swimming a superstition.
We are not talking about the foreign rituals of some Tibetan high valley - no, in the whole world, from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, from the Philippines to New Zealand, it was and still is practiced. Farmers, gardeners, healers, craftsmen, wood traders – everywhere, they lived “by the moon” just as the kids of today grow up with their technology. Never in their wildest dreams would these people have thought of not first consulting the lunar calendar before sowing and harvesting, healing and tending, building and digging for water. Foresters, for example, designed annual work plans for thinning, logging, and reforestation almost exclusively based on the moon's course.
If you wanted to grasp the full scale of the renunciation of this knowledge, you would have to imagine our situation as that of a person who, although perfectly healthy and without any disability, walks day in, day out on crutches. Until the muscles in his legs have become so weak that he is more than happy to be sold a wheelchair because it is “more comfortable.” And why? Because a wheelchair manufacturer employed a clever salesman who successfully talked his victim into this foolish behavior. The wheelchair is “progress.” It is “cool,” and it is “recommended by all the experts” as the best thing to buy in his situation. So many “crutch manufacturers” exist today, who in turn work quite closely with “wheelchair manufacturers.”
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To our ancestors and a few informed modern people, humanity’s behavior today would appear equally thoughtless: doing things at randomly chosen times - working in the garden, pruning fruit trees, using fertilizer and pesticides, working the fields, and harvesting, doing the laundry, having dental work done, etc.
The right timing can transform your garden into a paradise - only: you must know the right timing, and then follow it. We are here for the knowing. The following part will become your own personal adventure.
In the Beginning, there was Experience
It was the close observation of nature, the animal and plant world, and living in harmony with it that made our ancestors experts in the right timing. Certain native tribes in the Amazon can accurately distinguish countless shades of green according to different plants and their uses. Inuit are known to have over forty words for different types of ice and snow because only a few of them are suitable for building igloos.
When the survival of an entire tribe depends on good harvests, and when no pesticides or artificial fertilizers were available to them, the farmers of all previous centuries had no choice but to add the art of the right timing to their many skills, paying particular attention to the course of the moon and various other rhythms of nature. The list of their findings is long. Direct personal experience had led our ancestors to the awareness:
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* that countless everyday and less-everyday actions are influenced by natural rhythms - from chopping wood to field and garden work, from cooking, eating, baking bread, processing milk, cutting hair, fertilizing, and washing to the use of remedies, performing of surgeries and much more. Even about the times when fish bite most willingly, the moon has a few words to say.
* that day after day, plants and their parts are exposed to different energies, the knowledge of which is crucial for the successful cultivation, care, and harvesting of fruits. That herbs collected at certain times can be incomparably more useful than ones collected at other times, and that food from all these plants are to varying degrees tolerated by the body depending on natural rhythms.
* that on some days, drug administration and surgeries are effective, on other days, useless or even harmful - often independent of the dose and quality of the drugs.
* that numerous other events in nature – high tide and low tide, births, the weather, menstruation, and much more - are related to the moon's migration. Countless animal species, for example, strictly follow the course and position of the moon in the zodiac. For more than eight hundred animal species this is even scientifically proven, but it is likely closer to hundreds of thousands, in hindsight perhaps all, if one would take the time to observe.
To summarize: Our ancestors lived by the knowledge that the success of an intention depends not only on the presence of the necessary skills and tools, but also critically on the timing of the action. And that this favorable time largely depends on the moon’s phase and position in the zodiac. This knowledge was - as we can tell today by the numerous accounts and calendars from all parts of the
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world - widespread and alive, from Alaska to Australia, from Argentina to Japan.
Many calendars of the past were based on the course of the moon because the forces heralded by the moon's position in the zodiac are of far greater importance to our daily lives than the position of the sun. Today, many of our “flexible” holidays are still calculated according to the position of the moon; Easter is always celebrated on the first Sunday following the first full moon after the start of spring.
The Appeal of Forgetting
So, how did it happen that towards the start of the 20th century, this invaluable knowledge was forgotten nearly overnight? Until shortly before World War One, nearly every calendar contained the moon’s phases and position in the zodiac. Throughout this book, you will encounter the different answers to this question. Knowing how these answers relate to one another - besides experiencing the effectiveness and value of living by the lunar calendar for yourself - makes you immune against all attempts to degrade this knowledge. Lunar knowledge is not only an essential key to your living garden and your personal happiness, but also a pillar of true progress.
Surely, one of the main appeals of forgetting is to be found in the fact that this knowledge cannot be turned into cash. On the contrary, we would be healthier. Products would become much more durable, and they would manage just fine without any toxins to preserve, waterproof, etc. Many industries, which still thrive off the disregard and exploitation of nature, would have to tighten their belts or finally shift to the production of environmentally- and people-friendly products.
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Illustration from an 1878 Almanac, published by A.M.Church Co. Ltd., Troy N.Y.
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After World War II, our new machinery got reassigned to deliver the “faster” solutions to all the inconveniences of everyday life - instead of explosives, we got artificial fertilizers; instead of poisonous gas, we got pesticides; instead of atomic bombs, we have machines for the radioactive irradiation of food. In other words: The only person saving any money with lunar knowledge is yourself. The income of corporations which earn money via the exploitation of the earth, would sink.
Young people laughed at their parents and grandparents, spoke of “moon superstition” and began to rely solely on science and research - primarily because they trusted the new slogans of progress and were blinded by the prospect of a rapid material surge. Industry salespeople coaxed agricultural schools to sell young farmers artificial fertilizers and pesticides as the “blessings of the modern age” without devoting even a single thought to the consequences. Then followed the excessive use of fertilizers, pesticides, environmental toxins, and plastics.
The youth were encouraged to ignore their parents' knowledge of the right timing and threw all the “non-scientific” empirical values of the millennia overboard. Increasing yields and “prettier” apples, the seeming successes of medical technology and the plastics industry seemed to prove them right for a long time. Thus, more and more they distanced themselves from the cycles of nature. They began to simply no longer perceive the destruction of our environment, or worse, accept it as a “necessary evil,” forever supported by an industry that has growth and profit in mind, not people and nature.5
5 As recently as in 2018 there was a mandatory study book in German Agricultural Colleges titled Weeds on Farmland. It listed many plants and a detailed description how to eradicate them and with what kind of chemical pesticide. Almost each of the herbs in the list is a powerful healing herb!
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This seduction is one of the greatest crimes of certain fractions of science and industry, because here we see the abuse and exploitation of deep-rooted feelings and longings every human being is familiar with. No child, no adolescent or youthful spirit wants to feel as though they do not “belong,” as though they are not “up-to-date.” When the academics, the universities, the “experts” sent to the agricultural schools and farms, the editors of trade journals - when they all brainwash the young with the same thing - namely how desirable progress is, how modern a straightened river, a field free of “pests”, a bare mountain ridge is, then it takes a lot of backbone to say “no” to this collective delusion. Only a few young farmers and courageous gardeners made it; and today, we have a lot to thank them for. For example, for allowing us to buy any organic food at all.
The speedy development of chemicals and pharmaceutics seduced conventional medicine and patients to believe that they could disregard the wholeness of life with impunity. You have a cold? Take penicillin. You have constipation? Take this! You have a heart problem? Keep eating like you had before because we’ll have a remedy or a promising surgical intervention or whatever for you.
The quick elimination of pain and symptoms was considered a “therapeutic success,” while research into causes and prevention, patience, and willingness for long-term work with the patient took the back seat. Genuine healers were and are driven to the sidelines.
Right, and today? Today, hardly anyone can close their eyes to the high price we have to pay for disregarding the rhythms and laws of nature – lifestyle diseases are spreading, allergies are now the order of the day, agricultural yields are decreasing, pests have easy game as the soil is exploited with no chance to protect and regenerate itself. The use of pesticides has multiplied in just a few decades without significant success. Quality and nutritious value of harvested fruits
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plummet to zero. Vital minerals have left the soil. Quality of drinking water decreases.
The fact that this madness was able to spread so successfully and is still encouraged today by politics, science, and industry as the “magic formula,” has a simple reason: The resulting systems profit from damage, not from avoiding it. One example of many: The destructive farming methods and irrigation techniques in use today make crops highly vulnerable to insufficient rainfall. Instead of eliminating the causes of this vulnerability, farmers receive compensation for drought damage! The solution would be so simple: if farmers were penalized for drought damage rather than rewarded, there would be no drought damage. Take a look for yourself and observe which plants in nature survive long droughts and why.
Doctors, pharmaceutical and health insurance companies acquire their income and derive their power and growth from illness, not from health. True prevention, such as accurate information about healthy nutrition, doesn’t exist. On the contrary, today's doctors don’t even know what healthy nutrition means. They depend on nutritionists whose “latest research” results change almost daily.
Instead, we now have so-called “preventive check-ups,” during which one or two things will always be found - because the pharmaceutical industry will gradually classify normal conditions and results as a “disorder” and “disease” to develop a drug for it. Increased cholesterol caused by a momentary stressful state, which would have passed by itself with a little rest, must then be “fought” and “treated.” A spirited child with a slightly stronger urge to move than average becomes a “patient.”
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Altogether, not the best breeding ground for a wholesome contemplation of the simple, natural, and essential. But even those who would have loved to live and work with lunar rhythms had no access to the knowledge. Because there was yet another reason why it had been lost and revived merely a few years ago: Nobody recorded it!
The application of the “right timing” felt like such an ordinary part of life that the relationships between moon and earth were not completely summarized by anyone. Only in fragments, as a ridiculed “farmer's thing” and amongst a few enthusiasts, had the knowledge survived. It is precisely those people of good will who have welcomed the revival of the lunar knowledge with open arms and can now hardly imagine how they’ve ever lived without it. Many of our readers are among them.
You will not find a bibliography at the end of this book, and for a good reason. The rules and laws of nature we present are exclusively rooted in personal experience, partially from birth. None of them stem from superstition, none of them originated in assumptions or blind belief. They do not come from secondary sources and are not “scientifically up to date” (in which case they’d be obsolete really fast tomorrow). The information is tried and true, and you can rely on it.
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There are, of course, many more rhythms, cycles, and influencing factors in nature (for instance your personal biorhythm), many of which we have introduced in our previous books, but they aren’t as vital for the creation of a living garden. For now, it’s sufficient to familiarize yourself with seven different “states” of the moon, namely:
: New moon Y Waxing moon 1 Full moon 2 Waning moon The moon’s position in the zodiac: z Ascending moon Z Descending moon
The Seven Moons
Let us briefly introduce the moon’s phases and their effects which can be felt on earth in their respective intervals.
: New moon: As it orbits the earth, our little moon only shows us one side, the face we get to see in all its splendor during the full moon. Now, if the moon – observed by us – stands between the earth and the sun, then the side facing us lies in complete darkness. The moon then rises and sets together with the sun. For hours it will be invisible, and we experience what we call new moon. In calendars, the new moon is usually shown as a black or dark blue disk.
A unique energy emerges in the hours and days before new moon: Trees, for example, should generally only be pruned during
