Fitness in terms to suitability to survival and coexisting harmoniously in the environment we live, has everything to do with knowing our environment and being able to “fit” in, to (re)-establish and maintain a regenerative ecosystem, to thrive.

Modern societies have long manipulated and extracted resources from the environment without much consideration to long term sustenance. The natural world functions on a process of balance in giving and taking. Plants breath carbon dioxide to release oxygen for human consumption who in turn release carbon dioxide for the plants’. Animals consume plants and produce excrement for the plants to consume. Human processes focus on taking without sufficient giving back to nature. Humans have consumed plants and animals to the brinks of extinction. We have deposited animal waste into the ocean instead of replenishing the soil. Many human actions inhibit regeneration and may have given to the demise of many empires in the past . Manipulating the world strictly for human interest is destructive and unfit in the long term. Permaculture endeavours to establish a balanced ecosystem of giving and taking where all organisms are supporting each other. It has been said permaculture returns to aboriginal ways of life. Permaculture, developed by Bill Mollison and Dave Holmgren, endeavours to nurture and cultivate the land in a regenerative manner. Some have said humanity is destructive but this is a reflection of some, not all. Left entirely to itself, nature can be very chaotic and inhospitable. Human influence with a permaculture approach can guide hospitable natural development even in challenging climates. Geoff Lawton has influenced the greening of a desert.

At the Rough Canyon Ranch we endeavour to grow on rocky, sandy terrain in extreme climate conditions.

Rough Canyon Ranch
where our adventures and learning in fitness begin
natural – physical – emotional.