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Water restrictions and gardens
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"0tterbot" wrote: Permaculture is agriculture for engineers. AHH. i think in one sentence, you have got to the bottom of the problem! The idea is to consider inputs and outputs and see how you can make things work for you with a minimum amount of effort. it's interesting to me that you got this from the books. perhaps you read better books by people who came later. perhaps you read better than i do. I got that from PDM, on my first reading of it and with no understanding of permaculture prior to that. Of course it doesn't actually SAY that, but if you know any engineers, you recognise the mind-set instantly! The premise of all engineering, AFAICS, is to create a system to deliver the required results as efficiently as possible, and to prevent catastrophic failures. The idea of broadacre wheat farming, where you drill your seed in, then wait a few months before experiencing crop failure/success, is completely alien to the engineering mind (it's efficient, but it does not prevent catastrophic failure). The idea of continuous polyculture to spread risk would make much more sense to them. "minimum amount of effort" did not appear to be anyone's aim in anything i read. something like "fiddle with absolutely everything according to our model and leave nothing that was there prior, standing, plant loads of beech trees, and i certainly hope your block is sloped, young lady!!" is all i got from them. :-) Sounds like the principles got a bit mixed up with technique there. Elevation is handy simply because it enables you to use gravity, ie, free energy. THe "fiddling" is where you get existing processes to work for you -- ie, they would all have been examples. This is starting to remind me of debates about Attachment Parenting in misc.kids, where people say AP is a hard-line approach to parenting, instead of seeing that it's a few principles (the first one being "understand your child's needs") and a lot of suggested techniques. Did you interpret "slashing" leguminous plants as "chopping them down", perhaps? http://www.tortuga.com/permacultura/...Principles.htm gives a very succinct summary of the design principles of permaculture, in which you will see the words "energy" and "system" appear frequently. Soil characteristics are definitely an input. I think they are covered in PDM. In my example, my chooks need as inputs: a run to scratch in, green stuff to eat, and shade. They produce scratched-up ground, eggs, and poo. The lemon tree needs: the grass removed from its roots, nitrogenous fertiliser, and water. It provides: lemons and shade. (This list is not exhaustive, of course.) Therefore I arrange matters so that the chooks and lemon tree provide some of each other's needs *without my further intervention*. THAT is "control". no it's not, it's perfectly sensible :-) I think Linda Woodrow explains it best: in The Permaculture Home Garden, she explains that we are best at working with our brains, so we should consider design of the garden (following study of local conditions, principles of gardening etc) as our primary work. We should leave the job of destroying snails and spreading fertiliser to the poultry :-) what would you make of a statement declaring one should not have a property bigger than a couple of acres, because you would not be able to CONTROL it? (i freely admit the ordinary person _can't_ really "control" more than a few hectares - i just can't see what the problem is with that.) Where was that? What was the context? I do think it would be hard to get a continuous polyculture going on a bigger scale than that, so it would depend on what was to be attempted. The rest is broad conclusions and sample technique. what, stuff he thought up that nobody's ever tried? Well, planting beech trees for a timber crop that in the meantime feeds and shades your pigs, who fertilise the trees and supply you with meat/income until the trees can be harvested. That's an example of a guild. it's probably just not, in & of itself, my thing, & that's probably why i've got such an attitude about it. If my comments have been helpful in changing your mind, Rosemary Morrow's book has just come out in a second edition! -- Chookie -- Sydney, Australia (Replace "foulspambegone" with "optushome" to reply) "Parenthood is like the modern stone washing process for denim jeans. You may start out crisp, neat and tough, but you end up pale, limp and wrinkled." Kerry Cue |
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