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  • From: Martin Naylor <martinwnaylor@yahoo.com.au>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] Len's PERMACULTURE ESSAY - http://members.optusnet.com.au/~gardenlen1/
  • Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2005 14:51:27 +1000 (EST)

one problem he as here, is the cost of manufacturing of steel and concrete,
the cheapist way would probably be hemp, we have keith bolton from southern
cross uni [n.s.w. aust] doing research on building a house out of hemp, a
couple of months ago there where into creating the bricks,
are there any sites that keep track of what research is going on, on the
planet. i atended a talk given by david suzuki, and he mentioned they had
just finished research on a water problem when he came to australia, and
found another uni doing same research
martin

"Lawrence F. London, Jr." <lfl@intrex.net> wrote:
Australia
Down to earth Gardening Advice from Down Under
http://members.optusnet.com.au/~gardenlen1/


Permaculture essay:

Perma-culture - Permanent Culture or Permanent Agriculture, unless we
work within the limits of the environment we live in then nothing will
be permanent.

Permaculture is a "mind set", it is not about man made design, design
courses, diplomas, degrees or even school curriculum. Permaculture IS
NOT a career path, permaculture is a path to improving how we look after
the only planet we have to live on.

Len's thoughts, Permaculture is not a religion, it is not a philosophy
as such, it is nothing that can be limited or limiting. Permaculture
occurs when someone anyone is of the opinion that we can no longer keep
pillaging and wrecking this planets resources. It is when that thought
pattern occurs that people then look for something to highlite what it
is they can do to change their habits.

You do not need acreage you don't even need a suburban yard you can do
the things that Permaculture promotes in your confines, you simply do
what you can and what fits that all works towards conserving the
environment and the habitat. I f we wait for those who want to change
their earth unfriendly ways to buy acreage then change will never occur.

Someone asked the question on a perma-c forum 'they wanted to know where
they could do a good perma-c course, because the resulting
diploma/degree/certificate(!!!???) would fit nicely with their "master
gardener certificate" whatever that is or means?'. Someone else
responded by saying "there was a course at someplace in the US, and that
the conveners allowed for heaps of reading time!!!" Sounds like the
learning might have come from the books hey? And they further said "if
nothing else the $1000+USD they paid provided at the least a cheap
holiday"!!!!! My response was that all they need to know is already in
print. The whole PDC thing sounds awfully ego driven to me!

Other things I've seen written, someone did a course and then said it
was like being a WWOOFer (or WWOPCFer - Willing Workers On Permaculture
Farms) that paid to help the conveners to finish or start permaculture
projects, some holiday hey? (For those who may not be familiar with the
term WWOOFer, it means Willing Workers On Organic Farms, and usually
backpackers or working travellers stay on properties where they help
with chores and in return get somewhere to bunk down or camp, and
whatever food comes from the garden etc.,. they pay nothing and get no
money reward other than what I mentioned earlier).

It is a grass roots level "mind set", so in other words an individual or
family have it in mind that we humans are misusing this planet earth we
call home. All the climate, air quality & environment ill's and woes are
mainly due in course to this abuse of natural resources and the
mismanagement of the resource. All for the sake of quick un-sustainable
profits (don't like that word 'sustainable' it is too broad in it's
meaning but until something better happens along there it is).

Permaculture is using the natural design your system comes with,
permaculture is maintaining habitat, building habitat, improving
habitat, and then producing within the natural bounds of that habitat.

Permaculture is a tool full of ideas to help you achieve the changes you
want to or can make in your system, don't look at the big picture too
much yes by all means be aware of it but work within your picture. As in
the end if change comes from permaculture then it will be a lot of
little snowballs rolling into one big snowball that will succeed.

The change will come from the grass roots level of our society from the
little man. It won't come from the corporate end of town they are driven
solely by money and profit, and it won't come from diplomas or degrees,
it will come from those who roll up their sleeves and get down and dirty
so to speak. It won't come from the yuppies that want to sit back talk
big and sell permaculture. And it will happen when we who are trying to
change start talking about what we are doing, start swapping ideas, just
have a look around the internet there isn't much of that going on.

If you take on permaculture to impress friends and associates or as a
fad or fancy or fashion it won't last you will get very board with it
and go to some other fad of the day.

Permaculture starts in your home, you do an audit on the following items:

1. How much can you minimise what you send to the trash can each week,
how much of what you put in there could be recycled into your garden?

2. To cut down on the waste you need to process eg.,. send to the trash
can or recycle you need to look at the things you buy and bring home,
how are these things packaged, is the packaging able to be recycled
either on site or sent to a recycle station?

3. How can you better use the fresh drinking quality water that comes
piped to you through your reticulated water system, a resource that most
have to pay for and all will pay for in years to come, so do an audit
how you use this resource:

· How much do you waste pushing that little button of convenience in
your toilet, how many use drinking water to flush away urine?

· Do you use showers all the time? Use the bath more and share the bath
water i.e., wife baths first then hubby goes next or bathe together,
don't fill the bath only use it ½ full.

· Do you use a fully automatic washing machine? They use heaps of water.
We use a twin tub ok you can't set and forget you need to follow through
with the wash, but we fill the machine and wash all the lighter cleaner
stuff first working through to the extra dirty stuff so one fill of
water does as does one tub for rinsing.

· What do you do with your grey water, and it doesn't matter where it
comes from i.e., bathroom, laundry, kitchen. Do you recycle any of this
to your lawns/gardens? We use an earth friendly detergent in the
kitchen, we make our washing detergent for the clothes and this gets
used as a general purpose cleaner as well e.g., cleaning the bath tub,
wiping bench tops & washing hands.

· Lawns are the most resource wasteful folly gardeners have, they
account for huge amounts of pollutant run off all in the cause of that
perfect looking green carpet. The amount of drinking water that goes to
watering this folly is indescribable, and the mowing and trimming. Then
people collect the grass clip and dump it into their waste bins. Leave
the clip on the ground to become nutrient for the lawn if it doesn't
rain don't water the lawn, watch how fast it'll turn green when rain
comes, everyone ends up with the same green looking lawn after rain even
those who won't waste water keeping it green.

· Mulch - use mulch on all gardens around all trees, not those fancy
looking mulches or mulches that don't decompose and don't add to your
soils nutrients, use mulches like hay or straw.

Do you live in an efficient house? No I don't mean what the modern
building industry want you to believe in, I mean is your house designed
to keep itself cool in summer and warm in winter. Or is your house
designed to use far less heating and cooling, as do other houses in your
climate? Bet it's not. You see modern architecture still has homeowners
believing in and building those European style homes, they don't
incorporate any thermal qualities. Everyone lives the dream that has
been conditioned into him or her by the accepted standard, no matter how
inefficient it is.

Get around the permaculture groups and forums no one talks about Eco'
housing, surely this is as much part of the mind set as planting trees?
We built an Eco' house along the 'warm-house/cool-house' theme, lots of
people resist it because it doesn't comply with the accepted norm' in
design thinking. How many do you know who bought land for the aspect
i.e., southern aspect/northern aspect etc., etc., The answer will be
almost none, real estate won't sell on aspect their slogan is position,
position, position, and I agree the right position is the right aspect.
So if we go along with that that there is 4 basic aspects e.g.. North,
south, east & west and only one of those aspects is the one that will
work for your Eco' home then on an average we could say that ¾'s of all
land sold is the wrong aspect. You see unless you orientated your Eco'
style house with the right aspect on the right aspect on your land. How
well it will work will be very doubtful.

There is only one important zone and it starts where you think and live
in your mind & in your home.

Permaculture is living sustainably within our systems, providing safe
good quality food that is produced with the safety of the habitat and
environment taken into account, so that means no chemicals. We don't
need regulators we need communities involved, as communities. Look what
regulation has done to the organic name the standard has been lowered.
Regulators can only work to the lowest common denominator.

When you purchase a rural block of ground what do you think about the
trees & habitat on that block?

Do you reason you own the trees & habitat to do with what you desire?

Or are you a custodian of those trees & habitat that are needed for a
stable environment & climate by the community at large?

Permaculture is making use of a natural system - The way I see it
Permaculture in total may not suit your political, religious or dietary
biases. If you have particular needs in this area take from or use what
suits you or fits for you, but that then is your personal requirement.

Permaculture is about animals, work or useful animals i.e.,.

Animals and poultry to help with recycling and to create organic matter
for the gardens, the list includes cows, pigs, chickens, ducks, turkeys,
geese, sheep & goats. Whether you use these animals as a source of food
or not is your decision.

Horses only as work animals e.g., for transportation or to work the fields.

Dogs only as work dogs to help with herding animals etc., or to act as
protection for you.

Cats, I see absolutely no use for them as they are the greatest
destroyers of fauna that was ever bred. In a case where the individual
has cats and keeps them inside the house or confined in some way, but
then they only serve as pets, and serve no real purpose in how well
permaculture works for you.

Swales:

Bill Mollison's description as per 'Introduction to Permaculture' -
"Swales are long level excavations, which can vary greatly in width and
treatment from small ridges in gardens, rock-piles thrown across slopes,
or deliberately-excavated hollows in flat lands and low-slopes landscapes".

Don't try and find an understandable definition in a dictionary or
encyclopedia.

Ok just remember nothing is set in concrete ok, and all is open to
interpretation ok?

My idea of a swale: It is a method used to manipulate sudden storm or
rainwater either into the sub-soil or across ground to another point!
Commonly follows the contours across sloping ground.

So the method of constructing a swale is broad in description.

The permaculture designist ideal is a trench cut with some machinery
i.e.. A disc plow and creating or causing the soil from that ditch to be
piled on the lower side creating a berm, commonly if you remove 500mm of
soil and pile it on the bottom side of that swale/trench you have a
swale 1 meter deep or 1000mm deep. This type of design manipulated swale
needs to be exactly level across the contour, or damming will occur
which will then cause flood over and erosion. The length of this type of
swale needs to be regulated, as you need to create spillways in case of
over burden of water. Also these swales are very permanent (unless you
go back and fill them in) inclusion in your landscape, and may mean you
have to go around them instead of over them whenmoving around your property.

Commonly it is suggested that you grow food or habitat trees along the
berm as well. And below the berm and above the swale proper, in high
rainfall areas where trees need extra drainage the berm is ideal, but
then if you are in a high rainfall area swales may not be that
important. In lower or marginal rainfall areas planting trees on raised
soil is going to keep them drier than what is needed.

So lets decide that a swale is something that does with the water what
you want it to do:

· Then if you used a ripper. (A ripper is a single plow like device for
cutting a single rut into the soil. - commonly seen on the back ends of
bulldozers and under the middle of road graders). Pulled behind a
tractor like a plow this then is a swale, it impedes the flow of water
down a slope and puts it underground. Let's investigate this method
further I have very sandy loam type soils through to heavy volcanic
clays, I used the rip method as I needed to get water into my soils this
is another method of storing water.

1. This opens up the soil and helps compacted areas.

2. It allows organic matter and oxygen into the sub-surface.

3. It is semi-permanent and once grass is growing is not seen but can
still be working it causes no inconvenience when moving around your
property.

4. If you plant trees along this rip line they grow better and faster as
the soil is aerated which allows for bacteria and micazoria growth.

· So then if I lay a row of mulch grass or a row of bales of hey/straw
etc., along the contour this too is a swale. As once it settles in and
the grass starts growing along the edges and the mulch contacting the
ground starts to decompose and worms etc, begin to work then water is
impeded from flowing down that slope and it has a key to be able to soak
into the sub-soil.

1. So if that row of mulch (mulch berm) material were laid over a rip it
would be more effective.

2. Now if you planted your food or other trees along the contour mulched
around the trees then mulched (berm) along the rows between the trees
that is a swale, believe me it works for me, why not for you?

The swales we use are as permanent as you want/need or as are temporary
as is required.

If you live in heavy clay soil areas you need to be aware that once clay
saturates water no longer penetrates it. Just ask the blokes who build
dams they need a clay (be it reactive volcanic clay or non-reactive
sandstone clay) for the bottom of the dam so that the dam will hold
water. Yes I know the designists say to mulch along the swale trench and
in time this will make the clay more permeable to soaking in water, how
much time well that is the big question. If you are so locked into the
comfort zone of constructing this type of swale, and you are in clay
soil. Then might I suggest a good dose of gypsum (no limit to how much
can be used really, buy the good quality stuff, that is determined this
way, the more like talcum powder it looks the better the quality). Along
the bare swale surface and over the berm before laying the much this can
have the effect of spreading up the amending process. To go one step
further maybes consider cutting a rip along the bottom of the swale,
after all you are trying to get water down into the sub-soil.

Our idea is to plant enough trees along the contours so that in time
they put the water underground as a full working forest does. As I see
it you need to be getting water into the ground up on the slopes long
before that water gets down to the flat lands or flood plains.

When we purchased this block it had a grazing rate of around 1 to 5 or 6
and in the very dry seasons may have to be taken out to as low as 1 to
10. After 3 years of what we call simple management skills the land will
easily graze 1 to 3 or maybe down to 4. Right now as we are getting good
rains it could cope with some time as low as 1 to 2 or even 1 to 1,
these are cattle rates I am talking. Horses are a different kettle of
fish needing more grazing ground per animal, unless improved pasture
methods are used then you need to be where irrigation water is available.

The other bonuses of our system:

1. We have less tree loss at planting due to the extra moisture in the soil.

2. We don't water our citrus or stone fruit orchid (all heavily mulched
as well so we don't feed the trees artificially).

3. The pasture grasses are growing faster and stronger, this then
protects the surface soil from the sun and wind, and our growth rate at
present is 18 to 24 "s over a 7-week period.

4. We now have wet/soak areas down the flat and this lasts for weeks
after rain stops as the water slowly works it's way down though the
sub-soil, on its way to the creek.

TREES the all important link to a sustainable life & climate:<>

With all the political hype and hoopla that goes on via the media the
folk in our cities most likely have no idea that the degradation of
forest, habitat and bio-diversity is still running at full steam.

Any vegetation protection legislation or any other rules and regulations
bandied around are only there in an attempt to curb the little person in
the big picture, when it comes to the sacred cows they do as they wish
when they wish.

BY AND LARGE FOR THE MAJORITY IN RURAL TREES ARE LITTLE MORE THAN A WEED

Quote from this site: Farm Forestry for Green and Gold

"Trees support valuable pasture Trees don't necessarily suppress pasture
growth. It depends on the number of trees. A study near Gunnedah, NSW
found that the pasture output was at its highest level when the
proportion of tree cover across a farm was 34%. This moderate level of
tree cover enhanced pasture production because trees cut down on wind
driven evaporation and some highly productive and palatable grasses grow
better in the cooler and more fertile soil under an open canopy of
eucalypts.

Further reading: Walpole (1999)."

On our property our lushest grasses grow under the canopy of eucalypt
trees, there they are protected from winds. sun and get the benefit of
moisture that drips from the tree leafs from rain, heavy dew and fogs.
The grasses also get the benefits of the mulching from fallen leafs and
all the organisms that are attracted to break that material down.

So we guess the challenge to city folk who may read this, is next time
you take your family on holidays do something different! take them on a
campervan holiday, drive around the hinterland of your city, see the
missing habitat and trees, see the greying remains of piled up trees
where the best part has been used for fence posts, and the rest lays
waiting to be burnt and cause pollutants into the atmosphere.

Note the piles of trees that could have been used for fence posts that
have been burnt to create grazing ground or housing developments. There
are wood chip mills logging forest for timber to chip yet all this
resource is wasted left lying in paddocks. Reckon us humans might just
have to think a little bit more about using resources less wastefully.

The latest from Australian Scientists is; 'There is a definite
relationship between the loss of trees and droughts and lack of rain'
WOW wonder how many degrees you need to work that one out just try
living in rural it's right there in front for all to see.

As I write this essay I will try to encourage others to think "outside
the square", this broadens your acceptance of different ideas and can
help to break down cultural or other barriers. I will also be
encouraging you to extend your 'comfort zone/envelope'. It can be quiet
exiting when you broaden your thinking to take a good hard look at our
culture and see some of the ruts we are in, some of the old habits and
ideas that never were and still aren't efficient.

Our homes for one the accepted European influenced design gabled
macmansion with multiple bathrooms, toilets, lots of lighting, huge
heating requirements and cooling requirements, just aren't going to be
acceptable if we want to conserve resources and money yes the hip pocket
feeling. So exploring the idea of having the right aspected land and
then designing a home that will work toward keeping you comfortable

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