Interesting comment by Paul: " So in acting on a piece of land you
are necessarily in the world of intuitive 'policy development'. We make
decisions between alternatives based on available information. I have
not met many permaculture practitioners who do science... make
systematic replicable observations (perhaps quantitative) within a
theoretical context for the purposes of infering how things work. This
is a problem in ecological restoration as well. When the people who are
doing the work are not helping build the theory on which the work is
built this is a weakness... in permaculture terms, the experiential
output of the worker is not connected to the inspirational input of the
scientist. "
On my own land I can go slowly and not try to implement a full design at
once. I think I have avoided many mistakes by trying things out on a small
scale first before trying to scale them up. I know from experience that
Leucaena will not grow well on the soils I have. I initially thought
crotalaria would be a usefull plant, but it is a bit too woody and tough and
not easy to slash. Now trying desmodium. Maybe with experience one can
know what is the best approach for a given location, but for beginners like
me it might be best to make small trials first.
Charles