Permaculture: My New Word of the Day

            It’s a word I was starting to hear a lot. Like thermodynamics or some other equally lengthy, science-sounding word, it didn’t really resonate until someone painted me a picture.

            “Imagine you’re standing on a rock, looking out over a rocky plain with a bag of grass seed by your side. You spread seed in all directions and leave it to do its thing. Several months later you return to see where the grass came up, where the rains moved the dirt around; you decided to add a little dirt of your own to help it out. In the deeper pockets, you add a tree here, some perennials there. You spot the perfect place for crops that need sun; note how the water flows when rains hit. Somewhere along the way you might even position a cabin, working around the soil and creating a sustainable environment of self-perpetuating plants and green things.”

            (The picture is being painted for me to grasp a working plan for permaculture only I don’t know it yet.) The story continues:

            “Imagine this, you parents idea; you grew up here; you play here as a kid. Then you move away. Start your own family. Your parents die. It’s 25 years later and you come back to this spot and what do you find?

            (No brainer, I’m thinking: “Weeds!”)

            “No.” (I am corrected.) “You'd have a forest. If you had grown a linear garden you’d have weeds; if you’d grown a perpetual garden, you’d have a permaculture design.” 

            A term coined by a couple of Australians in the late 70s, with roots dating back to Egyptian times, permaculture is a system of sustainable architecture and self-maintaining habitats that work with nature rather than against it. According to Bill Mollison permaculture engages a philosophy of “… protracted and thoughtful observation rather than protracted and thoughtless labor, and of looking at plants and animals in all their functions, rather than treating any area as a single product system.”

In other words, we let our land tell us where things will best grow, rather than overhauling our yards to make it work the way we insist…(Cause usually nature’s going to win out anyway.) It’s not that we don’t put a shovel to it; we just put thought to things before we pull the shovels out.

            Think of nature as art.

            Think catching and storing renewable resources (rain, goat poop, hillsides washing away get repurposed and put to good use)

            Think permanent cultures.

            Think leaving the planet better than you found it.

            It’s a concept worth thinking about…One I’m going to test myself next go round (that would be early spring). For now, it’s time to learn more about the concept. (Stay tuned.)