By Lambert Strether of Corrente.
I used to write regularly on permaculture at NC; here is the category listing the posts. I stopped the practice, partly because I just didn’t have the time to spend in the garden any more, but also because I’d achieved my goal: I started studying and writing about permaculture around 2012, during Obama’s Jackpot: The Prequel, because I wanted to know if I could grow enough food on a quarter-acre of land to feed myself using permaculture principles. The answer turned out to be yes, but to really lead that life, I would have had not only to grow the vegetables, but to store them for eating over the winter and through the spring, by canning, pickling, drying, or in a root cellar. That was daunting, and so I turned into a mere gardener, itself a great and sadly abandoned pleasure that I highly recommend to anyone, even a project as simple as throwing wildflower seeds along the roadside. (The gateway drug for permaculture is sheet mulch; July may be too late to start, but you could certainly start next spring.)
What, you will have asked, is permaculture? Wikipedia throws down the guantlet here[1]:
Permaculture has been criticised as being poorly defined and unscientific.
All true — at least in the past! — but I think an article in Nature is a good riposte to both points. A quick placeholder definition, just to show that “permaculture” made the OED:
permaculture
/ˈpəːməkʌltʃə/
noun. l20.
[ORIGIN: from perma(nent adjective + culture noun.]
Ecology. The development of agricultural ecosystems intended to be complete and self-sustaining.
(Those who regard agriculture as a terrible mistake may quarrel with that definition, but as I think we will see from Nature, that’s mere semantics.)
In this brief post — brief so I can hit the road, sorry! — I’ll extract the salient points from the Nature article. Then I’ll suggest a few permaculture projects (beyond sheet mulch) and conclude.
Permaculture in Nature
Here is the article from Nature: “Permaculture enhances carbon stocks, soil quality and biodiversity in Central Europe“. To get the definition out of the way, the author’s describe permaculture (and contrast it to a parallel discipline with which I am not familiar, agroecology):
Permaculture creates agriculturally productive ecosystems that mimic the diversity, stability, and resilience of natural ecosystems. In this context, the term permaculture encompasses a set of agricultural practices, a design system to select, combine, and arrange those practices, and also the resulting agroecological farming system. Permaculture systems are, therefore, highly individual and context-specific, which can be essential for a high degree of sustainability. As a result, it is not possible to establish fixed general guidelines as is the case for organic agriculture. Instead, both agroecology and permaculture are based on sets of principles or elements emphasizing a growing set of favorable agricultural practices. There is a strong overlap in the principles of these two approaches, which include the promotion of habitat, species, and genetic diversity, the cycling of biomass and nutrients, the build-up of storages of fertile soil and water, and the integration of different land use elements to create synergies. Hereby, both permaculture and agroecology aim to establish regenerative agriculture in terms of environmental health18,19. Furthermore, agroecology has an additional focus on social values, responsibility governance and solidarity economy, while permaculture shows a strong emphasis on the conscious design of such agroecosystems.
And results (materials and methods here):
The results of this study highlight that permaculture in Central Europe enables higher carbon stocks, soil quality and biodiversity compared to predominant agriculture. Soil carbon stocks in the first 30 cm of topsoil on permaculture sites were comparable to average German grasslands while still producing cereals, vegetables, and fruit…. In contrast, average net carbon losses have been observed for the predominant industrial agriculture in the past and are predicted for the future. ….
We also found higher total nitrogen contents on permaculture sites. On the one hand, higher nitrogen contents promote plant productivity, but on the other hand, this means an increased risk of gaseous losses, e.g., nitrous oxide or ammonia into the atmosphere or nitrate leaching into groundwater. As permaculture farms work with minimal or no tillage, permanent soil cover, and without mineral nitrogen fertilizers, it can be assumed that the risk of nitrogen losses is low….
The plant-extractable concentrations of soil phosphorous, potassium, magnesium, boron, and zinc were higher on permaculture sites than on conventionally fertilized soils of the control fields, which can be explained by a higher input of organic matter….
A high input of organic matter together with minimal or no tillage is probably responsible for lower soil bulk densities48,49 and increased abundances and diversity of earthworms on permaculture sites. Soil bulk density is a key soil quality indicator with respect to plant root penetration, aeration, and infiltration and hereby codetermines erosion potentia;. An increased earthworm abundance facilitates a reduced soil bulk density and vice versa.
(NOTE Sheet mulch makes earthworms happy.) As FDR said: “A nation that destroys its soils destroys itself.” So let’s not do that! For more on soil at NC, see here, here, here, and here.)
The Conclusion:
In this study, we observed strong increases in soil carbon stocks, soil quality, and biodiversity through the use of permaculture. These results suggest that permaculture could contribute to the urgently needed transformation of agriculture to mitigate negative effects on various Earth system processes such as climate change, biogeochemical nitrogen and phosphorous flows, biosphere integrity, land-system change, and soil degradation. Our results suggest that permaculture is an effective tool to promote sustainable agriculture ([Sustainable Development Goals] SDG 2), ensure sustainable production patterns (SDG 12), combat climate change (SDG 13) and halt and reverse land degradation and biodiversity loss (SDG 15)100. While there are numerous scientific results on more environmentally friendly practices such as agroforestry, crop-livestock integration, or the promotion of semi-natural habitats, the key capability of permaculture is to select, combine, and arrange precise practices for a specific context of land and farmer to create synergistic, regenerative and resilient agroecosystems. We see this as the missing link between scientific knowledge and implementation in practice. Therefore, we propose to foster the education of farmers and specialized consultants in permaculture design and related practices, as well as the redesign of agricultural systems according to permaculture principles.
Phys.org’s summary is more pointed: “Permaculture found to be a sustainable alternative to conventional agriculture“:
In view of the challenges of climate change and species extinction, this type of agriculture proved to be a real alternative to conventional cultivation—and reconcile environmental protection and high yields.
To be hoped! Now let’s turn to permaculture on a much smaller scale: your own patch, whether garden, de-lawned lawn, community garden, or whatever.
Permaculture Projects You Can Do
From Homes and Gardens, “Permaculture gardening projects – 3 simple DIY jobs for the weekend,” their definition:
Permaculture and organic gardening practices focus on working with nature rather than against it, often considered a holistic approach to gardening. Put simply, this includes growing a diverse range of edible and ornamental crops, caring for the soil and encouraging wildlife. Here, we share some simple and quick jobs for the weekend that will help your backyard thrive in the months ahead.
(Rather missing the theoretical aspect of “mimic the diversity, stability, and resilience of natural ecosystems,” but I suppose that comes under the heading of “working with nature rather than against it.”) They suggest a rain barrel (not legal in all states):
Rainwater harvesting should be a priority for every homeowner. If you are looking for permaculture gardening projects for the weekend and do not have a rain barrel, why not consider installing one? Installation is quick and simple and can conserve water and reduce surface water run-off in your yard.
Rain barrels are a sustainable way to collect rainwater, typically positioned next to a garden shed or greenhouse, whereby water can be diverted from drainpipes and stored. This can then be used during the warmer months of the year, reducing the need to use tap water.
Rainwater harvesting is an important part of permaculture philosophy. This quick and practical solution helps to reduce your water usage through rainwater reuse, thereby promoting sustainability in your backyard.
Again, the, er, “holistic” (woo) aspect is missing. (Here is a permaculture project with a focus on water.) Any serious permaculture project is going to put more thought into water than capturing it in a barrel, but you have to start somewhere! (I really added this because in the papers I’m either reading about floods or drought; and a stock of water seems like a handy buffer to have, especiallly if (say) you can trickle it out to the beds at need.)
From Permaculture Institute Sydney, “Basic Design Techniques and Plant Choices for Growing a Fire Break” (granted, Australian bushfires; perhaps a reader from California will speak up). This is a massive plan, and so I will pick out one or two of the easy bits:
Food forests and vegetable gardens are largely fire retardant. They are usually moister areas and the plant species are not fire prone species. Placement of these elements between you and the likely fire front along with other firebreaks and strategies will greatly protect your home.
And:
Mounds of soil strategically placed near your house enable you to access the roof quickly and safely to fight fire and ember attack. The roof is a hot spot in a fire and climbing ladders is dangerous. Earth mounds also protect your home and other structures and keep them cool.
Conclusion
Permaculture has been growing quietly while I ignored it; there are three million permaculturalists worldwide, placing permaculture as an ethical or spiritual practice between Zorastrianism (2.6 million) and Shinto (4.0 million) in 140 countries. That’s not unimpressive! And permaculture is being normalized, and its concepts being extended beyond agriculture:
[T]he booming “blue economy” is no panacea. Fish farms can pollute the water. Mangroves are often felled to make way for prawn farms. The solutions of today could turn out to be problems of the future. We cannot simply shift from one form of environmental exploitation to another.
There is an alternative: permaculture. This approach has proven itself on land as a way to blend farming with healthy ecosystems. What if it could do the same on water?
So perhaps progress is being made, away from the spotlight:
The bottom photo will naturally remind the reader of Monet’s garden at Giverny, where he painted his famous water lilies. Here is one permaculturalist’s view of Giverny (the whole piece is thought-provoking):
An invitation to be a “pop up speaker” at the NGV’s Monet’s Garden Exhibition gave me an opportunity to address this vexed role of aesthetics in permaculture…. [According to founder Bill Mollison, [p]ermaculture was about growing useful plants in contrast the ‘useless plants’ of ornamental horticulture. Monet was not a target of Mollisonian scorn, but I suppose he could have been… Even the roses much reviled by Mollison as useless ornamentals are actually a source of perfume, culinary delights and medicinal rose hips as well as being yummy goat fodder. So maybe there can be an accommodation between aesthetics of Monet’s and ecological rationalism of Permaculture because these apparent polar opposites always carry the seed of the other.
And dialectics with aesthetics having charged onto left field, I will end, if not conclude. Gardening is, of course, one way to “stay safe out there.” Eh?
NOTES
[1] Wikipedia also has an excellent potted history of permaculture, starting with Franklin Hiram King’s Farmers of Forty Centuries: Or Permanent Agriculture in China, Korea and Japan..
