April 15

Trees trapping moisture

In Permaculture you are encouraged to find as many functions as you can in each element you use in the garden/land that you have. Trees are one of those elements that are a must; food forests are ubiquitous nowadays, and on permaculture courses you are often prompted to list all of their functions from food and fuel to leaf litter which enriches the soil. But one of the key things trees can do is harvest moisture from the air such as when it is misty and deposit it on the land.

We have had several days of sea mist this week with a couple of days when it hasn’t cleared at all. This morning was misty again and the picture shows clearly the damp spots on the ground where the mist has collected in the evergreen trees and then eventually fallen. Unfortunately it is on to tarmac so they won’t benefit from the moisture but this is going on wherever there is a tree.

Or so I thought until I walked down my road home. Here, there is no damp patch under the enormous eucalyptus, the small damp patch you can see is from the silver birch just past it. As Eucalyptus are a drought tolerant tree coming from hot places I wonder if they have some mechanism whereby they retain the water in some way through their leaves, bark, trunk etc. Silver birch don’t perhaps because they are a temperate climate tree.

You learn something every day!

Category: april, permaculture, trees | LEAVE A COMMENT
November 22

Permaculture Plan part 2

Last week I wrote about all the maps needed for my Permaculture Design Certificate but they were only about 2/3 of the maps needed, so this week it is the final maps with the actual plan on it.

Having decided where the water, access and structures are you are left with some space to fit in the things that you want.

The next map is a Zone map. Permaculture works in zones with zone 0 being the house and centre of activities working outwards towards zone 5. The zones are about how often you visit the area so zone 0 multiple times a day but zone 4 you might only visit once or twice a year where the area is virtually self-managing. For example, there is a large walnut tree in the garden which does not need any maintenance other than harvesting the nuts making it a zone 4 area in this location.

As you can see from my map the zones do not have to go out in concentric circles as shown in the diagram probably because real life is not that neat!

I have to admit to drawing this map after I had completed my final plan for the garden. I am not quite sure how you can do it before hand.

And finally, we get to the plan itself. At this point you can definitely say that you know this plot of land well and so placing of the elements that you want is quite easy.

There is a small food forest planted around the swale with fruit trees, bushes and shrubs, some permanent vegetables and spreading herbs. In front of this, in pink, are the annual vegetable beds in straight lines so that they can be easily covered over winter. There is a windbreak hedge in front of the veg beds and then willows in front of that to soak up as much water as possible before it leaves the property.

In front of the house are 4 apricot trees placed to soak up the sunshine.

 

Not all of the plants can be identified on this plan, they are just too small to show so there are some planting plans to go alongside it.

The first set of planting plans shows the herb bed around the pergola and the pergolas around the house.  Plants have been identified on the plan so that everything can be seen at a quick glance.

 

 

 

 

 

The second planting plan shows the pond, the windbreak hedge and the tree guilds, again with plants identified on them. Each diagram has its own compass and also has its own scale identified because they vary.

What I did feel at this point was that it was important to be quite specific about the plants, I didn’t want to come back to it again later, and it was a requirement that we provide the latin name. If you just list a walnut tree, a black walnut will have a very different impact on your planting plans to an English walnut. (Black walnuts have a substance juglone which they release in the soil and which kills some other fruit trees off such as apple, pear and plum.)

I also created a connections map because there are several concepts in permaculture such as each element having more than one function, using niches, stacking functions, use of edges and many others. I probably should have included this in my submission because the feedback was that I was a bit light on connections in my description of my plan. Below, I list an example of some of the concepts:

Elements having more than one function: Grass paths through the forest garden

  • somewhere to walk with out damaging the planting
  • can be mown and the grass be used as a mulch or incorporated into the compost which will then be used as a mulch
  • act as barriers if a lot of water flows down out of the swale and would be able to hold a couple of inches back as they are set higher than the soil
  • define the growing area
  • prevent the spreading plants such as mint from taking over

Stacking functions: Outdoor sink

  • the water used in the sink is rain water collected from the back half of the house roof
  • runs down the plughole into a bucket underneath
  • used to water vegetables
  • veg picked and need to be washed and so we go round again

Use of edges:

Edges are some of the most valuable parts because they are the meeting space between two places and therefore benefit from both but also create a third space of their own

  • the edge of the pond and the land for growing plants for food, habitat, keeping the water clean and aesthetic reasons
  • the edge of a forest where there is more sunshine and so is suitable for fruit bushes and shrubs
  • the edge of a hard surface such as paving where water runoff can be used by the plants

I have to say that this whole process took hours and of course, if you make a mistake with hand drawn maps you have to draw them again. I did use Tipex on several occasions. So, I have started to learn how to use Inkscape as it seems that many people use it to create their plans. I have managed the first three maps so far!

Have you ever drawn plans or do you create as you go along?

 

Category: november, PDC, permaculture | LEAVE A COMMENT
November 21

The Top 5 Myths about Permaculture

Photo from Olds College, Flickr

Someone in a Facebook group I belong to posted a picture of their allotment and said they were doing permaculture, showing a picture of their herb spiral and asking what did other permaculturist’s plots look like?

I replied that my plot looked like everyone else’s because it does. You wouldn’t look at it and say ‘Oh, she does Permaculture!’ It is a myth that you can look at a plot and know that the person follows permaculture principles.

So, here are some more myths about Permaculture.

Just because you have a permaculture feature, e.g. herb spiral, swale, banana circles, chicken composting system or  food forest, it does not mean that you ‘do’ permaculture. Permaculture is based around living by the three core ethics: Earth care, People care and Fair share and the 12 principles. You can’t see these by looking at the plot but you can see them if you know the person who has the plot because their behaviours will embody these ethics. I do have swales on my plot, they look like wood chip paths, but I also think carefully about the three ethics. Having the wildlife plot has increased the amount of People care and Fair share I can do.

You can’t use chemicals in Permaculture. Permaculture is a broad church and as they say, you can’t be thrown out of the permaculture family. It is true that under the Earth care and People care ethic you wouldn’t be spraying chemicals every week and replicating large scale agricultural systems but it is possible to spray with Round Up, for instance, once to clear the land of very pervasive plants and then move on and grow without chemicals.  There is no one way of growing in permaculture. You could be organic, regenerative, no-dig, biodynamic or even syntropic (I know! I had never heard of it before). They all fit with Permaculture because it is the 12 principles that drive what and how you do it and they all care for the earth.

Permaculture is about growing food and you can’t have flowers or a lawn. Not true at all. You can have whatever you want in a permaculture design but you want to establish as many links between systems as you can and if you want a lawn for whatever reason, then you can have it. The final design for my Permaculture Design Certificate included a lawn for playing games on and pitching tents. The feedback stated:

You illustrate a good balance between open space and design space. Often either the lawn/social space dominates the site, or appears to be an afterthought shoehorned in and does not “fit”.  Yours not only fits well into the rest of your design but strikes that good balance between it and the rest of your design.

Permaculture looks messy. This one is very subjective. My tidy might be your messy and what does looking messy mean. Do we mean lots of things lying around? If so, then whatever system you use to grow will look messy because that is a personal characteristic. Do we mean weeds are allowed to flourish? Well, the weeds might be a key component of the system. Nettles are a key component of my growing system. I keep them for wildlife as so many caterpillars live on them and I harvest them to create a tea for the plants and use them as an accelerator in my compost. They grow at the edges of my plot and can look a little ‘messy’ I suppose if your plot has none.

Is it that bare earth over winter looks tidy and that my plot doesn’t look like that? Permaculturists don’t like bare earth. Succession of the land means that something will always grow on bare earth so we keep crops growing throughout the winter, cover it with compost, mulch, green manures or woven plastic. These things also reduce erosion and provide protection to the hard work going on in the soil that means that our plants will grow. Is it that we have plants underneath and around trees? Yes, we do plant around and underneath trees and this is called a guild. Each plant has a function with the overall goal being to increase production of the tree.

Is it that there is a lot of long grass growing all over the place? Well that depends on the size of the land. If it is acres, then so what. If it is allotment size then that is nothing to do with permaculture. That is just how the grower allows it to be.

Permaculture is only about growing food. Nope. Permaculture is also about people and about how we apply the Fair Share ethic in a world that can prioritise accumulation of ‘things’ above connections between people and the earth. Social permaculture takes the principles and applies them to how we work with others. For example edge effect is where two ecosystems come together to create a third space which has greater productivity, fertility and diversity than the separate spaces. On land this might be the edge of the forest where different plants grow and animals live in comparison with inside the forest and out in the open. In social permaculture this might mean two separate groups coming together to work on a shared goal with the outcome of more creative ideas, greater diversity in the ways of thinking and solutions to problems, collaboration and friendships. The people and their systems are as important as the plants and their systems.

Do you follow permaculture principles?

Category: november, permaculture | LEAVE A COMMENT
November 15

Permaculture Plan part 1

I thought I would share the plan I  submitted for my final design exercise plus some of the writing that goes alongside it to explain.

Before you start anything you need to gather information about the plot, weather, climate, land and what is already there and this involves A LOT of maps and if you can’t do them electronically, you have to hand draw them.  I did draw them by hand because it would have taken me so long to learn a new piece of software that I thought it would detract from the space in my brain to think permaculture thoughts!

The first plan is a boundary map showing only the outlines of the land with no detail so that there is nothing to detract from clearly seeing the shape and area.  It states the space you have to work and ensures there is no confusion.

It needs to include a compass so that directions can be easily seen plus scale and I have included the road and buildings.  This map became my base map and is one that I traced or photocopied to use for all other maps minus the boundary lengths. To get this map I used google maps and a data projector and traced the land on a piece of paper stuck on the wall.

 

Next was the contour map showing the slope of the land. Although this garden felt fairly flat, there was one contour line running through it at 108m. Feedback suggested that one contour line is not enough on a map because it does not show in which direction the land slopes and therefore how water would flow. There are two things I could do here. I could show 107m and 109m both of which are off the property or I could have looked to see if there were any contours at 0.5m intervals on the land and I will go back and consider both of these and which would be more useful.

 

 

Then there is the sector map.  On this we map the sun’s pathway in mid winter and summer (red sectors), prevailing winds and other winds that affect the place plus things like views to be kept. We also map negative things such as noise, views we don’t want or anything else we want to block out in the design. This will have an impact on what we place and where. Different colours for each sector are used and most focus around the house because that is the centre of action. The sector at the top affects the barn which is why it is placed up there rather than around the house.

The small diagram at the bottom of the map shows the angle of the sun, important if you want to block out the sun in mid summer  and allow it in in the winter. This map enabled me to see clearly where a windbreak hedge needs to be placed for the prevailing winds (dark blue) and the cold north easterly winds (light blue) in winter.

Without water there is no life so the water map in Permaculture is extremely important. What we are aiming for here is to hold water on the land for as long as possible, preferably where we need it. The saying is ‘slow it, spread it and sink it’ and some add store it to that list. This property is not storing potable water, just water for the gardens but many properties where water is scarce or expensive will have systems planned into the design to do so. This map links up with the contour map because swales, tree growing systems that slow water down, are built on contour. The feedback on this map was that the water flow was not clear although I did show it on another map. I just needed an arrow from the pond at the top of the garden to the next pond and one from the pond to the swale to enable everyone to see the flow of water through the land.

This is the first map that shows design elements, elements that are not already present on the land. There is a second mini swale at the front of the house to water some trees that will be planted there but this is not on a contour line and will be fed from the front half of the house roof.

For this map we also calculate run off and overflow of water for a ‘once in a hundred years’ rainfall imagining that the land is 100% saturated so that we have no disasters with large bodies of water flowing across the land. For each element of water, pond, swale, rain garden and ditch the amount of water that will fall must be calculated and a spillway built into the system to allow it to overflow across the land. So, as you go down the land the spillways get bigger and bigger as the catchment area grows. I have over sized all of the spillways because these once in a hundred year events are happening more frequently now.

Next is the access map and again this features access to the land, paths, tracks, drives, roads etc that are existing and staying and new additions. This gives us a chance to consider whether the driveway is on the boggiest piece of land or how we will access all parts of the land.

Once again, I have removed all extraneous pieces of information so that the access is really clear. To create this map, I used tracing paper over the boundary map to get paths, driveway and paving in the right place and to show how they are all connected. The paths are 1.2m wide to allow space for a person and a wheelbarrow.

 

Following this is the structure map which shows fences, buildings, outbuildings, pergolas or anything which is a structure that you want to include in the design. My addition to the structures are two pergolas; one on  the southwest and west sides of the house to provide shade in the summer and one at the back of the house to provide a place to sit out and eat. The pergola around the house is designed to allow the sun in during the winter months but prevent it from hitting the house during the summer. This will have an effect on the temperature inside the house.

Some designs will include building a house or siting a shed, greenhouse or polytunnel. Mine is quite minimal in this area.

The last of the maps in this section (hooray!) is the W.A.S map or water, access and structure map where all three are combined but with the emphasis on where they intersect. This means that you don’t have to show everything but it is important to show things such as where the paths and water meet and cross because this will need to be designed for using things such as crossing pipes to take the water in that area.

The red blobs are crossing areas for swale and paths and the dark blue blob is where possible overflow and path meet.

You can also see on this map the two blue arrows showing the flow of water from pond to pond which I should have included on the water map.

Once you have this map it becomes much easier to place your other elements. Trees must go along the swale, the annual vegetable garden needs to go in a sunny, easily accessible place, a place to play and pitch tents becomes more obvious and so the final design can be created.

I’ll show you the maps for that in another post. You may well be mapped out by now!

Category: november, PDC, permaculture | LEAVE A COMMENT
November 14

Certificates galore!

What a month it has been. You can go for years without a certificate and then several come your way!

The first one is for passing my Permaculture Design course which I started in February and finished this month (November).  I have taken part in quite a few online courses, including writing one, and this one, Geoff Lawton Permaculture Design Course online,  was excellent.  The course has Teaching Assistants who patiently answer every single question asked and obviously have extensive permaculture experience themselves.

At the end you have to submit a permaculture design for a plot of land bigger than half an acre, although you don’t need to own the land, and explain your permaculture thinking. I am now qualified to undertake permaculture designs.

 

My second certificate was from the Vegetable Growing Course that we run on the allotments. John leads it but there are three of us that help, you could call us teaching assistants (!) and one of the course members has a daughter who is incredibly creative and made us certificates for a graduation ceremony. They are lino prints and absolutely fantastic. We started  the course the second week of February and finished at the end of October, sowing, growing and harvesting together working in a no-dig way. The best thing about the course was getting to know the group and now that they all have their own allotments we are still a community but part of a much wider one.  Our next activity is in December where John is hosting two sessions for us to make Christmas wreaths.

The third certificate is one for the allotments as a whole as part of the RHS Exmouth in Bloom It’s Your Neighbourhood Award where we received ‘Outstanding’ for the Vegetable Course and the Wildlife Garden. That was a real surprise as the Wildlife Garden was a last minute entrant and I didn’t really know what I was doing in terms of the In Bloom bit but we are delighted with the outcome. I haven’t seen the certificate yet but hope to soon.

After all these celebrations I am off to do the real work. Clean out my greenhouse and sow some broad beans. What are you up to this week?

Category: november, PDC, permaculture, the vegetable course | LEAVE A COMMENT
March 26

Flow in permaculture

If you know the TV programme The Fast Show, you will be familiar with Jesse and his sayings “This week I have been mostly …” I am looking a bit like Jesse at the moment because I really need my hair cutting and we have very strong winds so

This week I have been mostly looking at flow and pattern!

We have already covered the flow pattern called succession and are now concentrating on the flow of energy in wind, water and I am also going to include people in this because they are relevant to my site. The main focus of our work has been what happens when the flow meets an object – how it moves around it and how that differs depending on the speed or velocity of the flow and applying that to our patch of land.

Because my patch of land is right by the sea, flow has had a very obvious impact on it, creating the dunes in the first place but wind, water and people continue to shape it. It starts at the eastern end at the entrance/exit to a temporary car park which is necessary for the influx of visitors in the summer. The beach, however, is the other side of the road so most people that come out of the carpark need to cross the road and the quickest way to do so is walk up the patch of land to get to the edge of the road. These shortcuts, known as desire lines,  usually show designers where they have got things wrong! They are the paths or flows of least resistance and the land can become quite eroded depending on the number of feet that pass by on them. The path also  doesn’t go straight up or down but comes in at an angle.

It would be quite possible to build a set of steps here that flare out at the bottom, mirroring the erosion but would what happened in this picture happen because we know it is just quicker to walk up. Actually, in this instance I would formalise that path as well so that people have a choice about which to use.

In fact, desire paths are so common, and in some instances so fascinating, that Reddit users document them.

 

I have talked about the wind and the impact it has on this patch of land and some of its edges before but this patch has one difficult, solid edge where a wall and pavement meet. In a southerly blow, the sand hits the wall and drops to the base where one of the road sweepers that keep the beach area looking neat and tidy sweeps up the sand and puts it in his cart to empty it else where I am presuming.  I have often wondered what would happen if they didn’t. Would that paved area fill up eventually and join up with the dune/land at the same level?

Contrary to most edges, I think this is one of those edges that does not increase yield or create a third space that is richer than either side of it.

Are there any lines or paths of desire on walks you do?

Category: beach, Design from pattern to detail, East Devon District Council, Geoff Lawton Online Permaculture Design Certificate, observe and interact, pattern to detail, permaculture | LEAVE A COMMENT
March 18

Patterns on a plot of land

We’ve been studying patterns and all of a sudden, they are everywhere. It really is about looking through a filter and although I am not very good at it yet, I am definitely noticing more than I did before.

The plot, outlined in red here, is across the road from the beach and is part of a big pattern of sand dunes created many years ago. From the 1880s onwards the land was used as as a links golf course and some of the bunkers can still be seen.

A road then divided the course from the beach and with pavements and play centres built, the dunes became part of the built environment, parts often becoming separated from each other.

But whilst the sand dunes no longer have access to the sea, they are still building and being blown away in minature on the plot of land.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The sand dune that constitutes this plot of land is at the end of the yellow dune and the start of the grey dune phase. It is definitely no longer mobile but the main plant growing on it is grass which is stabilising it.

The first pattern obvious when you move down onto the lower pavement is one of a wave alongside the edge where the sand meets the pavement. Whilst edges are some of the most productive places, this one doesn’t seem to be but I think that is probably because people walk on it because the pavement is not wide enough for groups.

 

 

 

In order for sand dunes to be made, you need two media, sand and wind, where the wind  blows sand, deposits it and then blows it away again. In geographic terms, deposition and erosion. Whilst the dunes behind the beach are quite stable, this piece of land has mini dunes on it. The wind blows the sand which gets trapped by the grass on the land and is then eventually blown off, hitting the wall opposite it and deposited at the base of the wall. The ripples in the sand come from the patterns on the base of trainers rather than anything nature has created. Although hard to see, the pattern is again a wave pattern.

Here, the sea beet is moving out from the fence post which offers some protection from the wind in a scatter pattern relating to how the seed has fallen, almost in an explosion pattern.

A book I am reading to gain more knowledge about reading the land is How to Read the Landscape by Patrick Whitefield.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Category: Geoff Lawton Online Permaculture Design Certificate, observe and interact, pattern to detail, PDC, permaculture, use edges | LEAVE A COMMENT
March 14

Using nature’s patterns

In nature there are a limited number of patterns but an infinite number of variations. Take a snowflake: there are no two snowflakes that are the same although they are all formed in a similar way.

The air temperature and the humidity, to some degree, determine the basic shape of the snowflake. We get needle-like crystals at -1.6°C and flat, plate-like crystals at -15°C. The shape of one arm of a snowflake is determined by the atmospheric conditions as it falls; the temperature or humidity might change as it falls and this affects how the water crystal grows and also explains why the six arms are identical. They all experience the same conditions at the same point. Anyway, these patterns are symmetrical and fascinating, so what about others.

In nature we can find waves, lobes, spirals, clouds, branching patterns and scatters all of which are patterns of growth, and nets which are patterns of lateral tension, distribution of weight, storage of energy and shrinkage.

I am going to look at three patterns in a bit more detail: branching patterns, explosion patterns and spirals.

Branching patterns

Orchid flower

Alocasia sanderiana

Cornus controversa ‘Variegata’

 

 

 

 

 

 

With thanks to Meghan Rocktopus

Branching patterns (sometimes called dendritic or fractal patterns) can be one of the easiest patterns to spot. They can be found in leaves, roots, rivers and our circulatory and nervous systems to name but a few places. Looking closely at the three photos taken of plants inside and outside my house, I can see that they have slightly different ways of branching. A little research on the internet suggests that there might be 19 different branching patterns. The Alocasia looks more like a distichous or pinnate branching with the orchid more of a dichotomous branching and the Cornus a trichotomous. This isn’t really important knowledge for permaculture purposes, just of interest to me.

Branching patterns are found where there is a gathering and dispersal of materials or energy. At a micro level they are essential for the efficient exchange of  gases and fluids with the environment due to the maximised surface area.

So how could we use these as permaculture designers? Branching patterns are well-suited to roads and paths where something needs to be distributed across a wide area. Branching patterns can also relate to the organisation of people such as a large, hierarchical company where who line manages who is depicted. For an example of a branching pathway (cervicorn – branching like antlers) used in a permaculture design see p11 of Mobile home garden design by Aranya. Look on the right-hand side of the design next to the decking.

Exploding patterns

Weeds in my garden!

Back to the snowflake patterns which would fit into this category. The image shows two weeds in my garden that both have an exploding pattern in 2d with the leaves lying flat on the ground. You can see how they layer over each other in the weed on the right (I’m not sure what it is called) and in fact it is almost symmetrical with 10 leaves on the lower layer. It is obvious how the arrangement of leaves allows it to gain maximum sunshine and I do wonder if it does well in slightly shady spots where this photo was taken. There is a very direct route between the central point and each external point  in complete contrast to a spiral where the central point is a long way away from the end point if you follow the spiral around.

This explosion, however, is the dried flower of Allium x ‘Globemaster’ with some seeds left in the seedheads. The flowerhead is made up of hundreds of little flowers in a beautiful purple during late May early June.  It is an excellent example of a pattern within a pattern within a pattern because it is an explosion making a sphere with some branching at the end of each individual flowerhead. You get a really clear picture of how the seeds are dispersed all around the plant, some near and some slightly further away.

 

Some towns and cities have an explosion pattern built up over time. They may well have started off as a nucleated settlement but then have grown over time, spread out along main roads finishing with some isolated housing which eventually becomes part of the main settlement. Lisbon is one city that shows an explosion pattern of settlement.

 

So, how can we use this pattern in design? This is an image of La Ferme du Bec Hellouin in Normandy, France. Below the polytunnels can clearly be seen an exploding pattern set of beds all coming off a central point. Often in walled gardens there would be a well or water store in the centre of this type of pattern, making it quicker and easier to water the beds – or nowadays a tap on a standpipe from a gravity-fed reservoir on higher land. This link gives a closer view of the bed.

And finally, spiral patterns.

These are another type of fractal pattern frequently demonstrated through a snail shell, sunflower head, climbing tendrils on sweet peas and in weather systems.

Euphorbia myrsinites

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The euphorbia above has a spiral in a spiral. First the leaves spiral around each stem and then each stem spirals out of a central point. I did wonder if the whole plant was an example of an explosion but the stems curl round rather than being straight so I am putting it in the spiral group, not unlike weather patterns. The spiral arrangement of leaves on a plant is to ensure maximum exposure to sunlight and for the seeds. Spirals are able to capture and slow down energy such as in a herb spiral, that ubiquitous permaculture plant bed. To be fair, they are space-saving and allow for different types of herb to be grown, making use of the different amounts of moisture in different parts of the bed.

 

Photo from Olds College, Flickr

https://www.tomatocages.org/tomatocage/tomato-spirals.html

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So how else can we use spirals?

I have a number of spiral plant supports which I use for tomatoes in particular. They are tall, narrow spirals which you can twist the stems around as they grow. But there are also other spirals that can be used as plant supports. The third image shows a support that allows climbers to go up and the final one supports flower heads. I use one of these on a peony.

A vortex is a spiral where the air or water swirls around and anything caught in the motion is pulled into the centre. One place where this can be used in the garden is in free flow water features to aerate the water. They are based on an idea from Rudolf Steiner and shown through Drop Test Pictures developed by Theodore Schwenk. Water moves in patterns down a river and creates patterns when a drop is released. Pollution in the water will change the patterns formed so tap water gives a different and lower quality pattern to water fresh from an unpolluted stream. The free form fountains mix water and oxygen together providing support for organisms to break down pollutants and is reported to increase and stimulate plant growth.

Do you use any patterns from nature in your garden?

A book I have bought to read as a result of this module on patterns in nature is Patterns in Nature: Why the natural world looks the way it does by Philip Ball.

Category: Design from pattern to detail, Geoff Lawton Online Permaculture Design Certificate, march, PDC, permaculture | LEAVE A COMMENT
March 7

Where does it come from and where does it go?

Whatever we take, we must return.

Permaculture: A Designers’ Manual by Bill Mollison p12

Everything we use comes from somewhere and goes somewhere after we have finished with it.  The permaculture ethic, Earth Care, demands that we consider how we live and the impact that we have on the planet. If we eat food that we grow, it is easy to say where it has come from and where it goes afterwards. There seems to be a saying in permaculture that in nature there is no such thing as waste; the leaves that fall break down and provide nutrients for the micro-organisms in the soil, broken branches eventually rot and do the same, bird droppings provide fertiliser for nearby plants. Everything is in a large and sometimes complex loop where nothing is wasted. And in permaculture, we are using nature’s systems to learn from and replicate where appropriate. We know that we need to reduce our waste and so this task is about making me more aware of the issues involved in every day products that I use. Just the sort of activity for a wet afternoon.

I have chosen bubble bath to look at in more detail because I do love bubble bath and it does make cleaning out the bath after use much easier. In fact, if I think about the water, I should be having short showers rather than a bath but will leave that aside for now. I won’t name the bubble bath because it is not about the manufacturer but more about me, my behaviours and what I know about products that I regularly use. I have chosen to use Milkwood’s Life Cycle Analysis Tool to guide me through this process.

What are the ingredients of the product?

Aqua (do they  mean water?), sodium laureth sulfate, sodium chloride, Cocamidopropyl Betaine, Parfum, styrene/acrylates copolymer, DMDM hydantoin, Glycerin, Disodium EDTA, Citric acid, sodium hydroxide, polyquarternium-7 

Cosmeticsinfo.org has really good information about many of these ingredients as well as the individual sites I have linked to.

All of the ingredients are chemically made and many of the websites I looked at said that they were safe in the quantities allowed in cosmetics. Something to think about.  Because they are made chemically, there will be waste products as a result of manufacture of each item and then the bubble bath itself.

The bubble bath is made in the UK so whilst there will be quite a few miles before it gets to me, it isn’t as bad as some items.

There is waste produced as a result of using it – contaminated water that will need more cleaning than if I hadn’t used it. The packaging is recyclable and contains 25% recycled plastic. I did read that the supermarket’s own brands are cruelty-free and this blog provides excellent lists about products sold in the said shop that are all cruelty-free. Bubble bath isn’t included but many other hair and skin products are if you wanting to make a more informed choice.

So, on reflection do I think I should be using bubble bath – I don’t. I have looked around for products that are more ethical and the best I found is this from a company that is very transparent about ingredients, how they are made and with reduced packaging but now I think it is a product I should refuse. Blimey! I expected to go through this process and come out the other end changing the product to a ‘better’ one but still using it. Not the case!

Give the process a go yourself.

And finally, should ‘Repair’ be on the diagram used at the start of the post?

Category: PDC, permaculture | LEAVE A COMMENT
March 5

What’s in the local environment – permaculture activity

Having finally decided on the space for my online Permaculture Design Course activities, today on my walk I focused on the plants, including the big trees that I missed.

I have already mentioned the grass that is growing on the land which is doing a sterling job of preventing erosion and stabilising the soil but there are a couple of other things as well.

 

 

The first plant is yarrow, Achillea millefolium, wrapped around one of the fence posts at the west end of the land. The picture of it demonstrates how it creates more soil as the leaves that blow around and get caught in it rot down along with the plant stems. The Wildlife Trust website states that this is a plant that can help to restore arable land to grassland which it is doing here as well as stabilising the soil.

This next plant I am less sure about.

Again, its clumping form helps trap soil/sand, leaves etc. At first I thought it was a crambe which edible seaside plants but the leaves don’t look quite as kale like as most crambes do.  I wondered about dock, it looks like horse radish that has gone wild on the allotment next to mine. As there are no flowers it is hard to say. However, after using PlantNet I think I agree with them that it is Sea Beet, and edible coastal plant.  I will be more secure with the identification when it flowers.

On the other side of the road around the new development, there has been some planting and I thought it might be worthwhile noting what has been put in and look at how they do over time – you never know. There might be something that would do well on the bit of land I am looking at.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First we have a cistus and what I think is a cotton lavender, Santolina chamaecyparissus. I’ll be able to tell more when they flower but here the landscapers have dipped into Mediterranean plants. They are planted someway behind the buildings and so are probably somewhat sheltered from the southerly winds. The santolina can be used to create low hedges and that might be useful on my plot to trap leaves etc to build up the soil.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There is also an eleagnus and a sisyrinchium which likes hot, dry conditions but will also tolerate some shade and damp and our winters are damp.

One plant has already died – probably the Beast from the East saw if off with desiccating, cold winds. It was some sort of fastigiate small tree – yew/pine.

It is still behind the buildings but at the edge and probably is just not protected enough.

As more plants appear, I will add them to this list.

 

Category: Geoff Lawton Online Permaculture Design Certificate, march, PDC, permaculture | LEAVE A COMMENT