permaculture is economically viable

[Paul Wheaton]

This information is rather astounding.

For months a few of us have been discussing whether permaculture is economically viable and then somebody comes along and points out this essay (or maybe it is a response to something?)

Wow. Permaculture is far better than I thought.

"On approximately two acres— half of which was on a terraced 35 degree slope—I produced enough food to feed more than 300 people (with a peak of 450 people at one point), 49 weeks a year in my fully organic CSA on the edge of Silicon Valley"

"The farm produced so much income that I was routinely in the top 15% of organic farms in California (which has over 2000 organic farms) in most years on a fraction of the land that my colleagues were using."

"I'd like to remind everyone that in the 1850's, prior to refrigerated transport, New York City supplied all its food for a population of over a million from within 7 miles of the borders of the city. (It wasn't worth the cost of horse feed and time to go further than 7 miles to export food into the city). No one would discount a system of community food security for one million people as non-commercial."

"There are two main reasons known for the dramatically increased productivity of a polyculture?\the benefit of mycorhyzzal symbiosis (which is destroyed in chemical agriculture) and less solar saturation. Solar saturation is the point at which a plants' photosynthetic machinery is overwhelmed by excess sunlight and shut down. In practice, this means that most of our crop plants stop growing at about 10am and don't start again until about 4 in the afternoon. Various members of a polyculture shade each other, preventing solar saturation, so plants metabolize all day. Polyculture as we pursue in permaculture uses close to 100% of the sunlight falling on its mixed crops. Monoculture rarely can use more than 30% of the total sunlight received before saturation. How long could you run any business without external support at 30% efficiency?"

[chickenista]

Thanks for that link.. I read the whole essay and it is great.
I saved it into my favorites so that I can read it whenever I need a boost to remind me why I do all of this work.

[texican]

I have to wonder when someone says they feed 300 people off of two acres, exactly what they mean. Do the 300 eat only food off the two acres... all their sustenance, or do they get to each eat a strawberry?

I have an orchard, on less than an acre. I could say that it feeds thousands... if I gave away a pear, peach, plum, nectarine, or fig to everyone I meet.

Went and read the links... sounds like some folks can 'make it'... as long as they live near yuppies with excess disposable income.

I raise food for myself... not as a business. First, I despise having to interact and dicker with strangers over prices, I despise having total strangers (some with questionable intentions) visiting the farm at all hours of the day to purchase farm fresh food, and we're so far away from yuppies, it hurts *in a good way*.

I know some folks can survive off of some vegetables... and a veg garden just might get em through the year. Personally, I like a little grain in my diet... which, if I had to grow it, would require plowing up the hay meadow.

[ronbre]

Paul, thanks for the link. I have been experimenting with the idea of growing more and more things in more and more shady environment now for 38 years and I do find that this does seem to prove my theory that less sunshine is likely better for a lot of plants that grow well in my zone. I do respect the tropical plants and give them an extra dose ..some in the greenhouse..like tomato and pepper plants..as I live in the frozen north, but I have found that even "full sun" plants really don't need full sun in most cases as long as they are well cared for. Also in water shortage areas permaculture only makes sense as the closer growing of plants will always help plants to retain moisture rather than the soil baking between plants in conventional row gardens.
I first realized this in the 70's studying french intensive garden methods..and layering of crops..but the permaculture literature gives more knowledge to the garden of how plants helpe each other, as well as animals interfacing with the plants. I'll bookmark that link and read it through when i have the time, got a whole passel of permie links to read right now !

[ronbre]

wow i just went and read the article..and of course bookmarked that site..wow that is a great article. I so totally agree with what he said about "social security". My husband and I got an inheritance from the death of his mom this past year and we spent a lot of the money on an outdoor wood boiler to heat our and our son's house with scrap dead poplar wood and some hardwood, from our woodlot. It burns clean, for EPA standards and although it is a pain over propane..it sure makes sense ecologically. We also used several hundreds of $ to purchase fruit and nut trees for our OLD AGE..He is disabled now but I'm also not working out of the home cause of his mental condition. So being able to use that area around our home and beyond, to help sustain our old age totally made sense to us. We seek every form of perennial food to put on our land that we can be it tree, vine, shrub, herb, etc.. but we are not at this time raising domesticated animals..we have deer, rabbits, turkey and others resident thanks to God and the DNR so we can hunt them if we choose to, but the provide an enormous amount of fertilizer for our gardens and they spread it themselves. We also have wild birds that keep the insects under control.

Permaculture has always just made common sense to me and for anyone to argue, just shows their foolishness.

[stanb999]

Permaculture in the desert using water from far, far away... Not too likely.

[Wisconsin Ann]

There are some rather misleading ideas in his essay, I must say. For instance...

I'd like to remind everyone that in the 1850's, prior to refrigerated transport, New York City supplied all its food for a population of over a million from within 7 miles of the borders of the city. (It wasn't worth the cost of horse feed and time to go further than 7 miles to export food into the city).

1850 census shows New York City with 696,000 (that includes Manhattan, Statten Island, Brooklyn, Bronx, Queens). Not 1million. The other problem I see with his math is the idea that people only shipped in food 7 miles. That's just not true. If it needed to be iced, they used ice from the rivers that were stored in the icehouse. Plenty of farmers all over the country would take produce, meat, (fresh, smoked, pickled, salted), cheeses, butter, eggs....from up to 10 or 15 miles out..the distance a wagon can go in a day. You take your food in one day, drop it at the market, go home the next. They also had the commercial fisheries.

There are enough assumptions and non documented supposed facts in the essay to make me look at that essay ascance. . Yes, I'm sure permaculture can work in some places. Every farmer knows that you work WITH the land, not against it.

I'd also like to see his acreage, plantings, and actual harvest records. I can get 10lbs of pumpkin in a square foot. Or 10 lbs of tomatoes, I suppose, if I train it to climb upwards. But each and every foot? Call me a skeptic.

[Paul Wheaton]

Originally Posted by stanb999

Permaculture in the desert using water from far, far away... Not too likely.

Permaculture was born in the desert. Permaculture brings greenery to the desert.

[stanb999]

Originally Posted by Paul Wheaton

Permaculture was born in the desert. Permaculture brings greenery to the desert.

Then it's not "permanent". As soon as you irrigate you bring salts. Those salts will ruin your soil. Period.

If this guy is claiming to grow food in the desert without irrigation then he is truly a miracle worker!!! He has achieved what nature can't do. That would be GOD like behavior.

[edcopp]

Sounds like Stan already has all the answers, and does not know what the question was.

[stanb999]

Originally Posted by edcopp

Sounds like Stan already has all the answers, and does not know what the question was.

Sure I do... Live and garden where it rains. Any thing else is not sustainable long term. But if you wish to do cute exercises in futility, then by all means have at it.

[pickapeppa]

Greening the Dessert

It does rain in the desert. You just have to be smart about how to collect that rain and use it. It can be done. It has been done. This is just one example.

Here in the midwest, our modest sized home catches 52,000 gallons of rain per year. In Phoenix, AZ, the same sized home would collect 12,450 gallons of rain per year. If all that rainfall is collected and diverted toward the landscape layered with mulch or moisture holding ground covers, all of that rainfall can be put to a better use.

There are people in the southwest that have applied these principles in their own backyards successfully, and have as green of a landscape as anyone would want with very little or no trucked in water once it's established.

[Paul Wheaton]

Plant thousands of trees in the natural desert in australia. Truck in water for five years to baby the trees and then they are on their own. Now that big patch of trees is getting bigger every year all by itself.

It's all about picking the right trees/bushes/plants and placing them the right way and shaping the land a wee bit.

Of course, if you don't know how it is done, it would seem impossible.

If you are familiar with permaculture, you know that this sort of thing is done all the time.

And yes, those areas of australia that are struggling with salt issues are finding all sorts of solutions in permaculture.

[edcopp]

Originally Posted by stanb999

Then it's not "permanent". As soon as you irrigate you bring salts. Those salts will ruin your soil. Period.

If this guy is claiming to grow food in the desert without irrigation then he is truly a miracle worker!!! He has achieved what nature can't do. That would be GOD like behavior.

"This guy" that you are referring to must not be the same guy that I have been following for 20 years or so. The "guy" that I am reading about shared in a Nobel Peace Prize for his work. His work is Permaculture. Mostly he refers to repairing the mess that man has made of things on the planet.

For sure if your mind is closed to the facts, you will have to live with what you already have and know all about.

[stanb999]

Originally Posted by Paul Wheaton

Plant thousands of trees in the natural desert in australia. Truck in water for five years to baby the trees and then they are on their own. Now that big patch of trees is getting bigger every year all by itself.

It's all about picking the right trees/bushes/plants and placing them the right way and shaping the land a wee bit.

Of course, if you don't know how it is done, it would seem impossible.

If you are familiar with permaculture, you know that this sort of thing is done all the time.

And yes, those areas of australia that are struggling with salt issues are finding all sorts of solutions in permaculture.

So now you eat wood???

The article you posted was about feeding people. He was growing veggies...

[stanb999]

Originally Posted by edcopp

"This guy" that you are referring to must not be the same guy that I have been following for 20 years or so. The "guy" that I am reading about shared in a Nobel Peace Prize for his work. His work is Permaculture. Mostly he refers to repairing the mess that man has made of things on the planet.

For sure if your mind is closed to the facts, you will have to live with what you already have and know all about.

Like Jimmy Carter?

[mooman]

Sustainability comes at a cost. Can permaculture products curently compete with modern mass agriculture? Probably not. However, in 10, 20, 30 years when our "Modern Agriculture" practices have depleted our freshwater resources these industries will crash. Those who got on the "permaculture band wagon" and learned to "plant what grows" will still be producing food. It's about time eveybody started taking a hard look at how sustainable thier homesteading practices are.

[ronbre]

Not to be an idiot here or anything ..I have been reading and studying permaculture for many years and have been practicing it as well as I can in my situation in my property successfully. However, I am also aware that permaculture is different for each situation and each climate..it works with your land and your geography..certainly I would approach it differently in zones 4/5 of Michigan where it is cold and wet with an occasional late summer drought..then people would in the desert, but to say that it can't be done is just plain foolish..it is working with what you have to make your land better than it is without working with it..period.

the Zone 1 around the house can become something more than desert if you are able to collect what little rainfall there is..store it in a tank, and dole it out to some plants around your home, which in turn will shade your home and provide you with some food and coolness..what in heavens name is wrong with trying to better your property by not letting that water that comes off your roof in that precious few rains..just evaoprate and go to waste? Why not take some chances and put in a catch system and save it?
Why not once you have some of that precious water in a tank, use it, or even the graywater from your house, to grow a tree or two and something in its root zone to feed your family? good grief..what is the point in arguing..permaculture is nothing more than bettering the area around your home in the best way you can..what is so wrong with that??

[stanb999]

Originally Posted by ronbre

Not to be an idiot here or anything ..I have been reading and studying permaculture for many years and have been practicing it as well as I can in my situation in my property successfully. However, I am also aware that permaculture is different for each situation and each climate..it works with your land and your geography..certainly I would approach it differently in zones 4/5 of Michigan where it is cold and wet with an occasional late summer drought..then people would in the desert, but to say that it can't be done is just plain foolish..it is working with what you have to make your land better than it is without working with it..period.

the Zone 1 around the house can become something more than desert if you are able to collect what little rainfall there is..store it in a tank, and dole it out to some plants around your home, which in turn will shade your home and provide you with some food and coolness..what in heavens name is wrong with trying to better your property by not letting that water that comes off your roof in that precious few rains..just evaoprate and go to waste? Why not take some chances and put in a catch system and save it?
Why not once you have some of that precious water in a tank, use it, or even the graywater from your house, to grow a tree or two and something in its root zone to feed your family? good grief..what is the point in arguing..permaculture is nothing more than bettering the area around your home in the best way you can..what is so wrong with that??

I didn't say permaculture is a bad idea.... I said growing veggies in the semi-arid west isn't sustainable and is generally a bad idea.

To you thoughts on water catchment... In some areas where water is scarce it's illegal to catch rain water. Yeah, it's crazy I know. Using gray water on food crops is generally to be avoided unless you properly treat it. Which isn't hard but needs to be done right.

[edcopp]

Originally Posted by stanb999

Like Jimmy Carter?

Red Herring?