Summer 2014: Over lunch one day with a friend, I shared with him my latest gardening exploits. I started off nice and easy with talk about some of the things that avid gardeners do; like composting. Then I went on about how I am leaving my fruit trees in their containers so as to buy more time before planting them. I explained that I needed to further study the areas around the house in other to make a confident assessment of what type of micro climates existed. If that was not enough to bore him, I laid it on thick and talked about how I recently challenged myself to send off less green and brown waste to the landfill. To my surprise, my friend was not bored and was actually engaging the conversation. He wanted to know more about how I was collecting rain water and why I was sorting and saving the branches that had been pruned.

His question of why confused to me. Having known me all these years, he would already know that I dislike waste. Living in an arid climate; water that is not collected is wasted. Sticks that can be used to stake plants or start fires are wasted when they get sent off. Moreover, while the green and brown waste from one household requires a negligible amount of fuel to haul away, on the aggregate there can be a noticeable difference. 

As it turns out, my friend (whose thumb is as brown as the color of his plants) knew more about what I was doing than I did. That was when he turned me onto permaculture. Yearning to learn more, I took to the internet and libraries.

With permaculture, I learned that it is a social design principle centered around a partnership with nature. In its attainment permaculture is the polar opposite of the Industrial Era mindset that the destiny of man is to conquer nature and make her do his bidding. The full exploitation of fossil fuels (predominately crude oil) has enabled man to erect cities with marginal to dense populations. It has also enabled man to live in these urban areas with an overwhelming amount of convenience and security. As the debate on the affects of fossil fuel usage heats up, it is important take into consideration that these conveniences often times are wrestled against nature’s will. We certainly cannot give them all up. Doing so will unravel the very elements that intertwine together to form the backbone of a modern city.

Hence, the irony is that in an urban setting, it is difficult for permaculture to achieve true-to-principle attainment. Often the case, there is simply not enough dirt to sustain the agricultural needs of one household; let alone other basic needs like water and waste management. Even if there was plenty of dirt to dole out, many urbanites simply do not have the time that it takes to maintain a fully self sustaining system. There is simply too much to accomplish when there is a 9 to 5 post to man. However much “Debbie Downer” that sounds, there is a silver lining. As stewards of the earth, we can have our cake and sort of eat it too. We can do- what we can do- with what we have to do it with. We can apply permaculture to our urban lifestyle and trade in some of the conveniences where and when we are able to. The best thing about that is that many of us probably already do without realizing it.

In my gardens, the goal is to reduce the reliance on external inputs and instead use permaculture design and practices to increase yield and address issues. Permaculture principles will be sought after to bring forth a lifestyle that blends urban conveniences with rural tranquility. Be sure to check back periodically to see how this is all coming along. As always, get your hands dirty and happy growing!

Page / content update (September 07, 2024): Since originally publishing this “Permaculture” page on October 07, 2015, I have gone on to discover that the rabbit hole goes further. The sentiment of permaculture is very admirable and a good starting place. Since this page’s original publication, the world has changed immensely. Sentiments about “climate change” have changed from being a distant worry to an existential threat to humanity. The prevailing consensus is that Fossil Fuels are the cause of “climate change” and Clean Energy is the solution.

During and after the transition to Clean Energy, my original sentiment will remain true. Even with Clean Energy, it will still be true that convenience comes at an expense. Growing and creating our own food/things is most impactful. More importantly, the methodology needs to rely on a creation centric approach; and not a consumption approach.

An example of this is one you will find in the original writing– composting. Composting is a creation approach as it takes resources that would have been sent away as waste. This is the opposite of sending food waste away as trash and buying soil. At the time of this writing, even composting is taking on a convenience approach. This approach uses an energy consuming appliance to process the food waste conveniently indoors (vs having to walk food waste outside.) In this example, walking food waste outside would be more impactful than having the convenience of an appliance.

All the while, I recognize the purpose of progress and embrace it. While I encourage a low impact lifestyle, I recognize that this is not for everyone. That said, living a low impact lifestyle is not ‘all or nothing.’ Even a small sacrifice of convenience is significant.

The other major change since the original publication of this page is that “climate change” has taken an urgent status. Whenever urgency take hold, political divides are created and opportunists come out of the woodwork to take advantage. The permaculture community for the most part is not immune. Permaculture has become a political clique and all the while the resourceful few have found a way to capitalize its teachings. Viewing permaculture as the end all be all limits it scope and creates boundaries.

In many ways, permaculture has typecast itself. At this period in human progress, technology is set to solve many of the negative environment externalities that specific permaculture techniques have set out to do. Furthermore, technology will be able to do this at a greater scale.

Going forward, I see specific permaculture techniques (like swales and hugelculture) becoming obsolete as a large scale solution (farms.) However, the 12 Design Principles will still have merit and specific techniques can still have an impact on the small scale (urban lots.) In the small farm setting, there is opportunity for the marriage of modern technology with olden agricultural purposed approach (also known as regenerative / biodynamic agricultural.) This purposed approach is a situational approach and is a complete opposite to a matrix approach. An example is companion planting. A companion planting matrix will tell you what to plant with what. It does not take into account the Earth System Science (ESS)/ regenerative agriculture aspect of plant to plant to environment relationships. A companion guide will recommend planting tomatoes with French marigold. One reason for this companion planting is that tomato plants are susceptible to root knot nematodes and French marigolds can repel them.

The simplicity of the matrix approach is helpful in that it starts the novice gardener on the path understanding that success, failures, and disappointments are determined by the relationship between plants or variables. Going further down this path we cross into an Earth System Science approach. Working with the relationship between multiple variables and in realtime, the ESS approach is more robust. These otherwise obscure variables will become visible with proper coursework in ESS. With advances in technology, sensors can provide realtime measurements of pertinent variables.

To wrap things up: while the merits of permaculture has changed, the merit of its spirit is still very much relevant. Progress often means convenience and convenience creates negative externalities. Living in modernity does not lock us into convenience. Where we can, we can sacrifice convenience for wholesomeness. As I look into the future, I am excited that we are closer to having technology provide both convenience and access to wholesomeness. I am optimistic that there will more space than today for olden day practices of agriculture. Finally, I have discovered that a residential lot in Southern California is more productive than what I thought was possible in 2015.