10 Effective Tips to Start Your Own Permaculture Garden | Amazing Earth
1. Know your garden
Analyze the space you which to build your garden, things from the amount of light each area receives during the year to how much rainfall. What you learn from your analysis will help you make informed decisions about what to do next! The key is to learn each component from your garden and figure out how to take out the most out of everything.
2. Plan big, start small
Starting a permaculture garden is a big task, but that shouldn’t put you off. It’s much recommended to create an overall or ideal design first and then implement small goals to reach it. Doing this will let you see the progress you’re making and how much is missing until you have reached your goal. After that keep on expanding and creating new ideas, there’s always room for improvement.
3. Separate into zones
Order is always welcome when creating beautiful gardens. For this reason, separating your garden into zones is highly recommended to put everything where needs to be put. Design from patterns to details, this will help you maximize your resources more efficiently. Don’t forget to put the most used or caring zones closer to increase productivity too!
4. Diversity is good
There are many different types of plants that grow in nature, apply this same diversity to your garden. Don’t throw seeds from as many different plants, look for the ones that grow naturally in the area you live. Further research on what can or can’t grow in your area will help you know what to plant on your garden. Learn your weeds, you might be able to eat them too!
5. Use the no dig gardening method
Due to limited land available for growing crops, humanity faces problems to keep up with the demand for food. Fortunately, there are many ways to grow crops, plants and more without the use of soil or large fields. Think vertically or more creatively to expand your garden in ways never thought before!
6. Plant stacking
When building your garden, look for ways to make the best use of your space. In nature, everything grows abundantly in little spaces and shares its surroundings with other plants. A plant stacking approach will help achieve this and will also mean less work for you!
7. Natural predators
Learning which predators are attracted to your plant’s garden will help you plan ahead on how to control them. For example, the best way to deal with a slug problem is by adding frogs which are attracted by water. For places where predators can’t or are not welcome, you might need to think in other ways like smells or covers.
8. Use organic compost
We recommend the no dig gardening approach but if you want to use your soil, remember that it needs care too. Before planting anything, it is ideal to dig your soil once and add some compost to increase nutrient levels. It may be a good idea to use your own compost which you can create by using worms and your organic trash. This way you will actually reuse your trash while maintaining your soil high in nutrients!
9. Always plan ahead
When starting your permaculture garden one might get lost as to where they should start. It doesn’t really matter, as long as you made a design plan before starting. The point is to keep optimizing your zones to achieve the best results based on the goals you wish to achieve!
10. Harvest rainwater
Last but not least, another resource you can take advantage of without creating more trash is water. You can create a simple system to capture water when raining and then use this water for your garden. Who knows, maybe you could actually start using this water for many other things in your home! If the place where you live has very few rainy days, another way is to take advantage of humidity from around. This way, through condensation, you could obtain some amount of water from the air and then use it for gardening!
Credits and Attribution
Author: Adam Burns
Original Title: From The Earth
Source: https://vimeo.com/104607074
Licensed by: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Author: Joan Llopart
Original Title: Timelapse – The Natural Light
Source: https://vimeo.com/67449472
Licensed by: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Intro: RavenProDesign – https://www.ravenprodesign.com/
For more information please visit:
8 Tips to Starting a Permaculture Garden: A Beginners Guide – http://www.millracegardencentre.co.uk/blog/eight-tips-starting-permaculture-garden-beginners-guide/
10 TIPS FOR STARTING YOUR PERMACULTURE GARDEN – http://www.magazineim.com/home/index.php/10-tips-starting-permaculture-garden/
Five Permaculture Tips for a More Sustainable Organic Farm – http://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/permaculture-tips-zbcz1306.aspx
Starting Your Permaculture Garden – http://deepgreenpermaculture.com/diy-instructions/starting-your-permaculture-garden/