Show Notes
The question for this episode is from Geoff:
I'd love to hear your thoughts about how homestead sites can create a "whole nutrition" landscape with permaculture. What I mean, is that a "healthy balanced diet" typically includes sources for necessary nutrients, calories, minerals, proteins, carbohydrates/starches, etc. Growing the leafy greens, berries, fruit, vegetables is all very well and good -- but if we are seeking to create a 'whole nutrition' landscape, we need to re-evaluate how much area in the gardens are devoted to tubers/roots and protein sources like nuts (hazelnuts) or seeds (sunflower, serviceberry seeds) versus the more typical perennial greens. Ie Maybe way larger portions of the landscape should be devoted to tubers and fast-growing nuts/seeds than is typically seen in Permaculture Designs, for instance for PDC courses?!
Recommended reading to accompany this episode:
Gardening When It Counts by Steve Solomon
Diet for a Small Planet by Frances Moore Lappé
Recipes for a Small Planet by Ellen Buchman Ewald
More from The Permaculture Podcast
A non-technical exploration of questions to consider when you decide you want to start a food forest, based on Owen's question:"How do you convert a lawn to a food forest?" Resources:Philadelphia Orchard ProjectEdible Landscaping with a Permaculture Twist by Michael Judd
In this episode, I use the question from Owen:"Are there kinds of soil additives I should be using or should stay away from? Conventional wisdom is to look for balanced fertilizer, but I don’t know how much conventional wisdom overlaps with permaculture."to look more broadly at using initial, imported, industrial inputs to create a long-term, sustainable, fertility system around four areas:1. Collecting Organic Matter2. Harvesting Household Waste3. Using Biology4. Cover Cropping This is an overview of these ideas. If you'd like me to go deeper on any part of this in an upcoming episode, have thoughts of your own to expand on these ideas, or disagree with me entirely, leave a comment so we can continue the conversation.
This episode comes from Geoff's request to compare Solarpunk and Permaculture.Suggested reading from this episode:Always Coming Home by Ursula K. Le Guin's Kim Stanley Robinson's Pacific Edge by Kim Stanley RobinsonThe Fifth Sacred Thing by StarhawkThe anthology: Solarpunk: Ecological and Fantastical Stories in a Sustainable World