can you be a permaculturist without being a gardener or owning land?

Discussion in 'The big picture' started by songbird, Mar 28, 2014.

  1. songbird

    songbird Senior Member

    Joined:
    Sep 12, 2013
    Messages:
    1,791
    Likes Received:
    148
    Trophy Points:
    63
    Occupation:
    gardening, reading, etc
    Location:
    near St. Charles, MI, USoA
    Home Page:
    Climate:
    -15C-35C, 10cm rain/mo, clay, full sun, K-G Dfa=x=Dfb
    unfortunately modern society places more of a person's worth on what they do (or claim they do) or what labels they claim for themselves (even if they don't live up to them).

    i take anyone's claims/labels at face value out of basic respect, but after that i also pay attention to see if i actually do understand how they live up to those claims/labels.
     
  2. mischief

    mischief Senior Member

    Joined:
    Nov 21, 2009
    Messages:
    1,665
    Likes Received:
    94
    Trophy Points:
    48
    Gender:
    Female
    Occupation:
    s/e
    Location:
    South Waikato New ZeLeand
    Climate:
    Cool mountain
    I have been looking over the ethics and principles of permaculture again.
    It occurred to me that these are basically formatted around gardening/food growing, well the principles are at least.

    The ethics of caring for people and sharing surpluses/reducing consumption are the only points not specifically to do with this, but are not addressed in the principle guidelines.
    This makes me wonder if we(I) have been aligning activities I do, to permaculture, that dont actually belong there, or have we moved on and expanded into other areas that are related by way of lessening the impact on natural forests/habitats?
    That being the underlying purpose behind the whole thing, as I understand it.

    I see a need to encourage ideas like creating habitats specifically for indigenous species of flora and fauna that just isnt addressed and maybe a missing ingredient.
     
  3. Unmutual

    Unmutual Junior Member

    Joined:
    Feb 28, 2012
    Messages:
    599
    Likes Received:
    3
    Trophy Points:
    18
    1) Buying a home close to work and shops to where you don't need to buy a car to travel(and choose not to buy one too!).

    2) Owning/working/vounteering at a 2nd hand shop(recycling, selling at a reduced cost).

    3) Volunteering at a public garden/civil landscape/local botanical garden(not all use chemicals and most cities have one or more of these).

    4) use worms to compost and give it to gardening neighbors/friends.

    There are plenty of activities that don't involve YOU having a garden, that can also help the planet, help people and in a way give back to your community. A bunch of tiny drops add up to a lot over time. Just do something positive to reduce your footprint(and I'm not just talking carbon) on this planet. I'd check with volunteer activities since those can be easily tied in to the 3rd ethic(sharing your excess time). There are two organizations that I know of for the US: All states have a Master Gardeners program. A fair amount of states have the Master Naturalist program. You can do volunteer work while learning more about growing veggies and your natural world and neither require you to have land. There may be similar permaculture groups in your area too, if not, try to start one!
     
  4. eco4560

    eco4560 New Member

    Joined:
    Feb 9, 2009
    Messages:
    5,925
    Likes Received:
    9
    Trophy Points:
    0
    'Our' Craig would be an example - he has only recently acquired land and a garden. But the time and energy he has invested over the past decade on this website, photographing and documenting permaculture sites, spreading the news etc - I'd dare any one to say he's not a permie!
     
  5. Ppermiez

    Ppermiez Junior Member

    Joined:
    Mar 21, 2014
    Messages:
    14
    Likes Received:
    2
    Trophy Points:
    0
    How about the next evolution of Guerrilla Gardening ~Guerrilla Permaculture! 8)

    I was playing with the idea of taking urban parks, empty lots, industrial spaces, reserves, and media strips, and designing self sustaining systems or adding to native systems to make great little niches of food supply

    This is a serious question though...and I like the idea of taking our energy away from the debt-based military industrial complex and converting it towards permaculture local communities. Im sure you could even live in a van and do permaculture in an urban area, rent out someones backyard ( people were calling me about this ) and live in a teepee, or maybe you could make a stealth permie FRO (Forward recon outpost in the military ) mine was going to be made out of old carpets, concrete and some posts to make an invisible 'sand-dune' beach shack....but im sure you are only limited to your imagination. I ve also posted a forum topic on this discussion as this question relates to Rights of use of land https://forums.permaculturenews.org...question-Rights-of-Use-to-land-Accessing-land

    Perhaps the question is what area of permaculture are you most drawn to/excited about, and focus on that as an application you can create your own super-productive niche in? That seems the natural thing to do, like an animal that just does what it wants in each moment
     
  6. Pakanohida

    Pakanohida Junior Member

    Joined:
    Feb 27, 2011
    Messages:
    2,984
    Likes Received:
    20
    Trophy Points:
    38
    Think bigger all of you.

    Permaculture gardening is merely 1 hanger in the wardrobe closet that is Permaculture. Permanent Communities, Permanent Ag, Permanent Aquaponics, Permanent Zone 1...

    [video=youtube_share;zMBxJTQqnRI]https://youtu.be/zMBxJTQqnRI[/video]
     

Share This Page

-->