In February of 2012, I wanted to take a permaculture design course (PDC).
There was one near my home that was affordable; however, at the last minute,
despite finagling and scraping on my part to go, I had a very uncertain
feeling. By this point, I was learning to pay attention to my uneasy feelings
as a sign that something was not right for me. I listened and did not go. I am
not sure why I had this feeling, however, I started paying more attention to
the permaculture world as a result of not going, and I did discover some things
that were disquieting.
Two months later, I had a chance to visit the farm of the PDC teacher; he
needed help planting because he was behind in the growing season due to the
demands of the PDC. I volunteered to assist him and was invited to come join
him and others in a large-scale project. I was excited; this was a dream come
true to finally see permaculture in action. If we got along then I would be accepted
as a summer intern. He seemed to be an authority and a leader in the
permaculture industry; this time would be fun. Unfortunately, it was not fun. I
got to see a side of permaculture that I did not think existed; a side that
shows its exclusionary, exclusive nature. Needless to say, I realized that my exploration of permaculture had to be an internal journey where I learned to recognize and listen to my intuition rather than relying on some authority to show me the correct way. Do not get me wrong, I still want to take a PDC; however, I will do so to expand my knowledge not to fix my desire to dabble. I realized there was nothing wrong with me and my method. I desired to help the world; the world needed many different solutions because of the diversity of people on this planet. I realized that these authorities tried to pander a one-size-fits-all solution by putting everything into a neat, tidy, pigeonholed box. I still want to see how someone actually does forest gardening according to observation, planning, and proper plant placement; however, I only want to see what else is possible. I love my little forest garden and how we evolve together.
Today was a wonderfully warm, sunny winter day. I had not visited my little forest garden in a month or so; but I went today. Our winters are weird here; we are often in the lower 30’s in the day and overcast; but we have very little to no snow. Around mid-December we did have a few inches that stuck around for a few days; that was nice. But alas, it melted :( and we were back to gloomy days with no snow to look at. This winter has been milder than previous winters. My comfrey plants were green until December, and one plant still has a small portion of one leaf that is green. My strawberry plants are still green. Parts of the chicory and marigold plants are still green too. Of course, the grasses are still green in places; but they usually are. The odd thing is that there is some new growth: grasses and I believe some of my wildflower seeds are sprouting. For some reason, the huggle trenches are covered in green grass. I wonder if that area is warmer. I did hear somewhere that decomposition does happen in the winter and if that is the case then that explains the warmth. I suppose I could get scientific and measure the soil temp, but that will probably never happen.
Perhaps the thing I missed the most was the wonderful, peaceful, and focused feeling I have in my garden. The time I spent back there today helped jumpstart my creative visioning of the space; that part was dormant for the winter. This spring, I want to build a playhouse for my daughter. Last year I was concerned about the height of the branches of the purple plum tree that is over her play area. I have not taken a good look at the branches since before the leaves fell off, but today I did. Without the leaves I was able to distinguish the branch patterns and I realized some limbs I could easily remove that would open up the vertical height without sacrificing the coverage of the tree canopy; providing I ask the tree for permission first. I also evaluated the areas I still want to dig hugle-trenches in. Finally, I took a good look at the grasses and weeds that are sprouting and we came to a new understanding.
Last spring, between the time when I did not go to the PDC and when I visited the farm, I had gone to visit my family out of town. I was gone three weeks and when I got back, my garden had turned to a jungle of 18” tall plants. I gave them a haircut, but I did not remove them; I wanted to retain them for soil stability. I did not know what they were. This year, I will not be so hasty to cut them; I will identify them first because obviously they are pioneer plants. This year they are already sprouting and it seems there are even more than there was last year. I also did the same with the grasses; I cut them but left them.
When people saw my garden they thought I was crazy for all the weeds I left growing. I told them the weeds provided many functions. For one, the weeds shaded smaller plants that took longer to get going because the weeds were the first to sprout up. For two, they stabilized the soil and their shade cooled the soil. For three, many of them were dynamic accumulators and provided nutrients to the soil once they were cut down. Remember, my forest garden is on an abandoned organic garden plot that was plowed each year. The soil was loose, dusty, and I am sure it lacked nutrients. This year, I am determined to identify each and every one of the volunteer herbaceous-layer plants and determine their function.
One area I was always hesitant about were the grasses. I had read many sources that said how bad grasses were because their shallow roots competed with trees. I tried a sheet mulch to get rid of them, but they were persistent. Finally, I gave in because they did help stabilize the damaged soil. This year, I want to get more cover crops going so I can use them as green manure. I also want to plant perennial covers of clover. I hope my comfrey grows big this year. This will be their second growing season; they were still small at the end of 2012 growing season but they were strong and resilient. I also want to plant some daffodil, onion, and garlic bulbs around the trees. I want all these plants to eventually crowd out the grasses. I am not going to pull up the grasses because of the important function they serve, but I want to plant other plants to take their place who can perhaps do a more complete job such as providing nutrients as well as soil stabilization and cooling. This is just my intuition that I do not want to wage war on nature. I know that many “know” permaculture, I might seem incredibly naive, lazy, and whimsical.
I wish to embark on a slight tangent at this moment. This last month my brother in law passed away from cancer. I have my own thoughts on cancer, death, life purpose, and the psychology of physical health, but this post is not the place to go into those philosophies. My brother in law was perhaps one of the most outspoken people about the untidiness and ugliness of my garden. He even went so far as to call all my work fruitless because I was following a pseudo-science. This statement deeply hurt me because he was insulting my baby, my garden, my partner. I do not believe death is meaningless, and despite our differences, I felt his passing gave me a gift. With his passing, this conversation about a pseudo-science came roaring back; emotions, physiological reactions, and everything else involved in that moment. I saw myself standing there and suddenly I was bigger and determined. I saw myself continuing my forest garden, the learning, and the work. I saw what seemed like a future vision of my garden and my impact on the world by helping the method spread. His gift was to rile me up just enough that I would accept the challenge to educate people that permaculture and forest gardening were real and would help solve world hunger and lack. Thank you, my brother in law, for your amazing gift; you have reignited my courage in myself and this practice. I felt like I was faltering, stumbling, and starting to doubt if there was a point to my dabbling. Because of your wonderful display of doubt and insult, you have contributed to the healing of humanity and its apparent lack. Your love will ensure that more people will also feel the love. Thank you.
I will leave now, with a final thought about trusting myself. Last spring, my new apple tree, a three variety grafted one from Costco, blossomed. One of the branch’s blossoms turned to apples. The spindly, pencil-thick branch sported six baby apples. I was told by several people that I needed to remove those apples because they would break the branch. My husband was the only voice of dissent; he told me to leave them be. He said the tree had its own wisdom and he learned that from watching me follow my intuition in this garden. He said that the tree, in its wisdom, would decide if the apples were too much and it would drop its fruit. I was hesitant because six apples on such a small branch would be a lot of weight; but I let them be. I eagerly watched in trepid anticipation through the summer as the apples got bigger and bigger; the tree only dropped one apple. My husband and I observed a walnut tree branch that was growing into our part of the garden. We knew it was reaching for the peace of our place and wanted to be a part of it. He noted the wooden stilt supports on the branch and how they fooled the tree into thinking it was stronger than it was. We were also given the gift of witnessing a fruit laden branch break despite its wooden supports. It had over extended itself. The apple did not have supports and yet it was not showing any signs of distress. In the late summer, the apples were ready to pick because they slipped off of the tree with a slight twist of our hand. The apples ranged from 1” to 2” in diameter; they were small and not very tasty, but the point for this tree was not to produce tasty fruit but to prove that it could support fruit. I am very thankful for the chance to witness this display of plant wisdom and for my husband convincing me to listen to myself rather than the naysayers.
