Soil Investment

By Meg McGowan, Permacoach

In the first few years of a new permaculture system, it’s worth investing energy in building beautiful soil. Here’s how we’re doing that.

This system is three years old now and this will probably be the last (possibly the second last) time that we do this. In the early years we used a lot of fast growing, self seeding annuals, in exactly the same way that nature would reclaim a paddock. Now we’re transitioning to more and more perennials so that while our yields increase every year, the energy we need to invest in maintaining the system decreases.

I see a lot of permaculture systems that stall at the annuals phase. That’s fine if you have the time and energy to maintain it, but you will ultimately be fighting nature rather than working with it. Everything wants to be a forest. Annuals-based systems need lots more water and fertiliser inputs to stay productive.

My best advice for improving your system? Ask yourself, “to what extent am I cooperating with nature and to what extent am I fighting it?” Spend a day in a local forest and let it teach you.