Permaculture practices work even in Northern Arizona. We practice Back To Eden Gardening and Sustainable Agriculture with Animals.
Permaculture is a broad term which generally means:
- Observing the natural processes and ecosystem in which plants thrive.
- Emulating the natural environment.
- Assisting in natural ways to guide propagation.
- Following the plant life cycles.
- Integrating Sustainable Agriculture with Animals
Back To Eden (BTE) Gardening is among the more specific modalities of Permaculture, illustrating the same basic principles of all permaculture efforts.
With BTE Method, the focus covering the raw dirt with organic material.
This accomplishes a few things:
- Begins preserving and conserving moisture under the organic cover.
- Insulates plant roots from heat and cold weather more effectively.
- Creating a healthy environment for living microbiome (worms, bacteria, fungi, insects and more)
Once this Back To Eden cover of organic material (wood chips, manure) has matured into a living microbiome, the entire ecosystem comes into homeostasis. Weeds and insects are less aggressive. Plants have plenty of broken down compost and nutrients to thrive. The ecosystem which we form by watering regularly becomes an oasis in the desert. We see birds, mice, squirrels, skunks, racoons and more exotic insects attracted to the available water and food, from microscopic to little critter friends.
The forest has a natural scab of earth over it’s floor. No one waters, fertilizes, or tills the forest and yet it grows large and out of control. We seek to emulate the forest floor, but that requires bringing in the wood chips and even wood chunks. We also want the full sun for most crops, which is hard to get in a forest full of trees. This is a hybrid type method using natural processes and idealized growing environments.
Lastly, it is important to understand, that weeds are your friends. Weeds are BIO-ACCUMULATORS. Generally they show up in soils that have been scraped clean of organic material. Weeds have one job: grow up and die and deposit organic carbon material on the naked soil, over and over, until there is enough material to support microbial life. If you till it, you kill it. So just add more on top and keep watering. It takes about 3 years to fully mature and establish a thick enough layer of top soil that you can then add more and more wood chips and it becomes food for the microbial life in your soil.
Here is a detailed article LINK on how to set up a new Back To Eden Garden in Northern Arizona.
God Bless you and Happy Gardening!