backyard inari

turning an urban backyard in Japan into a vernal permaculture paradise

Saturday, April 29, 2006

Been reading about permaculture and "do-nothing" farming ala Masanobu Fukuoka and The One Straw Revolution and David Holmgren's Permaculture: Principles & Pathways Beyond Sustainability. They are must reads for anyone interested in learning how to live with and benefit from local ecologies.

Fukuoka is able to maintain the same high yield of rice as "modern" mainstream farmers on his farm in Shikoku without the use of herbicides, pesticides and labor intensive wet field farming. And, he does it with considerably less work.

Granted it took him a while to get "in tune" with how things work but after figuring out how things wanted to be on his farm he has been able to join and improvise on the natural rhythms there.

Permaculture demands observation and a deep, almost instinctual awareness of one's environment. On the other hand it also demands a rigorous, systems analysis of the forces at work (and play!) in the local ecology.

Simply, living in rhythm with local ecologies means developing a deep empathy and systems based understanding of how things work and learning how to harmonize with those workings. Once "in synch" it then becomes possible to improvise, create and sustain development.

One of the key dynamics of true long-term sustainability is the relationship to energy capture and storage, use and return. Basically as a user/consumer of energy, if we aim to live sustainably we have to not only limit our consumption but also focus on creating robust systems for catching and storing energy as well as systems for returning energy to the ecology.

Vermiculture is a good place to begin. I buy/grow and consume organic material to generate energy to live. What I don't need or don't consume I give to the worms. The worms, in turn, while converting my organic waste to energy, produce compost that is useful to plants to help them grow. Importantly, though, the compost also enriches and improves the soil thus improving its capacity to catch and store energy as well as provide energy to plants, insects and other critter-participants in the local ecology.

It's a system that, when deeply understood and properly managed-yes it does have to be managed if it is intentionally for my benefit-creates wealth and benefit throughout our home.