We're writing a book on systems thinking and permaculture and are looking for a publisher. Publishers of traditional permaculture books are not responding. Any suggestions?

Sede storica dell’Istituto italiano di permacultura.
Casa solare passiva, completamente autosufficiente con pannelli solari ad isola con
2,4kw di potenza, raccolta dell’acqua piovana dal tetto con tre cisterne per uso
alimentare da 5000 litri l’una per un totale di 15.000 litri, acqua agricola comunale
con acquedotto privato (costo 120€ annui circa), costruita nel 2013-14 con mattoni
poroton certificati ecologici, fondamenta in cemento armato, igloo di 50 cm di altezza
sotto il pavimento per ridurre l’umidità, tetto e soppalchi con travi di castagno,
coibentazione del tetto in canapa, tetto con tegole in terracotta, fitodepurazione con
vasca imhof per le acque nere, scarico in vigna delle acque grige. Muro di gabbioni
riempiti di pietre per la stabilizzazione del pendio. Metri quadrati calpestabili 108
circa (includendo i soppalchi).
La casa è composta da vari vani open space: Vano cucina e stanza da pranzo (18
metri quadrati circa), salone (26 metri quadri circa), bagno (10 metri quadrati circa),
stanza da letto (12 metri quadrati circa), corridoio ( 8 metri quadri circa), soppalco
( 26 metri quadrati circa), soppalco ( 8 metri quadrati circa). Presenti due stufe russe
per il riscaldamento a legna (un potager per cucinare e una stufa).
Lavori da finire: Intonaco e pavimento stanza da letto di 12 metri
quadrati,pavimento del corridoio, l’intonaco esterno,impianto elettrico.
Sono presenti due strade di accesso sterrate percorribili solo da veicoli con 4 ruote
motrici.
Impianti sciistici di Viola a pochi chilometri di distanza, 60 km da Savona, 100 km da
Torino, 30 km circa da Mondovi’, 10 km da Ceva, 65 km da Alba, 61 km da Cuneo,
159 km da Nizza (Francia). Per informazioni sul paese di Scagnello visitate il sito
internet del comune
La proprietà è compresa anche da un terreno agricolo coltivato delle dimensioni di
10.000 metri quadrati. Coltivato con frutta di vari tipi. Una vigna di uva da tavola con
100 piante di uva matilde e moscato d’amburgo, 20 peschi, 30 prugni, 15 meli a
cespuglio, due nespoli germanici, un pero, 3 ciliegi,10 melograni, 10 mandorli, 2
kaki,2 noci pecan e molte altre piante, area orto. E’ presente un lago anti erosione,
d’irrigazione con annessi canali di alimentazione del sistema australiano della keyline
( che si riempie quando ci sono eventi estremi), il primo in Italia. Tutta la proprietà è
recintata con una recinzione anti cervo alta 1,90 metri.
Al momento il proprietario è in possesso di un comodato d’uso con accordo orale per
la gestione di cinque ettari di castagneto acquisibile in futuro visto che è confinante
con la proprietà.
La distanza dalla casa al centro del paese è di 5 min. a piedi.

Contatto permaculturaitalia@gmail.com

When considering that one needs to have enough time todevite to all your projects and endeavors, how do you figure out how many is too many?

I've been living closely with the land and/or farming for over 10 years. But I still have a hard time trying to envision my workload, especially as we are looking to expand onto a new property that already has (new to us) products--namely beef and honey. Now i know honey won't take much time on the daily. Beef cows might take 20 minutes checking daily, and I can fairly easily estimate time spent calving, hauling/doctoring/working, and extra time when doing rotational grazing, perhaps once a week.

But then...adding on everything else we already do or want to add...like mushrooms, a CSA and farmers market, chickens for eggs, and don't forget taking care of our kids and ourselves! Which--kids load will change soon too as they are starting school next year and beyond.

So, any tricks to quantifying? Do i just need to write up a mock calendar month by month or week by week??

Hi y'all!

... basically what I wrote in the title.

We moved to our 5 acre plot about 3 years ago, and parked ~5 head of sheep and a couple head of cattle in the 4 acre pasture. I've been moving my chicken tractor around the front acre where I plan to make a veggie garden and plant fruit trees and bushes.

(I did come down with long COVID 5 months after we moved here, which took me out of play for a year other than composting and animal care, and then we had a baby which has slowed things down as well)

I feel like everywhere that has animals is doing better than it was before we got here, and I've also been composting food scraps.

My issue it that when I went to plant my spring flower bulbs, the soil is still so compacted. It is poor draining.

I have trucked some mulch in, but I'm running out of hope that I will have this thing thriving in time to really get any productive gardening done in the next spring/summer.

I just want to skip to the good part where my soil is thriving. Are there any "hacks" that can help me solve some of these issues in the next 4 months or so?

TIA!

Okay, so kind of a CRAZY thought I have.

First off, I love permaculture. I love the philosophy, the design concepts, the way it applies in every area of life.

And y'all are EXTREMELY creative. And I'm trying to cultivate my tattoo practice so it attracts the types of people I want around me-- people like you.

So what, as a permie, would you get tattooed on to? Are there any intriguing quotes? Do you have a preference on color vs black and grey? Are y'all out there getting sickles and borage and roosters tattooed on you? I just want to understand the real essence of what a permie wants.

I have a 5 year-old Pineapple Quince in my orchard. All indications point to it being a healthy tree. During the growing season it receives about 10-12 gallons of drip irrigation at the drip line. Last growing season was the second year that it has borne fruit. But something strange happened last year. Mid-season, when the fruit were about the size of a golfball, they all started to drop; not one fruit made it to harvest. Our other quince, an Aromatnaya Quince, which we care for in the same manner, delivered us a bounty.

I've asked around and scoured the internet for a possible explanation. Does anyone have any ideas about why the Pineapple Quince did this? Thanks in advance.

Hoping to record various weather parameters at a site without reliable cellular service. Any advice on where to start looking for an appropriate device? I imagine being able to load recordings and analyze back home. Thanks!

Hi all,

I'm currently preparing my backyard to start what I hope will be an edible garden and food forest. I've been trying to dig up some of the lawn along the perimeter, with the intention of sheet mulching and then layering with homemade compost and soil. The dirt under our lawn is a compacted red clay. Here are my questions:

1. What do you recommend I do with the compacted red clay I'm digging up? In a perfect world, yes, I'd mix it with stuff and turn it into good soil, but that's probably not going to happen with this stuff (plus I'm pretty sure the previous owners treated the backyard with roundup). Do I just have someone come and haul it away?

2. In the interim between laying down soil and planting, should I cover the soil with mulch or anything? I know a lot of permaculturists on TikTok say never to have open soil (theirs is covered with chop and drop mulch), but I don't have anything on hand to use––should I purchase and cover with wood mulch?

I'd appreciate any advice! Thank you!

Hi, I am 14 and will start planting a food forest on two and a half acre in Austria, middle Europe next year. I want many old and native varieties.

(Like Rowan tree, Mulberry, Apple, pear, plump, (German: Speierling), rowanberry, quince, medlar(German: Mispel), etc.)

I do not have any prior experience on planting a food forest, I just wanted to ask if there are any varieties I just can not miss Out on? I would appreciate help on which varieties to plant and what pattern might be the best. Thanks!

We recently bought an old hobby farm in southwest Wisconsin. The barn has been empty for a year or two, but the previous owners informed us that over the years they'd kept chickens, ducks, goats, pigs, a couple horses, and a donkey. There is an existing (open) compost pile at one end of the paddock. Can we just toss everything (minus the trash) we sweep up from the barn floor onto the compost pile?

old stall

chicken/duck enclosures

Hi all, I have a small greenhouse with two 55g barrels for watering over winter. I am looking for advice on what pump to get to pump water out of my barrels to my plants. I want something that I can mount and then run a hose into each of the two barrels depending on which I'm drawing from and want a small showerhead like flow from the hose to plants. I am currently looking at the Wayne pc2 portable transfer pump, but am not sure if this is too much power for what I'm looking for. My hose would be a maximum on 30ft or so. Any advice is welcome. Thanks!

I’m just now starting out. We bought a property in Nov so I’m trying to be ready by spring. I have 2 apple trees, 2 apricot trees, one pear tree and two peach trees I need to plan guilds for ( I bought the trees for 75% off in August back when we were looking for acreage and then repotted them) but I am utterly overwhelmed. I don’t even know how far apart the trees need to be. I’m in zone 4. Is there somewhere I can go that makes it simple? I don’t mind paying for a class or something but nothing applies to our conditions we have here (windy, dry, sandy and cold) and I don’t want to waste my money. I DO know I want strawberries but that’s as far as I can get without my brain freaking out.

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/permaculture-at-farm-scale-webinar-tickets-1151902273709?aff=oddtdtcreator

I have been collaborating with a local farm over recent years, helping them diversify and bring permaculture into the core of the farm work and planning, it has been an interesting journey so far. I feel like i have learned a lot, but there is so much more to add to the story too, I hope to share this far and wide.

Hello all,

My grandmother has about 5ha land in the Carpathian basin, her children don't want it so she plans to sell it. She could also give it to me if I wish so.

I was planning to get it and plant some kind of orchard there, maybe an apple one. The thing is, it's in the middle of nowhere. The land is not the best and the fields there are used to grow grass for animals or potatoes.

I want to do it for no other reason other than I really want to do it

I was looking at a way to plant them and leave them there through various methods that don't require me being there very often, as I moved to a different country.

Do you have any tips if this is feasible?

Hey everyone, just genuinely curious why this is the case. Is it because of the high cost of buying a drone? The technical complexity in operating one? Why aren't there companies operating precision ag as a service in developing countries? Seems to me like there is huge room for improvement, I just saw this statistic that said malaysia uses 2000kg/ha of fertilizer while the U.S. uses 100

Hi! I’m moving to southern Manitoba this fall, and I have a pretty large lot that’s a fairly blank canvas to do whatever gardening/permaculture I want. I’m coming from Vancouver island, so struggling to find things that will survive in a hardiness zone of 2b/3a.

Has anybody grown one in this zone? What can you tell me?

I need to store roughly ~30,000L of water over a 6 month period in my semi-arid homestead. I can fill that in the winter season when it rains, from the roof and other structures.

What kind of water storage solutions have you guys done? I was thinking of building a smaller pond (~2m x 3.5m x 5m), but I think evaporation will be a big problem. So perhaps build a cistern of similar size, but then I need to figure out how to water proof the bricks/cement etc.

The simplest idea, but most expensive, is just to buy 3x 10,000L underground tanks at ~4000euros each.

Thoughts?

Hi everyone,

I'm exploring the idea of establishing a permaculture site and need some advice. One of my main concerns is noise pollution from nearby agricultural equipment like tractors, combine harvesters which can get extremely loud (often exceeding 90-100 dB).

For those who’ve dealt with similar issues:

1. How much land or buffer zone would be ideal to create a peaceful environment? Is there a general rule of thumb for distance when it comes to mitigating loud machinery noise?
2. Landscaping strategies: Are there specific tree species, hedges, or combinations that work best for reducing noise? Would creating berms, earth mounds, or natural sound barriers significantly help?
3. Other considerations: Should I factor in things like wind direction, terrain, or seasonal foliage changes when designing for noise reduction?

I’d love to hear about any experiences, tips, or resources that could help guide me in planning this.

Thanks in advance for sharing your insights!

My county is doing a sale and I think I'm going to grab one or two of these bundles, but I'd love to have some semblance of a plan before I buy and plant. Is anyone able to throw out some ideas for how to integrate them together?

Context: I just moved onto 2.4 acres in the suburbs. Property is tree lined but the center is mostly clear (grass), so there's lot of room to work with.

I'm planning to plant a lot of the usual stuff down the line, so am down for that being included in the guild(s).

(by usual stuff I mean blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, blackberries, asparagus, garlic chives, grapes, comfrey, currant, etc...pretty much any stuff that comes up in permaculture discussion)

https://preview.redd.it/u1vgjia5hzce1.png?width=571&format=png&auto=webp&s=262f8704909ccd5e6ccc9138b3e78aa2950de601

Starting first growing season in the dome on our home place and reading up on Ruth Stout: Have any of you done her mulch method in your beds? Wanting to use only what we have, we would struggle to find pesticide free straw or hay. But kitchen scraps, leaves, etc, we have in droves. Do you think this would pose problems we don't foresee? Right now I only have a cover crop of clover going, but several plants in my house waiting to be moved in.

I've not planned or planted a fruit tree guild before, so I'm hoping for feedback on the design.

Zone / Conditions:
My zone is up for debate, but I'd say 6-7 is a safe bet. I'm in a valley in Southeastern BC, Canada; cool (not super cold) winters, and hot droughts in mid summer. The area I plan to put this in gets sun from mid day through to sunset (~6hrs/day)

Main Tree:
Fig! I've heard from local gardeners that we can grow fig trees here, so I'd love to try.

Guild plants are outlined in the image. I have a feeling that this is crowding too much into one space - that is generally my downfall in gardening.

Let me know what you think!

https://preview.redd.it/vn633ic48zce1.png?width=651&format=png&auto=webp&s=51e461443ff2ddfe9fb41b6465e9a70c3f4b387b

https://preview.redd.it/yr431hc48zce1.png?width=1300&format=png&auto=webp&s=1bc1c36c3bb3e3ddc87b1b9bd2afea2c79fa1404

Hello!

I used to watch a Youtube channel that would consistently do long form interviews with all kinds of knowledgeable figures related to permaculture, self reliance, etc. I remember he was a hopeful channel - talking about the flaws in society but trying to use his platform to educate and prepare people with real world solutions. I remember a specific video in which the guest talked about how he made money from a variety of sources with his lifestyle - raising and selling koi/goldfish on his property was one of them. I've browsed this reddit & all over Youtube and have yet to find it. Does anyone have any ideas on who it could be?