Hi everyone! 🌱

I'm a Master's student at TU Delft researching precision farming for small-scale farms. I'm developing a modular farm robot designed to support, not replace, farmers through automation and data collection—but I need real insights from farmers! 👨‍🌾👩‍🌾 My focus is especially on small farms involved in arable or vegetable farming.

🔗 Survey link: https://tudelft.fra1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_emtbmDLobtdldky

I've created an anonymous survey (10-15 min; available in English, German, and Dutch) to understand key challenges and farm structures better.

I’d be incredibly grateful to anyone who takes the time to share their knowledge with me - your input will help develop a future-proof solution. Thank you to everyone who spares these 10 minutes! ❤️

Much appreciated! 🙏

Okay so I’m doing everything I can now, late winter to prepare -Yes IF I do, I’ll buy native and local from a nursery if I can this early, -and I’m also using trap plants to get them away from the main crops this year. -I’m using neem oil like it’s going out of style

• I’m pinching and squeezing and spraying (and hoping) and using perlite and watching water sources

But none of that helps for PREVENTION in my greenhouse in 7A in February lol. Add to this the fact that I’ve been growing indoors all winter so I’m literally not helping lol.

Am I absolved of my permaculture guilt in buying some predators to help me manage the 6’x8’ greenhouse? Arthropods or not it feels like keeping them inside the GH may be cruel if they’re trying to go out and get some of that Bugussy.

IF YOUVE BEEN SUCCESSFUL USING BUG PREDATORS especially in a small GH please lmk if you did anything special.

Also has anyone tried fumigating with smoke? Not just aphids, I mean all pests. I’ve seen people mention it but it’s almost always the people who suddenly have a PHD in whatever the subject is. I get the sense you’d have to burn an astringent wood like birch.

Hi, looking for some advice please. We have bought an old farm house with about an acre and half of land. We hope to develop part of the land into a food forest and eco cabins in the future, but for now only have time for working on the house. In the meantime, we’d like to screen off the nearby neighbours and road by planting some fast growing bushes/trees. We have a high water table and clay soil to consider. Also we don’t want to plant something that could be too invasive or disrupt the future food forest. Any suggestions welcome 🙏 (we’re in dordogne France)

As stated, short story, marshy low lying area. Stays mostly dry, working on building up for drainage. Near a creek as well. Most of these systems call for perforated pipe, but I think it would just fill with water. We live in an area that can get 75+ inches a year. So is there a way to do one of these systems in wet areas? Solid pipe sealed with a cleanout for condensation? Not planning on going very deep, 16" frost line. More along the lines of the gh in the snow, running about 600' of pipe 2-3' deep. More info in the link. Pipe will be under a future food forest... greenhouse

Say I have three planting locations A, B, and C. It's winter, and I know that without a more sophisticated tool like a Solar Pathfinder, I can't really know *how much* sun each site will get during the growing season. However, if I record observations now to find out the order of sunniest to least sunny in winter, does it follow that the same order would hold in summer? Or does the differing angle of the sun throughout the year mean that this might not be true depending on how obstructions are positioned? I've tried to visualize this to answer the question but it kind of hurts my brain.

Hey y'all,

I have more than a decade of experience in commercial agriculture (mostly managing small organic vegetable farms), that all started because of an interest in permaculture. I've never done a PDC, but done plenty of self-teaching, and now I'm working on branching out into edible landscaping/professional garden design. My end goal is to make a living helping folks turn lawns into gardens and help feed themselves!

Though I don't have the time or money to go back to school or buy professional-grade design software yet, I'd love to get advice from more experienced designers on: (A) how to improve my designs in general, and (B) make my presentation more professional quickly and on a tight budget. I'm working on my drafting skills and know I have a long way to go...

Here's a mostly-finished design for part of a friend's edible landscape as an approximate idea of where I'm at.

https://preview.redd.it/tz3ol6zytege1.png?width=1145&format=png&auto=webp&s=c6ae49559b6388ef7cfde9f1707234a63db100d3

Seeing lots of people posting in various groups regarding plans for next season!

I thought perhaps now would be a good time to reshare this document I've been working on! The overarching goal is to list every naturally occurring plant in our region (as well as a few special natives that don't naturally occur in this specific county), for the purpose of habitat restoration and native plant gardening. The information here should be mostly relevant to anyone in the Midwest/6A eco-region of the US

I finally have everything formatted and cross referenced, but still adding more plants. It's sectioned by ecotype and organized alphabetically by genus! At the bottom I have listed native plant nurseries and sources (worth exploring!)

Hope this is helpful! Feel free to share!

Hello yall me and my wife will be buying some land within the next 5 years in the upper Midwest/superior highland. (northern Minnesota, three northern counties in Wisconsin, Marquette Michigan) we want to build with natural materials and have a homestead. My only problem is, is that it seems the most suitable for that area will be straw bale construction, it seems though, if going that route you have to have some square walls, I have worked in construction for over 10 years and have come to the conclusion that I fucking hate 90° degree corners and would rather rounded walls. Are there ways to not have a stereotypical looking house while still builidng with natural materials in the superior upland region? We would have to prepare for a lot of snow and fluctuations in tempature seasonally (thankfully it stays humid enough where you don't have to deal with the tempature swings of the southwest) i figured asking this sub sense it's the most active and the natural building sub isn't at all active

What do you recommend considering when purchasing vacant land? For example, currently considering a property that has several utility company easements but no utilities/local services, has a natural spring and well, dirt road shared by neighbors, and a decades-long verbal month-to-month lease for livestock grazing. What kinds of questions or investigations would you recommend?

I plan on writing a story involving that delves slightly into agriculture. I need to know, what kind of cover crops can grow through a snowy winter but would be around in a midevil time period and serve a function outside of just soil enrichment.

I know it's a strange question but it seems you guys know your stuff so any help is appreciated.

My house is on a 2 acre lot and I was thinking of starting a food forest but too too sure where to begin. We have a 100x50ft space in the front yard we cleared out next to the road. We thought planting some fruit trees in that area to help reduce sound and break line of sight would be nice.

Where's the best place to start? Best trees to plant first? What should I do to the area to get it ready for this year? Next year? Would native plants produce enough?

In on the edge of zones 7a and 7b in New Jersey. The town I'm in gives compost away to residents so I have plenty of that on hand. I have chickens and goats on the backyard already as well so fertilizer isn't an issue.

I've had success with gardening in the past but never really planned anything out or put much thought into where or what needed to be planted.

Any advice?

I'm trying to look into edible plants to grow, as someone who can get seeds to sprout but never grow very far. In my few attempts at growing plants, I usually have to container garden, which I know isn't great for certain plants. I'm a little overwhelmed with research.

Any recommendation for US region 5-6? I wanted to look into potatoes and squash, but I have heard those don't really like containers 😅.

Hi friends, I’m working on getting my garden set up for the spring. I’ve got some seriously aggressive grass/groundcovers that kicked my butt last year. I’ve had cardboard and mulch down since September and I’ve been clearing grass/weeds that are trying to creep under the edges. I’m thinking of doing a semi-buried rock/urbanite/brick edging, and then planting something around the outside of that border for an extra layer of grass barrier. Any recommendations for something that might be sturdy enough to keep the grass at bay but not so aggressive I’m fighting it instead of the grass?

Any advice appreciated.

Last summer, I collected wild berries from a few trees. I put them in the freezer for a month or two, and then planted them in containers. I watered them and waited and nothing grew.

They seem to be such hardy wild plants! Anyone got a better approach? Anyone done this successfully?

I'm in Zone 9b (Arizona, USA). I need a privacy screen against my 6' block wall in my backyard. I am putting in a shed or Sauna and need to hide the structure from the neighbors (it'll be taller than the block wall and be visible from the street- hence, needing a screen).

I had bamboo previously, and generally enjoy it. I'm looking for fast growing, heat tolerant bamboo that is non-evasive and very easy to maintain. I need it to eventually grow to about 10' or taller. I'll have about 3-4' between the wall and the shed for it to grow in. It'll get plenty of sunlight from morning until about 1-2pm. It'll also be on an automatic drip watering system.

Questions:
- What's the pros/cons of using an above ground planter box vs planting directly in the ground?
- Once it grows and fills out, it'll be between the block wall and the shed. How much maintenance will I need to do, if any, or can I just let it grow between the two without access to it?
- which bamboo specifically would fit this application, and can I grow it from seed?

Thank you for all your help!

I'm excited to get into permaculture but it's very intimidating and I know nothing about gardening so I decided to choose something simple - potatoes. I grew them in bags and followed a youtube tutorial but the yield was pitiful, the only potatoes I got were less than half the size of the seed potatoes. Feeling discouraged and wondering if anyone might know what was going on:

Details:
- I used 5 bags, they were fairly big, but only 2 actually produced potatoes, and they were very small
- All plants grew quite large.
- I added soil when the plants reached 15cm in height
- I found curl grubs in only one bug Idk if that's bad, but that doesn't explain the other two that didn't produce
- I tried using my wee as fertilizer for some bags and not others, the 2 that produced I didn't fertilize but they had smaller plants which is weird, I read too much fertilizer can prevent tuber forming, but that doesn't explain why there were so few potatoes and they were all so small
- I had loose soil but in one of the bags soil there was a lot of mycelium growth which made it more firm, but this was actually one of the bags which produced.
- I followed guidelines for when to plant and waited a bit over 3 months to harvest, some of the seed potatoes had started to rot and of the newly grown potatoes there were a couple which had a chunk missing which makes me think something was eating them, but it's weird that there were only 2 like this and every other potato was whole and the bags that didn't produce literally had 0.

Did I miss something obvious or does anyone have any ideas or suggestions? am still keen to experiment and dive further into the world of permaculture.

Found this wonderful project in Namibia! This man is developing his land into a food forest and trying to inspire his village to change from broom swept dirt to water harvesting self stainable community! Please support his channel. He’s doing fantastic work!

Hello! I work on a small organic operation close to a river in the Pacific Northwest. We are brainstorming creating a permaculture-inspired border of perennials to mitigate on-farm runoff into the river. We want to incorporate some chop-and-drop-friendly plants and pollinator-friendly plants. We're interested in relatively small shrubs so as to not shade the field. Any fun ideas of things you've done for borders? Some ideas I have so far are borage, comfrey, and pigeon pea. Thanks in advance!

Hey everyone,

We’re working on building healthy soil for a small piece of land where we plan to grow fruit trees and other plants. We’re especially focused on providing the right macro-nutrients (Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Potassium – NPK) and would prefer to do it without relying on livestock.

Here’s what we’ve come up with so far based on research:

• Nitrogen: Growing legumes to fix nitrogen in the soil.
• Potassium: Using wood ash or banana peels (we have a lot of banana waste).
• Phosphorus: Adding vegetable compost.

We’d love to hear if you have other suggestions for building soil fertility sustainably, especially if you’ve had experience with methods that don’t involve animals!

On a side note, my BF and I have pretty different approaches to tackling things. He’s very systematic and data-driven (total engineering mindset), while I’m more of a “let’s dive in and figure it out as we go” kind of person. For instance, we were recently discussing water requirements for our fruit trees. His process was like this: “On average, a fruit tree needs 30 liters of water per week. Based on our location, we get 34 dry weeks, so we’d need storage for 34 weeks. That’s roughly (30 × 34) = 1,020 liters per tree. If we have 50 trees, we’d need 50,000 liters—or 50 cubic meters—so we’d need a pond that’s approximately 5m x 5m x 2m.” Meanwhile, I was like, “Let’s just start building something—if we miss this monsoon, we’ll have no water this year! We can always adjust the size later.”

How do you balance these two approaches when planning and working on a project? We’ve found that his thoroughness often pays off in the long run but can slow things down, whereas my spontaneity keeps things moving but risks missing important details. I’d love to hear your stories or strategies for navigating this kind of dynamic!

Imagine a Los Angelean suburban back yard about 3 miles from the sea. Sod was laid 30 year ago, but irrigation was stopped a decade ago. A mature liquid amber, a strawberry tree and some older shrubs survive. Now we are transitioning from dead lawn/non-native weeds to native plants. The soil is mostly compacted clay and the whole property is on a slight slope. We want to keep rainwater runoff and moisture from gutters on the soil, but swales are hard to dig because tree roots crisscross near the surface. Instead of digging down, can we do shallow, wide swales and make berms of the displaced earth mixed with fallen branches and leaves?

We'll be adding a chip drop as soon as we've set up the swales. We are currently watering the soil and weeding out the sprouting grasses. We've planted a test Ceanothus, native iris, CA sunflower. Thoughts?