MY RESPONSE TO CURTIS STONE "What Permaculture Got Wrong... Dispelling Five Common Myths"
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- Опубликовано: 31 июл 2024
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Richard Perkins is a globally recognised leader in the field of Regenerative Agriculture and is the owner of Europe’s foremost example, Ridgedale Farm, Sweden. He is the author of the widely acclaimed manual Regenerative Agriculture, regarded as one of the most comprehensive books in the literature, as well as Ridgedale Farm Builds.
His approach to no-dig market gardening and pastured poultry, as well as his integration of Holistic Management, Keyline Design and Farm-Scale Permaculture in profitable small-scale farming has influenced a whole new generation of farmers across the globe. Garnering more than 15 million views on his blog, and teaching thousands globally through his live training at the farm and online, Richard continues to inspire farmers all over the globe with his pragmatic no-nonsense approach to profitable system design.
It amazes me how fluidly Richard expresses his thoughts. It’s spoken like a person that has seen every side and came to a firm conclusion for themselves and shares it with humility without bashing anybody else’s experiences. So unique in the world.
Well said! I was totally struck by his modesty and respect for others while providing well-reasoned arguments. I live in the U.S. and it's rare to see that kind of dialogue about virtually any issue these days :p
Quite common actually. However, it is unusual to see someone like this openly sharing with the masses which is why it appears unusual.
I have a feeling his thoughts are so well organized and then easily expressed because he likely isn't addicted to the "Average American Diet" like most of us. Get on a low carb, zero sugar, no caffeine, no alcohol, low stress, balanced healthy diet and you'll be amazed at how well you can organize your own thoughts and express them with the same ease as Richard Perkins.
I know because I changed my diet and saw the surprising improvement.
@@stephencarlsbad "Average American Diet"... Thats why the english have messed-up teeth!?
@@lewisbivona843 Under Cover Farmers - Feature Length ruclips.net/video/nWXCLVCJWTU/видео.html
stephencarlsbad nice causal nationalism/bigotry
I have my school children listening to and following you.....we include your work, book & videos in our curriculum. Thank you for bringing such value to our young farmers lives.....all the way from Sunny South Africa
Right on. We can get too caught up in concepts sometimes and forget why were really doing this in the first place. In the end, it's about making the world a better place for our grandkids, so whatever method it takes to get there is the golden ticket (even if it's a smorgasbord)
Justin Rhodes , well said! Sustainability, so the future generation can have a future 👍
Mmmmmmm you said Smorgasbord... Now I'm hungry to get back to doing the farming.. LOL Haven't convinced my wife to raising chickens yet(my city doesn't allow them in town either) I'm hoping I can hide em in my semi-forested acres.
As Joel Salatin states....it’s about soil restoration. Period.
Better world for people now & later. Can’t think in terms of grandkids. Way too selfish & narrow an outlook.
I think the problem with permaculture is that people are calling too many things permaculture. My understanding is that permaculture is a design system. It isn't swales or food forests it's what you have, a collection of systems that are placed and run in a strategic well though out way to reach your goal. Swales, market gardening, keyline design and agroforestry are all just pieces that either get used or not based on the client/land users needs.
Agreed. My first exposures to permaculture were Geoff Lawton and Sep Holtzer and Richard Perkins, and a little Paul Wheaton. I see narrow-minded decontextualized thinking in the comments sections for these materials, but not in the originals... Seems the problems are more with the permaculture fan club than with "permaculture" itself.
Ah finally someone that understands! This is exactly it. It is a set of tools not a set of prescribed methods. Permaculture is the hammer you use to build the house, not the house itself.
It becomes a problem when it is treated as if it is a political ideology!
Swales are simply drainage avenues. Directing excess water. Like a ditch but shallower and wider lined with grass to slow the water down and allow penetration of surface water into the subsurface water systems. Anyone involved in this field had better have more than just experience! Some real education continuing education! Let us be serious, this field is work and work is not a great marketing tool to promote gardening, so the words NO WORK sound real good to people who've never dug into the soil. Never got on their knees to look at an awesome world beneath our feet.
Any one who wants to be an expert had better know hydrology and chemistry and riparian systems, and soil and geology, entomology, bacterial disease, fungal disease and viral diseases and what bacteria, fungi and virus are beneficial in our soil. There is oh so much to know and I get tired of people afraid of dirt and sweat and understanding an entire new world of plants and life and and and and...we humans in no Universe are able to mimic Nature. Period. Very few of us know the forest from the trees. Gosh, we don't know the basics yet everyone wants to reinvent the dang wheel!? Without knowing fully just the basics we all think we should go do hydroponics? Or Hugelkulture? Arghhhh. Can you look up 'perched water table'?
There is NO fertility that nature allows willy nilly back into the soil of an ecosystem. How funny. There might be a bit of nitrogen available in the debris that is in the process of decomposition, but listen up! Decomposers use that nitrogen first and pretty much zip is left for any new artificial crop. Nature keeps those chemicals (not NUTRIENTS!!) sequestered in the bio mass. Population control! An ecosystem would be destroyed by an overpopulation of plants... Fertile soil only if a human threw balanced macro chemistry on that soil a few weeks prior? Decomposed organic matter feeds the macro and micro soil organisms NOT plants. DECOMPOSED is the key word.
Yeah, Pheromones from plants and insects? Interesting. Not too many gardeners need to be worrying about pheromones, they need to deal with the basics: Tilth and drainage of soil (all soil is great soil), Light, airflow, Water (the correct amount at the right time and monitoring the soil drying out) and FERTILIZER. Good grief. I am a master gardener X3 plus quite a bit of other major credentials...hands on over half a century! Full time not just on weekends. Licensed Landscape Architect. If we would all just get on the same page with the correct information and know the basics...happiness. That would be a major project all by itself, we already have all of the simple, straightforward rules and common sense to grow food and that does take a bit of time to learn and practice, quite a bit of time.
Stated perfectly
Thanks. Great video. I studied Permaculture with Geoff Lawton and he constantly reminded us that good design is based on individual sites and the purpose of the site. There is no one-system-fits-All in permaculture. I'm glad you have reiterated that. The biggest misconception, and you addressed it, is using zone 4 or zone 5 techniques, in zones 2 or 3 which is poor design even on a homestead level and impossible on a market level. I was also taught that keyline is totally in keeping with good Permaculture Design if it is the best technique for your land and purpose as it is for you. I think your strongest points are that people who haven't grown things shouldn't be teaching other people how to and it's all about APPROPRIATE design.
Wow! What a wonderful lesson with your clarity of mind, experience and conversational skills, and for showing us the result. I am 80 and a backyard guy, using no dig, and learning every day what works, and what doesn’t. My goal is to do well enough that perhaps neighbors will join in, adding plots, and developing soil, then, and as you point out, let the veggies grow. I know we can, at least supplement our block with affordable organic produce. You are a very bright guy, and a credit to the species. Thank you.
Richard..I like the channel buddy...this is my first time seeing you...you were recommended from one of my vids....nice to hear your opinions and useful information
WOW someone who is a straight shooter. Thank you for sharing your experiences. Certainly refreshing to have someone who understand difference between book learning and real life and is not a know-it-all.
he is not a know-it-all, b/c he does not know it all... thats ovbvious...
Did you have something constructive to add or are you here to just poop on someone’s compliment to Richard?
@@tristancarr204 Video said response too curtis, but he didnt and couldnt, and instead to save face picked out a few things he doesnt agree with in perm. but ended up looking like he was just tryin to ride on curtis's coat tails. And i find the arogence of his supports ignorant and misleading. Sorry if i up set you.
@@stormysampson1257 Why so offended if you are all that? I just find most people who have any education, as all of a sudden experts on all matters. Which is stupid, but what is real cancerous, is they close their minds too new ideas, without even trying them... im a contrarian, and into many topics, i find this fight or flight reaction too different beliefs, in all of them. Like wellness, ill tell ya, but not going argue with you about it. I tell them to eat what they like, not my fault if they are too lazy or bull headed to research it. I told them the truth, their subconscious knows it correct. And sorry you paid so much for an education.
@@stormysampson1257 I can not find your last comment, i maybe shadow banned. I think we are on the same team, good talking too you, if this our last communication. Hugz
Thank you for this. I am a 71 yr. old man in Donegal, Ireland, who just returned from 50 yr stay in Canada and am just beginning to look into all the field of growing food. I want to share with you someone I discovered while exploring You Tube concerning world food growing practices and she is Dr. Vandana Shiva. She has many videos on YT and has written many books. She comes form the northern part of India in the Himalayas. I suspect you would find her work of interest especially some of her books. I haven't read any of them but I just have a hunch and wanted to pass it on. Again, thank you. Best wishes. Seamus Duggan, Fal Carrach, Co. Donegal, Ireland.
I really appreciate your emphasis on systematically collecting data, being humble and teaching people about stuff you actually have practical experience in. This is definitely something we need more of in the permaculture movement. Thanks for sharing Richard :)!
Good video. Very well spoken 👍👍👍 The clash here is that the permaculture movement is about supplying your own food, which is great. Commercial agriculture is about supplying everybody's food. Two completely different goals here. Both can learn from each other, both successes and mistakes
Most eloquent and honest perspective I have heard. You have hit the nail on the head with all of my hesitations and struggles I have had as a self identified permaculturist over the years. Time to be pragmatic and use what works and ditch my attachments to conceptual design biases.
Thank you for addressing these issues. Certified in 2004, I have noticed these things, as well. My climate is beastly hot and dry. All of the local soils tend to harbor nematodes....not the beneficial kind. A forest garden situation is a nightmare for most plants, because the woody plants harbor the nematodes and even if they don't decline themselves, the vegetable crops increase the infestation and the ground becomes unusable. Old European methods work better in this situation. I was forced to remove all my fruit trees, institute an intense remediation program and start over! Thanks for the tip about berries in the orchard, that is one that would actually work for me.
WOW, such a great video. Thank you for putting in so much time and thought into this for us.
Richard, thank you for your views. Very much enjoy following you. I appreciate and am very grateful for your candid, no nonsense explanation. I sense your incredible dedication and commitment, to doing the best you can at your craft in all your RUclips videos. I am inspired by you and glad you are out there to learn from. I am joining the farming world this year. Hope to meet you some day. Thanks for putting your extensive farming knowledge and experience out in the 2nd Edition of your comprehensive farming book. 🙏😊 All the best to you and your family!
Excellent objective view point. I am a businessman aiming to move from the backyard gardening into production market gardening. The kind of analytical logic is so important. Thank you.
That was a great video. Thanks for taking the time to do it.
just fantastic the amount of wisdom in this video.. ilustrates just how to adress and respond to different ideas without a single trace of superiority or egoistic attacks that are the rule, tries (and accomplishes) to put a certain affirmation in perspective, trying to show how simplified and standardized information can be measleading, how to take into account that different solutions will occur in different regions and specific conditions..
it gives an enourmous help to those looking for design thinking frames, it adresses in many subtle ways how pre ordered schemes will not work, remembers us not to discard the totality of rural wisdom with ou inflated agroecological propaganda (sometimes) and activism. don´t know what else to say, we need more objectivity like the one i just saw in this video, that´s my feeling after watching this..
and i´m writing all this and still lack the words to describe how this has been useful to me.. it will help me to put in perspective all that i learned and all that i will lurn !
thank you to the author, way to go man!
love you too richard! greetings from an old lady in norway learning to farm here. learning so much from you and curtis and my small garden.
I loved the video Richard. I was meant to be doing a permaculture designers course this year but due to ill health had to cancel and was going to do one next year instead but for a while now I've been in two minds as to whether or not permaculture alone is the way to go , I don't have lots of land , I just have a 100ft by 27 ft garden and could never quite put my finger on why I wasn't going all out permaculture . You've made some very good points, obviously I won't be growing on a massive scale , it is just myself and my two teenage children to provide for but I've tried the polyculture type beds and to be honest, it's not happening , I can never get enough produce out of one bed of any one type of crop . I've had wood chips from local tree surgeons delivered over the course of this year and it's rotting away nicely in one corner , I've also got four compost bins with nicely rotting compost . I have to say , watching your video , first one of yours I've watched, has helped me decide on how exactly I want to grow , yes, of course there will be some aspects of permaculture that I will retain, for instance the earth care, people care and fare share , but it won't be all peramaculture from now on. PS I have a Hugulkulture and for what it's worth, it wasn't worth all the hard work that went into it.
"We need to be asking ourselves how little we can do". Love this quote. It's so easy to fall into the trap of complicating and making farming complex when really most of the knowledge and effectiveness comes from observation and simplification.
You make the point that permaculture is not a fixed approach; it's a set of principles to do with efficiency and sustainability. Some techniques have become erroneously associated with permaculture by certain teachers, authors etc. This is wrong, permaculture was never about saying: there is only one way to do things. Instead, it is a way of looking at the problems (e.g. land degradation) and finding a solution to them--as you mentioned, looking at natural systems is one of the suggested methods (though again, that's not a rule, just a possibility).
I think what happens is that many people see others practising their own version of permaculture, and they see that and assume, that's what permaculture is. Swales, for example, appear to have become associated with permaculture. But swales, while talked about in the very first pc books, were never suggested as a solution for every problem. They were discussed in the context of dryland growing and the need to capture as much water as possible on the property so as to survive the dry times. (Along with tanks, dams, keyline ploughing etc). All of these things were discussed as examples of solutions, not The Solutions. Mollison and Holmgren cherry-picked techniques from all over the world as examples of what can be done. to get people thinking. Not to create a prescription. Certainly when i did my PDC in the 80s, there were no prescriptions; we were taught a way of looking at things; that design is important and can save you a lot of time, energy and money; that we can look for solutions in many places; that each situation is unique and each design will be unique. And the data relevant to that situation will be unique as well.
So to my mind, these criticisms are misdirected--point them at the people or articles that are misrepresenting permaculture as a fixed set of solutions. It's not that and never has been.
Thank you Richard for all you do. My key takeaway is your open mind. I practiced it daily in my prior business. Although automotive was not farming the eagerness I had to embrace the moment good or bad and make it greater was key to our success. I have always enjoyed gardening to supplement our produce need. Recently relocated to another state and climate had its challenges. I am thrilled with our results. Lessons learned timing crops to the climate and bug pressure of all things earwigs.
Take care
I really like how you've got everything 'down' and thought through on so many levels and your overall pragmatism. It's a real education listening to you in all of your videos...not just in terms of your insight, acquired through experience, but also in terms of your understanding of soil chemistry/biology and ecology.
You make this stuff really interesting and relevant...and I think to anyone with a passion for growing.
Thanks Richard.
Thankyou for sharing your knowledge and thoughts about scale, food production and holistic management. This puzzle piece was missing!!!
This is the kind of practical thinking I was looking for. I hate to talk to people who have a 'system' from both sides of the table. It usually means they are locked in and emotionally invested in being right. This seems wonderfully open in comparison. Very interesting!
Richard Perkins you a are a model for future generation of farmer thank you so much from quebec (canada)!
Thanks, so much, for this super video! I watched Curtis's video and that lead me here. You both make really good points. I am so glad you reminded us all to be humble and learn, learn, learn,then practice for years, before setting ourselves up as teachers. I've been cruising the internet in search of ways to make my one acre property productive in an earth-loving way, and there are a lot of well-intentioned people offering advice. But what I really wanted was what I found here: A dedicated professional who is also an excellent presenter.
Thank you for this video. I truly appreciate your humbleness & expertise. My husband and I are new to market gardening. I was raised on a hobby farm my husband the city boy. The diversity of your farm is amazing! We have chickens (17) 25 to start. The bear ate 7 & 1 rooster had to go. They just started laying. We are very excited to have our own eggs finally. Our season is much like yours I think. Maybe a month longer. Challenging but doable. I must say that I was sad to hear in your interview with Curtis that you may be stepping away from these info videos. :( My husband & I find them fascinating & informative. However, I understand priorities! Thank you so very much. Wishing you and yours much success and happiness!
"Consider integrating anything that works, and throw out anything that doesn't." Spot on in my opinion. I've got a PDC, but I'm skeptical as to the seriousness of the average permaculture designer because I believe we should integrate as much technology as we can to move ourselves forward. We don't manually reload guns anymore, we don't (or hardly do) manually change gears, so why do so many people find integrating appropriate technology such a threat? Why must we go back to the stone age to appease climate change activists and permaculture designers as a whole? I enjoyed your video, thank you for airing your opinion. Same to Curtis!
> Why must we go back to the stone age to appease climate change activists and permaculture designers as a whole?
some people think that hard work has more value. this way, they can compensate their blindness for more elegant solutions
Wow. Thank you for sharing. I’ve learnt so much in this one video of yours! So glad to see how you’ve integrated so much.
I love your humble heart and I love everything you teach us online !!! Thanks 🙏 for Every Knowledges you had sharing
Wish the best for you and your family with Regards from a Cambodian woman farmer 😉😉😉😉
Brilliant and well thought out reply! I love the permaculture movement, but at times it does seem to take on almost a cultish feel and filled with judgement on any deviation from the norms within permaculture. When you talked about soil health and pest/disease control, it reminded me of the talks given by Dan Kittredge and his focus on minerals and soil health directly affecting his market gardens and produce quality. Great stuff there. Thanks for being so honest and pragmatic while also being inspirational and ecology focused. Its refreshing! Oh. And one more point, I couldn't agree more with your last point regarding teaching. I personally don't think that one can complete a PDC and suddenly have all the answers and can teach. Sharing information is crucial, of course, but knowledge based on experience is far more influential and powerful.
The PDC is not about showing you how to do things to replicate what they have shown. It is about teaching people the tools so they can create their own designs and have their own ideas. This is what a person with a PDC can teach but that is all. Each property is different and will have a different optimal design and so teaching one's own ideas as gospel is actually harmful to the movement. But it happens and that is creating a negative culture that makes permaculture look like a cultist movement. In true permaculture, there are no norms, only what is best for your land and your design. That being said, of course there are things that every permaculture person integrates into their design as they have been proven to work already and must now be built upon. For example, growing in guilds is a concept that many use as it has proven to create strong soil and plant health. But all of the people i have seen using it have done so in different ways because an efficient system has not been found yet and in some cases because their land demanded a different approach.
That being said, Ideas must be shared and the permaculture properties that have been established for 20+ years generally are open to visitors to show what they did right and most importantly what they did wrong. These places will often send your mind spinning and some such as Permadynamics have shown great profitability. The problem with knowledge based on experience is that experience is generally gained in an environment where things are done in a certain way and you attempt to copy what you have seen instead of creating your own design and doing things the way that best suits the land. For this, academic knowledge is needed and academics are flocking to permaculture to address the knowledge gap and a great example of this is the more recent mycological aspect of permaculture that has shown that growing mycorrhiza in the soil enhances plant growth greatly while providing many additional benefits. Understanding these new concepts is vital not only for permaculture but also for no-dig and many other farming techniques.
This is also where newcomers to agriculture are a great benefit to the movement because they bring fresh ideas, skillsets and different ways of thinking.
@@JoshStobart
Love permaculture. It requires a knowledge of a lot of different techniques, if you are going to be a good permaculture designer. It is about doing good at where you are at with the simplest, low-tech methods available so as to be achievable. It is relatively easy to implement and maintain provided you are diligent enough to not let it get ahead of you. Observation when starting is key, and well-rounded results are the aim.
I have tried find university classes that taught permaculture, and found most offered sustainable ag. Sustainable ag is not as good as it could be. There is still a lot of monocropping and chem ag. Some permaculturists are completely ignored by some programs/profs despite their contributioms and success in the field.
Part of the problem is that universities receive much of their funding from mega corporations and much of their studies have "funder bias". Funder bias is when the study favors the business paying for the research, whether by overtly endorsing a favorable finding for said business, by ommission of critical data, etc.
great response video, it took me a while to watch Curtis stone's video due to the title but I think you've both brought up good points, I've been attempting to grow permaculture veggies for years now and I've come to think without putting a lot of work into breeding i have decided for my systems to implement more and more of the productive market gardeners techniques and am slowly growing out of my "hippie" ways of thinking... definitely agree that you're not properly addressing pest or disease issues if you're not looking at soil health
Absolutely agree about not being boxed in!!! Too many variables to have a cookie cutter farm. Small co-op market gardens here in the US, work together on crop diversity so not to duplicate. Otherwise it just becomes sustainable gardening for ourselves, right? The USA needs more Richard Perkins & Curtis Stone educators and they’d see less illnesses from GMO & pesticide sprayed crops!! Bravo to you and Yohanna!! 💞👍🏼Blessings 🙏🏼
Excellent!!! It's always wonderful to listen to the experts, who can show us, the greenhorns, how to do what they do best. RP, CS & JM are the three amigos, the new generation of market garden / farming experts...
God Bless all.
This is the right direction we all need to be heading in to help feed more people good nutritional high density foods.
very good job richard. for years i have been telling people in my area that they cannot learn to garden unless they plant the seeds.
I'm glad you are really clarifying the difference between homesteading where in general you're growing your own food along with some extra as opposed to having a sustainable (both usages of the word) farm, that makes you money to live because those are very different things. The first time I learned about permaculture I thought about the process of farming in an efficient way and I struggled making the connection because it seems like permaculture taken to an nth degree makes sustainable farming really hard. Now, this really depends on what it is you're growing and as you said the climate you live in because people who think about the tropics have to forget about people talking about temperate agriculture because they're very different. We have land in the tropics and we can use different no-dig and permaculture techniques along with the usage of animals in an ecosystem in a sustainable way (sustainable = for the earth, not for your business, so at most carbon/emissions neutral, so you are putting into the ground at least as much carbon as you are emitting.) So we can use the same techniques of grazing animals being followed by chickens over sections of land. But for the lay of our land we have to do it smaller scale. Things have to be easier to move.
But there's different agriculture that we can do that's more like a food forest and it doesn't add much to the work. The main issue is giving yourself the space you need for harvesting the fruit from the trees, at least for us.
Beautifully done! Thank you so much for sharing. I love the details here.
I appreciate you being so honest! most tell what they have seen not what they use on their farm and works! great video thank you!
I would've cried if I didn't see this before I started my farm!! Thanks so much for sharing your experience!!
I'm not a an expert in permaculture or gardening (though I've been involved in intensive farming over my adult life), but as a one-time ecologist I'd like to point out that while there are no ecosystems without animals, there are many islands with no large mammalian browsers. Here in New Zealand we only had native birds and one small bat. The same is true of many south pacific islands.
Yes but then they devellopped other systems in nature , without the need for them, so then you look what nature does in those places
Thank you, Richard, for your clear-headed, sound advice about the primacy of direct hands-on experience and the contextuality of all techniques.
This video should be required viewing for people taking PDCs! Thank you Richard for your experience, knowledge, and eloquence. You put great things into the world.
Nice one Richard!
Urban Farmer Curtis Stone - The collaboration between the two of you has been fantastic. I've really enjoyed them immensely!
Agreed! as a follower of both channels I really appreciate the transparent no BS approach from both. Thanks guys for all you do!
I also follow both channels and have come to appreciate cone t from you both for your unique takes on things
Just posted a response video from a complete beginners perspective, what I've learned, and how things have worked for me in San Diego.
Buffalo Bird Woman's Garden,Forest Gardening by Robert Hart,1491 has a great chapter on building soil in the Amazon by ancient people.
Right on Richard. I've said the same for years and get plenty of backlash from those with little to no experience in production agriculture. Great to hear someone else saying it too.
I agree with most of what you said. Excellent monologue on this topic! Beautiful no-till beds too by the way! Yes, certainly production has to be more practical about how it integrates permaculture.
One of the biggest hurdles I see is the super low cost of government subsidized commodity veg and protein. I have been watching lots of these small scale production to get a sense if I could make a go of it. Elliot Coleman not so long ago gave a talk and said that him and his wife netted just $35k a year, and they have been farming for 50 years. So the conclusion that I have come to so far is that a couple of things need to happen; there needs to be a robust PR campaign to convince those that can afford to buy the higher priced locally produced food and two encourage deep pocket patrons to purchase land for Farming Land Trusts (and remain in Trust for in perpetuity) and offer it up at no cost. In the US, there is an enormous amount of land that could be farmed but it is just sitting unused. In my eyes, society can't keep going down this path of high unemployment, lack of access to proper nutrition and high incidence of contaminated food recalls. And in the US, for the USDA and FDA to not put up barriers from small scale producers but to be partners in a stable and healthy food supply. In conclusion with wider profit margins, even a moderately savvy business person and moderately skillful producer can sort out the glitches and have a successful operation. So motivating the general public to insist on a better food production model would be a big boost to this sector.
I am so impressed with how you and Curtis are having this discourse. What a learning experience! Thank you for sharing.
Depends on what youre looking for. If you want to feed as many people as possible whilst maintaining profitability, start a richard perkins farm. If you want to supply food to restaurants profitably in an urban environment, start a curtis stone farm. If you want to make a system that produces food for thousands of years, start a geoff lawton farm. If you hate slaving away in a market garden with boring crops in straight lines, try all the other permaculture methods (back to eden, masanobu fukuoka, hugelkultur, food forest, perennial vegetable garden, biodiverse veggie patch etc).
Ben Schiavi you said it right there ! If want a farm that lasts a Thousand years start a Geoff Lawton farm although that’s yet to be proven however daytuna runs off zero fossil fuel imput ! Most of these other farms do not! Which is what permaculture was originally intended to achieve permanence
Permaculture is a fun hobby.
But its when the permaculture hobbyists get on their soapbox and predict that permaculture will feed and save the masses is when it reaches kook proportions...
@@stephencarlsbad Permaculture is just sustainable agriculture. There are no strict rules. Agriculture is currently unsustainable. The only options we have are to reduce the population or to make a farming practices sustainable. That can be done by applying principles of soil building, rather than soil degradation. Reserving areas for nature is also something current agriculture does not allow for.
Why would you only choose one? Why would you choose between a starving child and the planet. Why would you presume a wild apple forest in Kazakhstan would tell you anything other than how wild apple trees grow in Kazakhstan. I wouldn't use a forest in the West of Scotland for guidance on growing a tree in the East any more than I would use the Highlands; even in a small country the size of Scotland there are different micro climates that produce different forests. West coast is much wetter than the East the Highlands is cooler more acid based soil with poor nitrogen. Don't go to Kazakhstan stay where you are and learn what the plants that are already there say about your soil and your climate. When you've listened to them go look at scrub land because scrubland is the intermediate step to forestation.
@@shanekonarson I want to see daytuna running in the Australian desert or in mediterranean , not in paradise sub tropical!! Geof is a daytuna pot brain from Britain.
Top notch Richard as ever clear and consise and helping all to understand better the best way forward. Thank you.
Richard, Thank you for a extremely informative video. It is easier for people to belittle and ridicule then to understand. A good example is wood chips and how nature breaks them down for the soil to keep it loose. Plus the biological ecosystem it provides for microorganisms that provides for the soil.
Yes Richard, I have enjoyed your video. Thank you for sharing your knowledge and experience. I pray that more young people will come to you and learn how to follow your lead. I'm a retired primary teacher...very different from what you are doing and I couldn't agree more that people should only teach what they know. Book learning should be preparation for hands on learning for there is no substitute for real life experience whatever we are trying to grasp. I like to follow Charles Dowding as well as I find his no dig approach helping me in my modest garden here in NI. Do keep making these videos so I can share and discuss them with old and young alike.
This is some of the best pragmatism I've heard on this subject. Thank you for sharing.
A great thing you might look at using is bark removed from trees at paper mills and saw mills. Very high in nutrition and used by most production plant growers for plant mulch. You might also look at adding a plant section if there any people or businesses that would buy small plants or to sell at their stores. Like small tomato plants, pepper plants and others. Plus other small shrub and flower plants. Add a small nursery to supply all these products and gives you another layer to your business portfolio.
so practical and sensible! great voice for ag
Context is key, heavy mulch is kind of necessary for tropical and dry climate high evaporation climates, colder climates its just a nest for pests.
Thanks for your insight on animal/ag balanced production. As someone raised in America's cattle country I believe we need to eat meat for long-term health but production must be the most sensible and healthy for the land, the animals, and the consumer as well as the producer. Thanks for being open minded and practical. Animals are essential.
Great vid! A "Big Ag" guy here(3000 gal. of milk a day), I totally agree with you. I dream of the day I can retire to a smaller more relaxed farm. But, the only way to feed an ever growing world population is though commercial agriculture. How else does 2% of the people feed the other 98%?
We need more than 2 percent of people to be farmers.
Wow! What a thorough, informed, experience backed and articulate dissertation taking and using a Holistic perspective and approach. Mega appreciation to Richard for all his hard work and sharing his experience and knowledge so generously
I agree with everything you said. Here in the UK, and probably a in lot of other western, affluent countries, townies like me pick up permaculture after getting inundated with scary articles on the internet, filled with negatives about farming. What they seem to pick up first is the easy slogans: "the lazy gardener", "forest gardens", "herb spirals". What is easy to ignore, are early Mollison's writings, where, for instance, he puts together a monoculture of sugar palms, on a wave pattern in order to stuff as many as possible in a given area, and connecting the flowers with plumbing to automatically harvest the sugar sap, and deliver to the processing building. There's more ideas like that, but people don't have the large scale thinking caps on. They usually think of their own garden, next to their house. And then they try to talk to farmers, completely out of context. I know, I've done it - guilty as charged. I know now, that even the most staunch user of chemicals, deep down has had enough, and only uses them because they don't know any better, and have bills to pay. Great work Richard, chat soon. Daniel T. (the soil guy ;) )
Excellent message Richard. The last part in your video deserves specific mention. Many people (often without previous experience) feel that succeeding at their PDC gives them the license to teach others. This is, indeed, the negative side of the Permaculture non formal approach.
"Know what you know, and also know what you don't know" as you mentioned... is the key to improved design. Your conclusion about learning from hands-on experience, rather than just copying what others do is, IMO totally necessary in order achieve the best result... Creativity and experimentation are the key factors for improving existing systems of design. Tempered by a generous dose of humility! As vital lessons come through learning from one's own mistakes... rather than taking accepted learning as gospel truths....You can only fail- if you bother to try something out yourself in the first place! Your open-minded analysis - through personal field trials of the so-called proven systems have lead you to your own success. Repeated trial (and error) will eventually lead to building the better mousetrap... merely studying the rules, as prescribed by others who just teach (for a living) will not.
Very cool watch. The pheremonal dynamics is something I haven't heard raised very often. Definitely something I'll dive into in the future.
Great chat about your views on Permaculture. Thanks a lot. On another note: Holy Crap! That pond is almost full!! Guess you got more rain than anticipated Richard. Congrats!
We have clay soil, and are often too wet...I’m trying to amend the soil, but I would love to hear more about wood compost, and no dig method. I will also be looking up your book! 😊
Thank you so much for your excellent explanation Richard.. awesome thoughts for the future farmers. Really inspiring..
Great Video. very sound, holistic advice. Love it. Keep up the great work. Cheers from Melbourne, Australia.
So I am a California Archaeologist looking to transition into agriculture. I have to say, I love the work that you are doing. My emphasis is California prehistory and I am a landscape archaeologist by both training and intellectual bent. Both your holistic approach to ecological interactions within the human sphere and the environment and how that profits humans who do this is a key factor in the development of prehistoric societies globally. There are a number of examples in archaeological/anthropological studies and ethnographies in california that strongly parallel much of the work that you are talking about. What I am saying is that "what was true then, is true now" , and your success is a perfect example of that. These principals are critical in both the recognition of landscape carrying capacity for human consumption and also on how humans historically managed both the landscape and the plant and animal resources then and now. Those processes were conducted on a case by case basis in any given environment with a direct and intimate understanding of the how the natural environment works in waves ...or cyclic events. Thank you so much for your willingness to share your insight and experience.
When you were with the cows talking about how their bones return minerals to the soil, one was listening very intently to what you were saying, but in the end it went right back to munching away at the grass. A cog in the wheel.
Well said. I respect your humility and thoughtfulness. Refreshing to see. Thanks so much for your extremely helpful video!
Thanks for the great insight! I would love to hear what your experience shows in regards to which permaculture principles are not practical (if there is a video already about that, apologies).
Richard, l like you and l appreciate your attitude, your humility. I've subscribed and look forward to learning from your videos. Mahalo nui loa.
Troy in Hilo, Hawai'i
Just discovered this channel, so excited!
Such a good video response. Thank you!
I'm a farm-tube bender at the moment. Lots of food for thought here.
I think the whole video can be summarized via the statement at 33:33 - "We need to be way more humble than that. And we need people sharing direct experiences, not book learning... You gotta know what you know, and know what you don't know"
Hi, this is the first video I watch from you and I really agree 100% with what you're saying! Awesome explainations! Thank you for sharing your experience! As new professionnal this short video helps me a lot!
Greay stuff Richard! People have absolutely done the same mistake within PC as in conventional ag by geting hung up on some idea. And as you say impose that idea on the landscape.
But PC was the reason that I regained an interest for farming. I grew up with animal farming, and a bit of vegetables, but lost interest like many do. The idea of integrating ecology in a deeper way than most organic farms do really appealed to me.
When I discovered regen ag. Holistic Managemet, Polyfaces, Gabe Brown and more it all came together, because then I knew that you could acctually make a profit too. Then you came along, and did all the leg work in a comparable climate, that's invaluable in the word's proper meaning. Your book is a bargain!
Straw mulch worked for me for two years, then the slugs found it, so no more mulch for me in the veg garden.
I do a system that has been high yield, low input. Potatoes mulched with waste hay from feeding sheep over the winter has worked really well. It's about turning a waste stream in to food really. I have used a handfull of compost on each seedling to ensure good biology. It has yielded just as well as tillage and NPK, but with spottless potatoes.
But this year I changed two things at once. I unrolled spoiled silage bales over the seedlings with a tracktor, and I didn't use any compost. And then there was drought, no rain for a month after planting, then just a few drizzles, so germination was very uneven. But there will be a harvest, just not a greate one like I've been used to.
The issue isn't that PC is making people impose their design on the landscape, rather that they do not understand what it is. It is a set of tools that you use to maximise your land's output. Most people see something like Sepp Holzer's concepts that were designed for in dry or mountainous areas and then implement those concepts on temperate flat land. If PC was used correctly, people would not be shaping the landscape so drastically unless it was to fix an issue such as water supply in an arid environment. And if the change is to add to the landscape, it should be done slowly using organic material rather than moving soil. People get too excited about ideas they hear about and are impatient to wait for it to happen so they create a quick fix that is more damaging than beneficial.
One of my favourite PC places in New Zealand was a place where the people said they regretted the impositions they made upon their land in the first few years because it hurt them in the long run. 25 years later, it is unimaginably beautiful and at the same time they can still point to the areas where they created that damage because they had not thought about the needs of their land. They never fixed it because they felt they had done enough damage already and wanted nature to take its course to fix the problem. They learnt from their mistakes and were open and honest about it and they teach this lesson to visitors before anything else.
Anyways, it sounds like you have found a nice balanced approach in using waste products into a beneficial part of your system. I can see the PC influence :)
Extraordinary! I agree, teach from your hands on in depth knowledge and experience. Demonstrate your capacity before sharing what to do and not do. So critical! You are such an inspiration Richard. Thank you far all the time and energy you dedicate to learning, thinking and teaching others in the realm of regenerative Agricultural. I am so grateful you’ve dedicated your life to this work. Thank you!
Was that your pond in the background??? That looks a LOT more full than I've seen it in weeks and weeks! Glad to see that. Thanks for making this video and pointing out the difference between ideas and principles vs what's actually working in any given place on the ground.
As someone who got obsessed with this, this video is like a bombshell. Absolutely brilliantly put these sentiments!
Hi Richard, really enjoying your channel. I would love to hear you speak about the challenges of Tropical climates. Intense summers of Heat and Humidity.
Thank you for this explanation, I wasn't aware that in Permaculture-culture there were dogmas too... and that people debate about dogmas rather than how to apply nature's lessons into their homestead/farm. You made it quite clear though, and I just subscribed and will start binge watching your videos... to learn. And who knows, we might come over for a season and learn your lessons in real life. Thanks again.
I am glad with these comments since they reflect what I have been struggling with. Talking with Allan and Will Harris straightened me out.
Thank you as always man. im in south africa and planning to start a permaculture after compliting my agricultural degree and please keep on advising and inspiring us with your work, because poverty is still a problem to be solved in africa thanks man.
Your corrupt, inept, uneducated leaders keep you poor. They cannot run sophisticated ststems.
Thanks Richard, for remaining a professional and refraining from bashing others that are doing their things their way. After all, in the end we are all colleagues in the business of making a living. Thanks for being a great resource!
We lead by example and personally feel that you Richard have paid your dues my brother. Accessing credible info is paramount in the execution of a successful enterprise. I’m a 70 year young organic grower in Florida and find your videos a profound inspiration . Thank You ...😊
Very much enjoyed this video. Thank you for sharing your experiences and wisdom!
You always explain things very well. There is no linear approach in permaculture. It's about taking in all factors within our own situation so that our practice of culture provides a permanent situation for us which in majority does more good than harm. Diversity is key, and why all around the world people who all have the same basic needs are different with different cultures and different foods. Foods require different measures to sustain the growing of them, even the same foods in similar regions (and why suggesting people eat the same as you is not sustainable or practical either - can't see you growing bananas for your business for example).
The diversity of videos on what is working for people, and what is not (and why), is a great resource to help people think about things they may not have tried or thought to try in their situation that may, or may not, help them improve. But at least gain a better understanding towards further improvement faster than going it alone.
I couldn't agree more with both you and Curtis. Also, your final point about not teaching without experience is so important!
Love all this common sense & thoughtful information. 💕
Great video! Sorry I'm late watching it, not sure how I missed it.
I'm inspired more with every video!
Thanks well said. You just understand the principles of variance better than he does, and I am glad you made that clear. Without bias and prejudice.
Very informative and done in a way that is easily understood, nice one Richard 👍🏻
Yes, I have enjoyed watching this video. In fact, I consider it to be one of your best (neat kind of summarization).
Superb argumentation/reasoning. Not that this is any kind of helpful for you, but yes: Thank you.
Excellent presentation Richard, very thoughtful and pragmatic advice
‘Life Evolves’ as Should our knowledge and skill sets.. Your So Right Richard.👍🇦🇺
Thank you for an excellent video! I nearly headed down the utopian bandwagon and after further business research saw that as of yet, in my case, it was not the direction to take. Cheers from Gomera
Your video was a breathe of fresh air and a lot of sound advice I haven’t heard and place else. Only some of the names I’m not familiar with and have no idea what they are like the tool or method to to deepen soil fertility instead of putting in swales
34:22
This is so precious. Thank you, Richard.