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An open encyclopedia of plant information, with interactions, guilds, uses, functions and more

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posted 12 years ago

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Allow me to make a rambling introduction to a website. For the "too long - didn't read" version: Follow this link to a wiki database of plants with polycultures/guilds and interactions... http://practicalplants.org

Like most gardeners, homesteaders, permaculturalists (and so on) my partner and I have a mountain of books we reference to decide what to plant, where to plant it, what's wrong with it, how to harvest, store and use it, etc, but as much as we love our library it takes a lot of page flipping and book swapping to answer the question "What perennial nitrogen fixer would be at home in that shady spot by the house?" or "What grows well with tomatoes and peas?" or even "What are some good guilds/polycultures containing squashes?". We searched for a website that could do so and provide us with all the information we wanted, but came up empty. Moreover, we were worried by how many websites out there are relying on their users to build a plant database which they then claim exclusive rights over, essentially stealing the data from the community which created it. We think it's crucial that information on growing and using plants is free not only to access, but to edit , share and own, especially when it is created by a community of growers.

For that reason since the start of this year we've been hunched over laptops every evening, weekend, rainy day (which have been painfully rare here recently!) and spare moment we've had, to put together something we feel the world could do with. Something which fulfilled all the requirements we were searching for, but moreover, something which belongs to everyone. Along the way we discovered with joy that the Plants for a Future database we had been referring to while planning our forest garden was licensed under a Creative Commons license (free of copyright to use and modify as you like). It's the best database we'd encountered in our searches, containing short but information packed descriptions of 7,400 plants. It lacked some of the information we wanted (guilds/polycultures, plant interactions/companions, expanded information on uses and functions, problems & pests, etc) but suddenly we went from a database of about 100 plants we'd manually entered, to one of over 7000.

We've been fiddling with things for a while now, trying to get them just-right, and there are certainly still plenty of things we're not happy with. That said, we want it to be a community effort and we want community input on what we've done right, what we've done wrong, and how we can work together to make it better. A huge job lies ahead to convert the information from PFAF into more reader-friendly articles, and with adding all the plant interactions, guilds/polycultures, and all the other information we want to gather, but we hope that we can build a community which is as excited as us about the possibility of having a tool as powerful as this could be.

We're aware there are already plant databases out there, and the last thing we wanted to do is duplicate efforts, here's what we think makes Practical Plants necessary:
* It's a wiki, editable by anybody, and all the information is licensed under a Creative Commons license for anyone to use for any purpose with attribution
* Interactions between species, genera and families (positive or negative)
* Polycultures/guilds
* It will have extensive and detailed information on functions, and edible, medicinal and material uses, crop storage, and so on
* It has a direct focus on practical horticulture, and as such can provide depth and complexity of information which other sites cannot
* Every property is searchable, making it easy to ask those important questions: "What would go well in that dry spot in my garden?", "What frost hardy perennial likes acid soil?", "What plants can be grown for using as twine?", etc
* It's future direction is to be decided by an open community, not a closed organisation

So, please head on over to Practical Plants (http://practicalplants.org) to have a look at what we've done so far. Have a browse, join us in the forums to give any feedback, report any problems, and find out how you can help make things better.

Thanks for taking the time to read all that

Practical-Plants.png

Practical Plants is a collaboratively edited database of over 7000 plants with information on edible, medicinal and material uses, polycultures, interactions and more, and we need your help making it even better!

Written from Xardín do Cernunnos, a little valley permaculture homestead in the beautiful hills of Galicia.

Rich Dana

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posted 12 years ago

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Nicely done! Thanks for sharing! Just an FYI- I signed up but haven't gotten an email confirmation yet, so I can't log in.

Andru Vallance

Posts: 27

posted 12 years ago

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Thanks Rich - Phew! That was a much bigger problem than I anticipated but user confirmations should now be working. I'll mark your account as validated so you should just be able to log in

Cal Edon

Posts: 36

posted 12 years ago

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Excellent site, one I'll be bookmarking and directing people to!

PFAF's database can be oddly spotty, at times - I don't see a listing forMelilotus officinalis, although several other M. species are present. Hmmm.

Tyler Ludens

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Cal Edon wrote:Excellent site, one I'll be bookmarking and directing people to!

PFAF's database can be oddly spotty, at times - I don't see a listing forMelilotus officinalis, although several other M. species are present. Hmmm.

Are you saying M. officinalis isn't listed at PFAF? Or are you saying it isn't at Practical Plants? Because it is at PFAF.

http://www.pfaf.org/user/Plant.aspx?LatinName=Melilotus+officinalis

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Cal Edon

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Ah, my mistake. Thank you for the correction.

I've rather wondered if there aren't ways to use sweetclover in permaculture designs. As an introductory plant in a food forest, perhaps. It's such a common weed near me that finding practical uses for it would be quite helpful.

Andru Vallance

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posted 12 years ago

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Cal Edon wrote:I've rather wondered if there aren't ways to use sweetclover in permaculture designs. As an introductory plant in a food forest, perhaps. It's such a common weed near me that finding practical uses for it would be quite helpful.

If you find any information on it, hit the edit button on Melilotus officinalis and share it with others! That's the beauty of a wiki

Michael Newby

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Posts: 697

Location: Mount Shasta, CA Zone 8a Mediterranean climate

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Wow, I really like the site Andru! Looks like you guys have been very busy creating something that will be of great use to many people.

As for the M. officinalis, after a quick browse of the wiki and pfaf, I'd have to say that it looks like a great candidate for initial food forest establishment in less than stellar soil. You've got a good N fixer that's got edible parts and you know it won't take over because it dislikes the shade that the food forest canopy will provide...

"Instead of Pay It Forward I prefer Plant It Forward" ~Howard Story / "God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease, avalanches, and a thousand tempests and floods. But he cannot save them from fools." ~John Muir

My Project Page

Andru Vallance

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posted 12 years ago

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Thanks Michael. Very busy indeed! Now we're busy trying to find other people interested in making it even better

Does anyone have any smart ideas for spreading the word?

Ben Stallings

pollinator

Posts: 181

Location: Omaha, NE

posted 12 years ago

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Wow, Andru! That's great! Back in January I worked up something similar for my own use and was planning on opening it up to the general permies, but life got in the way and you beat me to it! Good for you!

A couple suggestions...

1) The one piece of functionality my site has that yours does not appear to have is that users (so far just myself) can specify a "design" (a garden plot, say) with its climate zone, soil type, sun exposure, etc. and specify which plants are already there, and the site will make suggestions of what else to plant based on the unmet needs of the plants that are there, taking the site characteristics into consideration. In other words, it helps you build a guild and saves it as an example for others to see. If you're interested in adding this functionality, I could work with you to make it happen. If not, expect me to piggyback on some of your research!

2) Check out Elia Charalambides' permaculture planning pack at https://permies.com/t/14704/permaculture/Permaculture-Planning-adults-children . She could benefit from your research, and your site could output her printable tiles, allowing people to go from abstract online planning to tabletop 2-D planning at the push of a button.

3) Many seed catalogs are partnering with http://www.growveg.com , a commercial 2-D garden planner with many great features, but it doesn't tell you anything about plant interactions. It will let you plant peas next to potatoes, no problem. If your site had some of the features of growveg (such as weekly planting guides customized to a particular garden plot and climate zone), you could partner with seed catalogs in a similar way and spread the word that way.

Thank you for this great service and for making it free to the world!

Andru Vallance

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posted 12 years ago

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Thanks Ben, it's been a lot of hard work (as I'm sure you can appreciate!) but we're really excited to have it online. Thanks for the links, I'm looking into them now.

We're interested in building a lot more functionality into Practical Plants, but our main priority at the moment is building a community. We're interested in adding a garden planner to help the plant search and selection process, and we're also interested in adding more social features and more ways to explore and improve data. I've dropped you an email already so if you're interested in helping with something like that let's talk

Michael Campbell

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posted 12 years ago

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Now this is the stuff! Amazing work there.

This editable plant database is looking extremely useful, and will greatly cut down on the book time trying to search for needed plants.

As far as getting the word out social media seems like it would be king, finding Facebook groups that are permaculture, seed swaping, gardening related ect., and posting links. You may want to contact folks running podcasts in similar or parallel interests to see if they would mention your site to feed visitors and support. I know The survival podcast is fairly pro permaculture and maybe Paul would toss out some words. Doing it in that manner might help you get the initial backbone community you are looking for without swamping your site with negative folks.

Please keep up the work, and thank you.

Xisca Nicolas

pollinator

Posts: 1981

Location: La Palma (Canary island) Zone 11

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Hi guys!
Great, I have been doing this for myself too, though it is not on the net but in docs on my computer.

pfaf is great, but very "british oriented", and I am in a special climate, at the same time Mediterranean and dry subtropical.

I am pissed off with information that always bother with cold and never with heat! We should be able to search according to our climate, and even usda zones are not enough, as they say nothing about the kind of SUMMER you have! It is based on winters...

I also laughed as I understood the goal!!! I have a awesome place for permies, as I have
- nice good earth,
- and also stony places,
- a rubble slope
- a tropical place facing west and down a rocky cliff
- shade under avocado trees (and they have allelopatic leaves...)

I also suggest to take into account winter rain or summer rain, though some plants can adapt, but never know...

And that would be great to compare climates. I have done it for my place, so now I know which plants from south Africa I can plant, or natives from which parts of Australia.

So, I wish to participate.

Xisca - pics! Dry subtropical Mediterranean - My project
However loud I tell it, this is never a truth, only my experience...

Tyler Ludens

pollinator

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American Horticultural Society Heat Zone Map http://www.ahs.org/publications/heat_zone_map.htm

Idle dreamer

Andru Vallance

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posted 12 years ago

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Michael: Thanks! We have a Facebook page online and we're trying to spread the word via that, so far it's going ok, but we've had very little support or reply from other Facebook pages about permaculture, homesteading etc. Not sure why!

Xisca: Great to hear you're interested! As Tyler inferred, the combination of a USDA hardiness zone and a ASH heat zone can give a pretty good indication of a climate. As you said, the wet season is an important piece of data too, which we haven't seen tracked anywhere yet. I've just seen your posts on the Practical Plants forums so I'll reply in full over there.

Tyler: We do store AHS Heat Zones, but finding the data for them is another matter! So far we've failed to find any source of data for heat zones. If anyone knows of one please let us know!

Tyler Ludens

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posted 12 years ago

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That information in not easily found on the internet, though the AHS says thousands of plants have been classified by heat tolerance, I'm not sure where one is supposed to find this information. Frustrating! Supposedly some plant catalogs have the heat index codes, but I haven't found any yet....

Idle dreamer

Devon Olsen

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Location: Central Wyoming -zone 4

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great looking site, i cant wait to see it develop further, maybe one day it'll be one of my most visited sites if it ever fills up enough:)

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My Available products thread . My Blog!! . My Podcast!!

Jaime Wilder

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posted 12 years ago

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Hi Andru

Nice work.

I've created a site that is more oriented around mapping out a garden/permaculture. I did not want to recreate the wheel as there are already several sites like yours that have excellent information on specific plants.

I already have dedicated wikipedia and USDA links off my site for each plant that gets entered.

I'd be happy to include dedicated links on every plant page to your site if you'd like.

Perhaps you would mention mine for people looking to do actual garden design.

Find it here: www.plant-life.us

You can take a peek at my garden in my sig as well.

Xisca Nicolas

pollinator

Posts: 1981

Location: La Palma (Canary island) Zone 11

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It is really great to have links and that each site has its specificity.
Ed, the idea to make plans on line and find gardens with a similar climate is also great,
and I hope you can both link your works!

The main problem I have on Internet, when I look for plants that suit my place,
is the amount of pages I have to open and check for...
and sometimes they give the same information.

I have found an Australian site that gives pfaf text, and nothing special to give more.
Andru wants to give more, and what is most specific in his project is:
- the search engine with criterii
- make guilds

I got angry in my search, and I just thought to write to all plant sites I bookmarked,
and tell them to agree and share the jobs!
This means accepting to drop part of the giant goal of having ALL in one site.
Each site would have its specificity, and then, the nature oriented people would give a good behaviour lesson on how to cooperate better than what is seen increasing on the net.

Xisca - pics! Dry subtropical Mediterranean - My project
However loud I tell it, this is never a truth, only my experience...

Andru Vallance

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posted 12 years ago

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Ed Colmar wrote:
I've created a site that is more oriented around mapping out a garden/permaculture. I did not want to recreate the wheel as there are already several sites like yours that have excellent information on specific plants.

I already have dedicated wikipedia and USDA links off my site for each plant that gets entered.

I'd be happy to include dedicated links on every plant page to your site if you'd like.

Hi Ed. Thanks for your interest. While there are indeed plenty of plant reference sites, Practical Plants isn't just-another-reference site. We built it precisely because our experience in using other reference sites was lacking. It is different in a few very important ways, the first and most important of which is that it is open. As a wiki, the community are the curators of the database. The change this produces cannot be understated: instead of wishing the plant database you use kept data about X, you and the community can implement it. Instead of wondering why a database doesn't have an entry for plant Y, you can add it. Beyond that and equally important, the data is a common treasury for all. Many plant databases on the internet, even those that use their communities to build the database, have exclusive rights to it's use in whole. They are using a community to build something that the community has no legal right to. What happens if the company comes upon hard times and decides to sell access for a fee or even close that website? The community has no rights. Again, I don't think the importance of this can be understated. The data on Practical Plants is released under a Creative Commons license for it's community to use, modify and reproduce as they wish. It belongs to us all in common.

Practical Plants also has functionality that is incredibly difficult to find elsewhere: polycultures (guilds) and interactions. The relationships between plants can be stored with information regarding that relationship, and in doing so the database builds a complex web of plant interactions. Likewise, polycultures can store a reference to species, genera or families, allowing every plant to list the polycultures it belongs to.

We'd be more than happy for you to link through to Practical Plants articles - they're there to help!

Devon Olsen wrote:
great looking site, i cant wait to see it develop further, maybe one day it'll be one of my most visited sites if it ever fills up enough

Thanks! Well, it's a wiki - if everyone waits until it's "full" then it'll never be - don't wait until some point in the future to use it, come and help us fill it!

Xisca Nicolas

pollinator

Posts: 1981

Location: La Palma (Canary island) Zone 11

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And how are we going to fill it?

There are 2 different parts in the job...

1) Find the info elsewhere and fill the plants pages. That is what you did with pfaf.
Now, you need other DB to go on for missing plants.
For this part, yes, it will be "another plant reference site"

2) Then there is the job to design guilds...
Then the question is how are we going to decide about it?

You presented the example of the 3 sisters.

I can tell what I did last year:
I sow mungo beans for a try, and I added millet in the same lines, because it was also a try, and also my local carrot.
The result was great, because millet did not grew well, and I did not have to wonder how I was going to fill the gap between plants.
I 1st collected the mungo, it dried, and left room. Then I harvested the millet, then I had a great patch of carrot all winter long.

Is it the kind of example you are looking for?

Xisca - pics! Dry subtropical Mediterranean - My project
However loud I tell it, this is never a truth, only my experience...

Andru Vallance

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Xisca Nicolas wrote:
1) Find the info elsewhere and fill the plants pages. That is what you did with pfaf.
Now, you need other DB to go on for missing plants.
For this part, yes, it will be "another plant reference site"

2) Then there is the job to design guilds...
Then the question is how are we going to decide about it?

1) We will indeed search for other sources of data to import. Some of this information is sure to conflict with that from other sources, and for that eventuality we are working on technology to allow users to resolve those conflicts easily. We'll be posting about that on the Practical Plants forum soon to get feedback on the ideas

2) Polycultures (guilds), as with everything on Practical Plants, should only be entered if they are well tested and established. In order to be a reliable source of information, we cannot accept contributions based on limited first-hand experience or hearsay. Eg. If a person tries growing a few things together one year and it works, that is not sufficient evidence to say it is an established guild. However, if a person runs a trial with a guild - grows it multiple times and can confirm it works, explain the reasons why, and can explain their processes, they should document all this information somewhere (on a website, blog, forum post, or something) and use this as a reference (citation) for the guild. That way the guild can be listed, and anyone looking to find out the details behind it can follow the reference to examine the process. This allows a somewhat scientific process, allowing others to check the methods and repeat an experiment.

Xisca Nicolas

pollinator

Posts: 1981

Location: La Palma (Canary island) Zone 11

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posted 12 years ago

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Well, ask permaculture teachers about it....

We all know about those famous charts with the companionship...
But not everyone will tell you to sow beans when corn is 5" tall.
Some plant go well with a second one, that goes well with a third, that goes bad with the first!!!
And it is never taken into account the simple 2 lists that should be done (and never saw):
which hate water on their leaves, which love it, or don't mind.

And in MY place, I must find guilds of what loves sun HERE,
like capsicum that do not grow in the shade,
(even tomatoes need some shade in full summer heat...)
and what I can (have to) do in the shade.

So why the job of telling you practical answers does not seem to be done by those who teach the great principles of permaculture?
Yes it depends, but then it could be detailed.
I will never go to a course for this reason.
The great principles can be found in books.
A course should be practical, so for people having the same needs in he same kind of places.

So, let's do something that will help on Internet.
For the sources, I have already said in practical plant forum that I have a list of DB about plants...
Some extracts are used by seed sellers, and this is a big job of opening windows because of them !

Xisca - pics! Dry subtropical Mediterranean - My project
However loud I tell it, this is never a truth, only my experience...

Jaime Wilder

Posts: 47

posted 12 years ago

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Andru Vallance wrote:

As a wiki, the community are the curators of the database.

We'd be more than happy for you to link through to Practical Plants articles - they're there to help!

Yes, crowdsourcing is great so long as you have a community that contributes. A big part of inspiring the community to contribute is contributing back to the community, and making people feel wanted.

I added the embedded link to your site on every plant page of my site. Hopefully this will drive some traffic your way.

Achillea millefolium on plant-life

I would appreciate you returning the favor on your site with a mention. This is part of that "making people feel wanted" bit.

Andru Vallance

Posts: 27

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Ed Colmar wrote:I would appreciate you returning the favor on your site with a mention. This is part of that "making people feel wanted" bit.

Certainly wasn't my intention to make you feel unwanted, Ed. I was mostly responding to your comment about us "reinventing the wheel" and mistook your suggestion of a link-exchange as only a request to link through to Practical Plants. I'll drop you a PM about a link exchange.

Xisca Nicolas

pollinator

Posts: 1981

Location: La Palma (Canary island) Zone 11

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Ed, the links do not work.

wikipedia, USDA DB and practical plants do not have the same goals.
And you might add some more links...
I would suggest that you do a page to present your resources, so that everybody knows what can be expected from this site. For example, when I search, I do not anymore bother to open a window for a USDA link, I will never find what I need on this site !

Xisca - pics! Dry subtropical Mediterranean - My project
However loud I tell it, this is never a truth, only my experience...

Jaime Wilder

Posts: 47

posted 12 years ago

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Xisca Nicolas wrote:Ed, the links do not work.

wikipedia, USDA DB and practical plants do not have the same goals.
And you might add some more links...
I would suggest that you do a page to present your resources, so that everybody knows what can be expected from this site. For example, when I search, I do not anymore bother to open a window for a USDA link, I will never find what I need on this site !

Hi Xisca.

I have not added all of the actual links yet. I added the functionality. I will go through when I have time and add the actual links in.

Like practical plants, this site can be updated by anyone. Just log in, and you can add the links yourself if you so choose.

"Do a page to present your resources" Is the homepage on plant-life not clear?

Xisca Nicolas

pollinator

Posts: 1981

Location: La Palma (Canary island) Zone 11

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It is proposed to log in through google only... So I cannot add my hotmail address... Or else I would have gone and explore!

Your home page explains your specificity: drawing a garden map and find people in the same climate.

But it does not have a resource page to explain what you can expect to find, from your plant pages, if you click on USDA links, or now, what you can expect to find in practical plants! I cannot contribute in a foreign language for me...

Xisca - pics! Dry subtropical Mediterranean - My project
However loud I tell it, this is never a truth, only my experience...

Jaime Wilder

Posts: 47

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Xisca Nicolas wrote:It is proposed to log in through google only...

it does not have a resource page to explain what you can expect to find

Yes, we use google authentication because the site connects to other google services. If you don't have a google account, you're really missing out. Creating a login/password for every website is rapidly becoming obsolete.

The plant-life site is not designed to be a replacement for a dedicated plant database, which is why we include links to other authoritative sites, like wikipedia and USDA. The main purpose of the site is garden mapping, and the plant information is connected out of necessity.

Yes, the site is currently only in English, hence the .us domain name. After we get out of beta, we will consider localization into other languages. The site will still work for you, and you will still be able to create your own garden map if you like.

Xisca Nicolas

pollinator

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Location: La Palma (Canary island) Zone 11

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Yes I have, but I want to use my Spanish address for all this stuff, I separate... I am an emigrate...
Some sites offer the choice to connect through other accounts.

For the rest, I just could not make me understand in English, but is is not important. I just suggest that people can know what they will find in those websites that are cited as resources.

Well, yes I know how I can explain: if you are linked in practical plants, won't you like that they mention that in this site, yours, people will be able to map their garden?

Xisca - pics! Dry subtropical Mediterranean - My project
However loud I tell it, this is never a truth, only my experience...

Devon Olsen

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Location: Central Wyoming -zone 4

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^ you may try using google translator to translate the page, it is not always accurate but sometimes it works just enough to get the jist of what is being said

Farm Website
My Available products thread . My Blog!! . My Podcast!!

Xisca Nicolas

pollinator

Posts: 1981

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Some good cooperation at the horizon...

https://permies.com/t/4292/plants/Plant-Tree-Guild-Database

Xisca - pics! Dry subtropical Mediterranean - My project
However loud I tell it, this is never a truth, only my experience...

Kim Travis

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Location: Bedias, Texas

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Greetings,
I was so excited when I saw this, but now I am disappointed. What happened to the category of plant: Legume? Finding legumes for my area is a real challenge and one I was hoping you had solved. I am still new to all this stuff, but I know I need to get a bunch of legumes on my property. Also, how do I know which plants are pioneers or do I have to do the standard look at the details of all plants? I get so tired of looking, trying to find what I need.

Kim & Garth Travis
Bedias Texas

Andru Vallance

Posts: 27

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Kim Travis wrote:Greetings,
I was so excited when I saw this, but now I am disappointed. What happened to the category of plant: Legume? Finding legumes for my area is a real challenge and one I was hoping you had solved. I am still new to all this stuff, but I know I need to get a bunch of legumes on my property. Also, how do I know which plants are pioneers or do I have to do the standard look at the details of all plants? I get so tired of looking, trying to find what I need.

Hi Kim,
Please see the family Leguminosae for a list of all plants in the Leguminosae family (Legumes). We store everything by latin (binomial) names, as common names change hugely from place to place.

While plant species do have common names assigned, we don't yet have common names for families and genera (working on it!) so if you don't know the genus/family name for a plant the best thing to do is search for that plant (eg. Apple, which will show you Malus domestica, the latin name for Apple) and at the top of that page it tells you the family and genus.

Hope that helps.

Kim Travis

Posts: 19

Location: Bedias, Texas

posted 12 years ago

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Greetings,
Thank you for such a quick reply. I run a 20 acre farm by myself while I am taking a permaculture course and trying to plan the farm as my homework/project for my certificate. It is a real challenge to do on very little time and energy. I do appreciate your efforts and if I find any information that I can add, I will. First, I have some learning to do.

Kim & Garth Travis
Bedias Texas

Tyler Ludens

pollinator

Posts: 11853

Location: Central Texas USA Latitude 30 Zone 8

1261

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posted 12 years ago

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Kim, have you searched in the Texas Plants Database for your ecological region? http://tpid.tpwd.state.tx.us/ It will give a listing of plants native or naturalized to the region. Unless I messed up, here is the list for your region http://tpid.tpwd.state.tx.us/PlantFind.asp Legumes I can see in that list are: ILLINOIS BUNDLE FLOWER (PRAIRIE MIMOSA) , COFFEE BEAN , HUISACHE ,HONEY MESQUITE ,LEADPLANT, YELLOW SWEETCLOVER ,FALSE MESQUITE ,FERN ACACIA (PRAIRIE ACACIA) ,WHITE CLOVER ,RED CLOVER ,EASTERN REDBUD ,SLICK SEED WILDBEAN ,TRAILING WILDBEAN ,SLIMLEAF SCURFPEA (WILD ALFALFA) ,VIRGINIA TEPHROSIA (GOAT'S RUE) ,TEXAS SOPHORA (EVE'S NECKLACE) ,WATER HONEY LOCUST

I might have overlooked some. The database is also helpful for designing guilds based on existing native trees, by searching under the name of the tree and looking at the bottom of the page where it lists "associated species."

I hope this helps some....

Idle dreamer

Elia Charalambides

Posts: 78

Location: Boston

posted 12 years ago

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Ben Stallings wrote:
2) Check out Elia Charalambides' permaculture planning pack at https://permies.com/t/14704/permaculture/Permaculture-Planning-adults-children . She could benefit from your research, and your site could output her printable tiles, allowing people to go from abstract online planning to tabletop 2-D planning at the push of a button.

I commented on this on my thread just now.

P.s.
Elia is a he

Blame my parents on their poor choice of spelling. Usually Greeks spell it Ilia and sometimes Russians spell it Ilya.

Help me develop a design kit for permaculture enthusiasts: http://legendofthegreek.com/permaculture-planning-pack/

Eric Toensmeier

Author

Posts: 145

posted 12 years ago

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That's pretty grreat. Have you been to www.apiosinstitute.org? We are doing some similar things.

Author 'Perennial Vegetables', co-author 'Edible Forest Gardens'.

Website - http://www.perennialsolutions.org/

Xisca Nicolas

pollinator

Posts: 1981

Location: La Palma (Canary island) Zone 11

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posted 12 years ago

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Eric Toensmeier wrote:That's pretty grreat. Have you been to www.apiosinstitute.org? We are doing some similar things.

Great Eric, the objective is precise. I hope that people can cooperate on many precise, unique, but related, projects!

Xisca - pics! Dry subtropical Mediterranean - My project
However loud I tell it, this is never a truth, only my experience...

Eric Toensmeier

Author

Posts: 145

posted 12 years ago

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Yes, almost as though we ourselves are members of a polyculture! I'm posting my first polycluture on practicalplants as we speak.

Author 'Perennial Vegetables', co-author 'Edible Forest Gardens'.

Website - http://www.perennialsolutions.org/

no wonder he is so sad, he hasn't seen this tiny ad:

A rocket mass heater is the most sustainable way to heat a conventional home

http://woodheat.net