Ross Mars

Congrats to those who won my latest book. There will be a north american version by New Society Publishers and it will be called The Permaculture Transition Manual. This is due out in Sept or October. My very best wishes for your permaculture journey. Ross

Denise, re aging and permaculture. Half an acre is quite a large site to manage. Every tree needs pruning or looking after in some way, so I think your mum will struggle. Simplest, easy things mum can do is to get someone to install some raised garden beds (one or two, each 8' long and 3 to 4 ' wide, preferrably 2.5' high), fill with herbs and vegetables she would actually use, allow her to look after and handwater these. Plant a few dwarf varieties of fruit trees she would eat and underplant these with colour - either flowers or herbs or both. That is enough to keep her busy. No-one has a black thumb - everyone can learn how to grow plants. If all of this is too much then a few window boxes filled with plants, a small plucking bed near the back door (or whatever door has sunshine for things to grow). Plant a herb lawn if you have too. Good luck, Ross

I don't cover zone 00 at all in my book. While I acknowledge the importance of social aspects and a person's mindset, I tend to focus on permaculture as a science based on ecology. Zone 00 is not really a zone, and maybe some other term needs to be used to describe a person's psychological makeup and thought process. All of this is, of course, crucial in a design process, but should not be lumped with the accepted permaculture zones.

Tyler, I think your dam is too small. In a heavy rainfall event of one inch over your 20 acres, about half-a-million gallons fall. Imagine what falls and moves towards your place from the much larger catchment/neigbouring properties. A 1000 sq ft dam which is say 6 feet deep only holds 45,000 gallons. Assuming most water that falls ends up in soil I would still expect that dam to fill in one heavy rainfall event. You need to think about diverting runoff from neighbours away from your property as best you can, and collecting more water, which needs to take overflow towards creek or to another dam.

I was surprised to read some of the comments about PDC's. I have taught PDC's and other permaculture courses for about 25 years, and for me and I would hope the majority of my students, it is life-changing. Sure, different teachers cover some aspects more than others, some leave important bits out and so on, but experiencing permaculture first-hand by the visits to properties, by the teacher/s and guest speakers, by the practicals, by the sharing with others, engaging with your community will always win over reading a book or watching a DVD (and I should say I have produced about five books and two DVD's on permaculture and related topics). Just a thought.

One of the key fundamentals of permaculture is "Design for Catastrophe". As our climate is changing, two things will be evident. Firstly, some areas of the world will become more wet and others drier. Secondly, there will be extremes of weather, so more flash floods, more droughts or extremes of temperature. We all need to become better designers to enable our properties to become resilient in the face of adversity. My permaculture 'specialty' is water - how to harvest it, use it, store it, recycle it, conserve it and move it. Having excess water can be a blessing if you can get into the ground or storage tanks or dams, or at least have provision to drain excess away. I don't have quick fix answers for a deluge from nature, but think about how you could mitigate these events should they occur.

To know what to 'prepare' you really need to know about your site. Observation and then analysis is the first step in any permaculture endeavour. Then it's all about putting the puzzle together and to make those connections between the elements you want to have. Permaculture is essentially about design - it provides a framework for you to design the space and then begin to implement. Don't rush and start planting and building until you are sure that what you are trying to achieve is the best for you, your family, your property and the environment.

APC13 will be held in Perth in October this year. There will be lots of concurrent sessions and various courses, both before and after convergence, run by well-known practitioners David Holmgren, Rowe Morrow, Robin Clayfield, Graham Bell, Ross Mars, Robina McCurdy and Cecilia Macaulay, among others. Tours in and around Perth, hills, the south-west and north to Geraldton and back. Details found at www.apc13.org.

Hello everyone. I live in Western Australia, so there is often a huge time difference to where you may live. However, I will be around each day, maybe even at the same time as some of you, so please ask questions. I'll do my best to answer as much as I can. I am happy that finally my latest book has come out. It has been many years since "The Basics of Permaculture Design", and I wanted to write about things that were based on fact. So often you read about the most miraculous plants, the superfoods, dynamic accumulators and healing herbs - only to find out that most of this is myth and folklore. So I did some research about all of this and wrote only what I knew to be true. Anyway., enough about that! Hope to hear from some of you soon. Ross