I plant trees first because they take a long time to grow but if you are worried about bettering the soil then somthinglike oats that drives lots of roots down into the soil. Roots rotting in the soil make organic matter in the soil. or Paul Wheatons buck wheat which has, if i undestood it right, really long stalks that you can use for mulcc it produces more mulch thatn other grasses. If it were not rented land you would simply at first want to grow as much organic material as possible you would want to plant everythig at first maybe the garden has good soil so it so there is no need to increase the vegetable matter planting lots of things.
Who has a list of the plants that produce most organic matter quickest the most airail matter and the most roots to make soils.
you would want a duck poind so as to have th e animals that permiculture approves both for attacking pests and for passign organic matter, that could be ornamental so your landlady did not get cross with you. and ornamental ducks for the same reason. YOu coudl plant Lea Sattlers special spinach that grows like a vine so the land lady would not know it was spinach,and beetroot for its pretty red leaves.
Ifyou are rich you plant a mass of plants, both trees and ground plants in a year and put in really big trees walnuts have really lovely leaves and are meant to protect against insects th efrench put on in each feild so the cattle can erst unpesterd by insects and fatten quicker. if you are poor you collect plants slowly you can collect seed of treesv pips and stones of all the fruit you eat put them in wet soil for two mounths in th fridge and then sew them. I threw cherry seeds in the garden and when i had forgotten them they started coming up which was nice. Maybe you can walk round parks stealing cuttings. it is bad to be a theif but if you aren't rich well permaculture is more important than other things, wha tthe hel we have the planet to save.
Make a small reaise bed you can cover with posts you can hang a cover on to protect it from cold and a too hot sun and put cuttings in there you will soon learn to get better at them. I start reading things up an dlearning when i fail at them. Start with willow cuttings they are easy. Seeds are expensive at one and a half euros they soon mount up, take the seds out of your tomatoes aubergines peppers melons hpe they ahve grown in a big feild full of melons not mixed with cucumbers and maybe your melons wont have a cucumber father this method its at least feels cheaper.
As trees and bushes bring up
water from deeper in the ground and feed it to superficial roots if these are suffering from negative pressure which means losing water to the soil in stead of taking it up, the earth is so hot and dry then the roots of bushes and trees wil be keeping the soil humid an benefiting other plants.This is a new-ish bit os biological knowleg¡dge but it is true, look up HYDRAULIC REDISTRIBUTION TREES. the other advantage of roots apart from stopping erosion in the soil is that they improve drainage and the equal distribution of water.
If you plant a hedge in a mass it provides more protection for birds a round hedge a big bush i suppose.
If there are winds you need a hedge, it break the winds. A reallly good wind break is a whole
wood with lower trees in the side of the prevailing winds and then higher and higher trees so the wind is lifted gradually . If you build a wall the winds come up and over it and form little whirl winds on the other side.
vegetation reduces heating bills and air conditioning ones lots of trees to break winds and creepers on your walls.
If you are rich you can get a specialist and put in water harvesting areas and swales for irrigation and ditches for drainage if that is necesary and make a pond to grow water chestnuts in and fish for the table and buy masses of mulch, dig raised beds or huglekulture beds but these are the sort of thing you can't do in your rental property except discreetly.
If you aren't rich you think of mulches that can just be picked up and digging and maiking raised beds by yourself, the cheapest i have seen was using corrugated iron as walls for the raised beds and fillling them full of earth and if you are poor were do you get the earth from, when buying a lorry full is a problem. Garden Girl has videos of making medium rich raised beds. she has good looking raised beds and vertical gardens and lots of other permaculture things she is a tv character but there are lots of her videos on youtube.
If you dig out a ditch at the side of your raised bed the earth you take out goes to make the raised beds, If you simply make a box with corrugated iron sides, then you hav eto think how to fill it wiht earth for the unrich this is the cheapest raised bed i have seen or you can make one of train sleepers piled up or with a stone wall if i you are rich, then you need to fill it full of earth from somewhere if you are poor or even just not able to hhandle lots of extra expenses you must find it in your garden, you had better think of were you would like low areas. and dig it out from these.
Raised beds protect the far side from the wind or maybe the sun and bigger ones would be better than smaller ones for this.
If it where not that your garden is rented you could plant a stand of trees to serve you as fire wood. and a stand of chestnuts which coppiced provide you with stout wands that you can use for furniture using the split wood method or chair and
fence making.
agri rose macaskie.