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What are the basic rules of permaculture garden design (2D plan)?

 
Posts: 29
Location: Northeastern Hungary, zone 7a
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Hi Everyone!

Is there a book or guide on permaculture garden design (plant placement, distances, geometry, plant species) which contains information on what type of plants can be planted, how close to each other and why?
I want to design a 2D garden plan which works and I want to know the rules of garden design in zone 7a.

1. What are the rules for designing the location of shrubs and trees in a garden in relation to smaller plants?

2. What type of plants can I plant near trees and shrubs and how close can I plant them?

3. I don't want the roots of the plants to compete with each other. Is there a list of plants by root debth?

4. How does solar exposure, slope rate and orientation, prevailing wind direction and USDA zone/climate (I'm in zone 7a) influence shrub and tree placement?

5. What are some productive shrubs, trees or perennial vines for shade application to protect against harmful radiation?
UV B radiation has burnt the top of the foilage of trees and the stem of annuals where I live in USDA zone 7a this year and last year.
I can't plant big overstory trees because of community garden rules.

Thanks for your help in advance!
 
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I am not sure there are rules about this though there are opinions.

Alot of folks on the forum believe in in bio intensive gardening.  Have you heard of this method?

There is a book by John Jeavons on this subject.

https://permies.com/wiki/20295/grow-vegetables-John-Jeavons

https://permies.com/t/16349/John-Jeavons-Method

https://permies.com/t/192558/Jeavons-rule-trees-shrubs-mediterranean

 
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I'm no expert, and live in a completely different climate, but I'll go ahead and quote the standard permaculture "rule": it depends. No two sites, even in the same climate, are identical. There are just too many factors at play to exactly pin down with 100% certainty what will work and not. Standard agriculture takes a lot of these factors out of the equation by pesticides, herbicides, intense tillage, chemical fertilizers and heavy irrigation, at the cost of massive environmental degradation. Living landscapes are, by definition, complex, and therefore somewhat unpredictable. I personally think permaculture is a lot about accepting that unpredictability, and learning to work with it. That said, here are a couple of thoughts:

-You live north of the equator. Most of the annual vegetables that you'll likely want to grow don't handle shade well at all. The same goes for a quite a few of the perennial, herbaceous species, and most fruiting shrubs and smaller trees. Even the ones that survive a bit of shade likely won't give you as big a harvest as they would in the sun. So, if you start with a bare-ish land, plant the annual vegetables along the southern side, so they get as much sun as possible. North of that, you might plant herbaceous perennials and/or low berry bushes (currants, raspberries, etc), and north of them taller bushes and low trees (hazel and apples, for instance), finishing with a belt of taller trees along the northern side (if you can, but I just saw in your post that there are rules against full-sized trees...)This mimics a natural forest edge.
There are obviously situations where this doesn't apply. For instance, in areas prone to extreme heat in the summer, a bit of light shade could be beneficial for some crops, and in very windy areas, shelter is a good thing. However, in most temperate climates without extremes of wind and heat, this might be a way to make sure that all your plants get the light they need.
-I don't know about UV protection. The problem is that the only way to use plants to protect against it, is to create shade. Very few things do well in deep shade, and lighter shade might not be enough to exclude the UV radiation. Maybe you can see if there's a pattern as to which plants get burnt, and which manage, and then focus on growing the ones that manage?
 
Zoltán Korbel
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Location: Northeastern Hungary, zone 7a
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Eino Kenttä wrote:-I don't know about UV protection. The problem is that the only way to use plants to protect against it, is to create shade. Maybe you can see if there's a pattern as to which plants get burnt, and which manage, and then focus on growing the ones that manage?



The leaves at the very top of Black Locust trees got burnt in the lowlands of Hungary even though Black Locust loves the sun and is not very thirsty.
Fruit trees were also burnt similarly and lost their fruit (they got enough water). This is why i'm worreid about the vegatables plants and herbs.

A permaculturalist farmer said that in his orchard in the last 2-3 years, the quince trees mostly lost their fruit except for the one which was accidentally planted next to a native Elm tree and the fruit tree climbed on the Elm like a vine and grew in partial shade.

I've heard astronomers say a couple of years ago that the Sun has been bruning hotter and hotter since the 1980s so it's a trend it seems like affirmed by farmeres' experiences as well recently.

I left potatos in the ground for more than a year and their leaves got yellow in the summer as well, but the one which was under partial shade from a tree looked better.

A shade cloth, mesh could be a temporary solution, but I'd rather provide shade with plants. But I'm not sure how exactly.

I think a tall tree, the foilage of which is closer to the top and is spreads out horizontally would provide dappled shade at noon in the hot summer (when it matters), but in the morning and afternoon the less radiant Sun from a lower angle could shine on the plants growing near the tree.
In the winter when the Sun shines at a lower angle the light can reach the plants under the tall tree (just like the eaves of a traditional peasant's house) which should be decidious so without leaves it allowes even more light to shine at the plants.

I was thinking about growing hardy kiwi on a trellis consisting of posts and horizontal structures/wires/grid on top maybe. Hardy Kiwi doesn't have many good companion plants though and the kiwi may grow too dense of a foilage (not partial/dappled shade).
hardy-kiwi-trellis.jpg
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kiwi_t10.jpg
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pollinator
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I think kiwi can only grow in zones 8 and higher?
 
Eino Kenttä
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Riona Abhainn wrote:I think kiwi can only grow in zones 8 and higher?


You can grow one of the hardy species, Actinidia arguta or A. kolomikta. The kolomikta grows and fruits just fine in north-ish Sweden (supposedly USDA zone 5, but with quite long winters). The fruits are way smaller than "ordinary" kiwi, but taste about the same, if not better, and can be eaten whole, skin and all. The skin is not hairy, unlike ordinary kiwi.

As for kiwi casting too deep a shade, I've heard someone say that you can't over-prune a kiwi vine. So maybe you could grow it and continuously prune it to the right density, and use the pruned material as mulch? Chop and drop, more or less?
 
Zoltán Korbel
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Riona Abhainn wrote:I think kiwi can only grow in zones 8 and higher?



Near where I live I've seen Kiwi grow in partial shade on a fence, in a zoo which is in the mountains in the forest, and it's even colder than where I want to grow it, so it should grow in my garden just fine, which is on a slope (heavy, cold air drains to the bottom of the hill) and receives much more sun light.
I know of professional gardeners who grow and sell Kiwi plants in my country for outdoors planting. They say it's edible too but I don't know which variety it is.
 
Zoltán Korbel
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Eino Kenttä wrote:You can grow one of the hardy species, Actinidia arguta or A. kolomikta. The kolomikta grows and fruits just fine in north-ish Sweden (supposedly USDA zone 5, but with quite long winters). The fruits are way smaller than "ordinary" kiwi, but taste about the same, if not better, and can be eaten whole, skin and all. The skin is not hairy, unlike ordinary kiwi.


I will look up these varieties.
In my mind Kiwi was an exotic, tropical fruit but after reading up on this plant I realized how wrong I was.

Eino Kenttä wrote:As for kiwi casting too deep a shade, I've heard someone say that you can't over-prune a kiwi vine. So maybe you could grow it and continuously prune it to the right density, and use the pruned material as mulch? Chop and drop, more or less?


Good idea. It could work too.

Do you happen to have experience based knowledge of how fast Kiwi grows in a specific zone or climate?

I also need to find out how close I can plant other plants to the trunk of the Kiwi plant. I heard it's not a good companion.
 
Eino Kenttä
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Zoltán Korbel wrote: Do you happen to have experience based knowledge of how fast Kiwi grows in a specific zone or climate?

I also need to find out how close I can plant other plants to the trunk of the Kiwi plant. I heard it's not a good companion.


Not much experience yet. We've planted some kolomiktas at our place (supposedly zone 6, but again with long winters). This was their second year after planting, and one of the plants put on probably half a meter during the summer. I don't know if it will accelerate or remain on that level, and the soil is not yet awesome where they are, so maybe they would grow even faster with better soil. Anyhow, they're fast growers for sure.

As for them not being good companions, I don't know. They probably wouldn't get along with anything wanting full sun. On the other hand, in the local arboretum they have some massive kolomikta vines, one of which is climbing on an elder bush of some sort, and two on bird cherry trees (Prunus padus). Both the elder bush and the bird cherries seem to be doing fine. I guess the bird cherries manage by having most of their branches out of reach of the kiwi, but the elder isn't that tall, and seems to have reached some sort of equilibrium with the kiwi. The kiwi climbs the bush, their respective top branches are on about the same level, and neither of them seems to be taking over.
It's true that the ground vegetation under the denser kiwis is a bit limited. I think there are a bunch of ferns, but maybe not too much else. Too deep shade, I guess...
 
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