Ivan Mayes

Hey Amy! I've been working in very small pieces to put some of this together. I have a working version of something that I'll put up for people to try out at some point this spring. Its not a complete planning app like most gardening tools, right now its mostly focused on making groupings or lists of plants, and its serving you information about that whole group of plants together. Its like having all of their Plants for a Future pages up in a spreadsheet together, so you can see things like soil preference issues, which layers and functions are being filled.

I would like to make it smarter and alert you about functions that you haven't filled, like "You don't have a good nectary plant" or "You dont have any groundcovers" just as tips for people, and I would like to go from there to making a simple drag and drop builder where you can show what patterns you are using and then of course have these default as public systems that people can share to others or visit the site for inspiration based on a plant search.

Right now its mostly just my real job (and spring planting!) keeping me from making progress, but would love to open source this and get some help moving it forward, as soon as I can get people aligned to the roadmap. Thanks for your interest Amy!

Hey guys, I have posted a couple times with guild / polyculture design apps in mind to build. The trouble i've found is getting decent data to fill in the software. I've tried talking to both Dave's and PFAF with no luck, if someone has any idea on how to get the plant data to make good recommendations for polycultures or guild based design principles (height, function, soil type, etc), please let me know and I'll be happy to build out a front end for everyone to use ideally.

Ah i'm sorry I didn't realize there would only be plants in the second pool to filter the water. What you said makes alot more sense now, thanks David!

David Pagan Butler wrote:I can't really advise on the snake issue. A conventional chlorinated outdoor pool will carry a similar risk so talk to a local pool installer to see how they deal with snakes. Better still get advice from a local ecologist. It maybe the case that any pool, Natural Swimming Pool or conventional pool, may not be appropriate to your area.

I think the difference between a conventional pool looks, from the examples i've seen, to be that there is a plant ecosystem in the pool that provides habitat for snakes, and also makes it more difficult to see one should it be there. In our climate we see very little issue with snakes in conventional pools (unless they get trapped there) simply because there is nothing for them there, aside from perhaps a sunny open area to sunbathe. Also, its very easy to see them in the pool or surrounding area typically because conventional pools don't typically have any place to hide around them.

Not trying to knock natural pools, in fact I am curious about other peoples experience with these issues so that I can make sure that the pool I build is safe for my niece to use. I don't think many people would be comfortable with their kids running and jumping into a pool that might have an aggressive or territorial snake that is setting up home and not easily detectable though. Anyways, I am determined to build one, so I will perhaps resurrect this thread next year and report my findings / potential solutions for snakes.

Hey David!

I've been very interested in building a natural pool since I saw some of the first permies videos showing some of the examples. However, I live in Arkansas and we of course have alot of potentially dangerous water loving snakes and other things that like water habitats. Have you had any experience with this issue and what kind of mentality do you have about balancing natural ecosystems with the danger of some species in your swimming area? And are there any methods to take to dissuade snakes from setting up camp in/around my natural pool?

Thanks!

I didn't realize Paul had a wiki already set up. After I finish a freelance project I will try to dedicate some time to help organize and get some things started on it.

I agree about having books on hand, and each perspective is different, especially for the days that you need to come back and reference something quickly. I think the wiki's purpose would be to ease people into the idea of permaculture and how to get started in a way that is close to alot of these books, but free. Also I see it as a valuable tool for people to quickly have a platform to show what they are doing in their garden and write a quick article that shows design and examples of how they are using permaculture in their lives, which is what Collin was referencing in his second or third post.

I love how they do it on this site http://our.windowfarms.org/. They've open sourced a window garden and let the community submit all their creations and come together to find the sort of best configuration all together. The site functions as a way for anyone to go write a post about their implementation and talk about what they did and why, its awesome to see everyone's creativity with the project and to see the different results!

I don't think we are ever going to have a true "model" that works in every environment and climate, but I think we can all benefit from seeing everyone else's work in a more organized way than the forums. For instance, one of the things I have never seen in any book is workable examples for the southeast around Zone 7, most examples from US authors are west coast climates, or colder northern areas without really hot summers. I'd love to be able to open a page and see peoples workable examples from climates closer to mine as a source of inspiration!

What I see as a potential problem here is that the real experimenters and leaders in this field (that we know about) are the people who have taken the time out to write a book or start teaching as a way to make all or part of their income.

What I see in this forum are ALOT of people who also have valuable experience from their successes (and failures) at attempting this way of life that will never stop long enough to write a book, but who will absolutely contribute in small bits to the community via this forum and other places.

It seems to me that it would be really helpful to start a open source group wiki where we can organize alot of the meaningful information contained in these peoples heads plus the experiences of this forum into a way for someone to easily disseminate into a permies wiki/book of some kind. This could greatly improve the learning curve of someone interested in learning permaculture that doesn't know where to start or who to follow, and in a way that is completely free to the public without buying alot of these books to glean little differences of information (not to cheapen the great experiences of alot of these writers, I just have personally bought dozens of books that are 70% of the same information so that I can learn a bit more about the 30% thats different)

If we believe in this lifestyle as a way to heal the earth, lets work together to create a learning material that we can distribute to everyone that will provide a legitimate case for permaculture plus the steps to achieve the lifestyle in their own lives! We would obviously want them to come to this resource for questions and community participation, but it would be great to see more organization of the valuable information retained in the archives and minds of the people on this forum! I look at places like http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/LifeTrac and think, there needs to be a place to do this for permaculture!

My two cents

Hey Aranya!

+1 for Claire's comment, I'd love to see more information that is applicable in southeastern climates. I am in a fairly flat area and trying to work out how to best catch and distribute water into my urban permaculture area, any tips?

Hey guys, wondering if i could get some good tips with a hedgerow i'm planning for a newer house.  The section is a 20 yard right up close to the road at the beginning of a 100 yard drive to this house.  Trying to plan a sustainable row that will not receive alot of care, with some quick growing things that will get outgrown by longer, bigger things that will establish a permanent hedgerow.

This is in NW Arkansas, zone 7.  Here is a pic of the area (out close to the road. http://t.co/aLqLrd1J

What would some good varieties and species be to start looking at?  Also, does anyone recommend bamboo in open areas like this, even with protective barriers around the area to keep it from spreading?

Thanks for any and all help to get me started!

Great replies guys, thanks for your comments!

@Ryan - I think both search suggestions would definitely end up as part of the browsing function, thanks for the suggestions.

@Becky - Mostly what I see in relation to plants is in terms of hardiness, but not heat tolerance.  Could you dive a bit deeper into what would specifically be the most helpful for you to look at?  Would it suffice to see other guilds constructed in/around Phoenix, or is heat tolerance a descriptor for every plant?  If so, I'm wondering how we will get reliable (or any) information to help you if it seems to be so hard to find.  Would love to do some research into an effective solution for this, thanks for your comments!

@gobe - I agree with your sentiments against capitalism.  That said, I would love to leave this as a totally free option for people to use and share the ideas of permaculture with others, but would also like to see a method that at least covers the hard costs of creating a website of this complexity (namely hosting fees, not my time working on it).  I would love to see a donation model work, but may have to resort to ads or some other means if it is required to keep the website up and running for people to use.