Canberra Permaculture Design and Education

For the first time this (Australian) summer we had a heavy enough rain to fill the back garden swale system. As a designer this is what I get most excited about - passively harvesting water means a garden is a lot more drought resilient, because there is greater moisture stored in the soil than would otherwise be there, plus the water is free! This system takes surface runoff from an old driveway plus tank overflow (the tank harvests from our roof and was pretty full before this rain event). Funnily enough, passive water harvesting is also helpful against flooding - because slowing water as it moves downslope means less water rushing into flood prone areas - imagine how much less runoff there would be if every garden had some of this!

Psst! Image is 100% real. That’s really a snapshot of just some of our home grown produce. If you love sustainable food and good design and live in Canberra or surrounds, we have 3 upcoming permaculture workshops! 😃😃😃
Permaculture design principles (28 Feb), Reading the landscape (14 Mar), Design in practice (28 Mar) plus 2 design labs.

We provide small group, individualised tuition, focused on your needs. 💚 Each 1-day workshop is fully catered and will be based at our home and permaculture garden 🍎🍊🥦🥒🥬🍅 Book one or take all three for a big discount. 😀 For more info or to book your spot please check out our links (check bio on IG, check our Events tab on FB). OR: send Cally a text directly on 0410121272 (within Australia) and she’ll text you the details straight back!

Yes it’s true, we do love a good wicking bed! Especially in a spot that will be super close to the house, super hot and which doesn’t get much water. The aim is to grow a smallish shade tree in one of these 2nd hand IBCs (once it’s converted into a giant wicking bed) which will provide some much needed shade on the western side of our house. Once the site is levelled and the IBCs in place the next job is to clad them in some recycled decking boards to make them pretty - that will be another vid!
If you want to know more about wicking beds check out our about page for resources or our events - there are just a couple spots left in our upcoming wicking bed workshop!

Nashi pears…

Can you hear that? It’s the beginnings of a gentle rain. I shouldn’t jinx it. But such a lovely sound. Especially after so much blasting heat lately, here in Canberra. Our back garden faces west so it gets particularly hot in the afternoons and evenings. Growing a lot of food has meant we prioritise getting enough sun, but during a heatwave it’s clear that even vegetables can get too much sun exposure! And we also need to enjoy and inhabit the space, which we’ve realised means more shade trees than we have at the moment. Especially after we demolished the huge garage in our back garden a couple years back - that introduced a LOT more sunlight. It’s an ongoing dance balancing so many aims for the same place! Food, habitat, chicken play zone, entertainment, education space, relaxation too. It’s an important lesson in permaculture principle 12 - ‘creatively use and adapt to change.’ Everything is always changing in a garden. We are changing too. Our preferences, abilities, health, our time availability, all change over our lives. And on top of that this extended heatwave reminds us that the world is most definitely getting hotter. What once grew well may not grow so well in the future; other species will have to be planted that can cope with more volatile conditions. Truly, having a garden is a real life example of system dynamics in action! So many lessons to learn if we just observe - and often very humbling lessons at that! 👩‍🌾 Dear fellow gardeners - what has gardening taught you?