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Permaculture 06 - Tree-Hugging for Permaculture

Part of this journey in learning Permaculture has given me the impetus to watch just about every ecological documentary available on Netflix. Recently I ran across a BBC2 series called “How to Grow a Planet” (Link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01bywvr), in the first episode “Life from Light” Professor Iain Stewart “tells a stunning new story about our planet.” Throughout the first episode you realize he's not talking about flowering plants (that's episode 2), but he's definitely talking about Trees and other plants like it.


So, trees were the start? Was it not Henry David Thoreau to said “I went to the woods so that I may live deliberately...”? Who among us has not sensed the importance of trees to the world? Trees are surely important to nature, and to permaculture systems on a larger scale.


There is definitely an intricate relationship that trees have with rain, our atmosphere, and the radiation from the sun. The elements that literally drive all life on earth, and trees have harnessed those elements long before any creature walked on the surface of our planet. To not utilize the power of trees in our Permaculture design would be ridiculous.


We already know the use of trees as a wind-break, but when view trees on our site we can also see from their shapes where the prevailing winds are coming from and how strong that wind routinely is. Trees provide us protections from soil erosion, chilling our plants/livestock/homes, and moisture evaporation.



Trees offer us water via transpiration in amounts that can be quite useful. As a result of this natural process, trees can assist us in temperature modification as it is usually cooler around the tree (the air and the soil) by day and warmer by night; Trees actually emit heat or conserve the daily heat, so at night the surrounding plants are also warmer.


A tree's relationship with rain that has a huge impact, for our permaculture as well as for the health of our global ecosystem. Rain is held in the branches to dissipate the heaviest of rainfalls and soften the impact of a squall on our delicate plants, allowing niches of growth, soil protection from the kinetic energy of raindrops, and storing rainwater in the soil for later use by the tree itself or the organisms that populate its soil.


It never ceases to disappoint me when I drive by a place “in development” and see that they've stripped out all the trees, exposing naturally rich topsoil to fly away in the wind or wash away in the next rainfall. A barren landscape is what's in store for that site. Trees, from the very beginning of our Earth, have been the solution for our survival, as students of Permaculture we need to give them the respect and place that they deserve.

 



Jimmy Barrett is a work-at-home Dad who enjoys the journey of learning about Permaculture, Homesteading, Sustainability, Simplicity, and Disaster Preparedness. Please note that opinions expressed by Jimmy Barrett may not be shared by Heart 2 Heart Farms, should you have any questions please feel free to email us directly. If you wish to reach Jimmy directly, you can email him at jd@simplifiedoffice.us.


 

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