This document provides information on permaculture and sustainable gardening methods. It discusses (1) permaculture principles of working with nature rather than against it, (2) five sustainable gardening methods: planning, soil building, pest management, gardening techniques, and water conservation, and (3) details on implementing each of these methods, including companion planting, rain gardens, and keyhole gardening. The overall message is that permaculture aims to create self-sufficient ecosystems through observation and design principles that conserve resources and produce food sustainably.

2. PERMACULTURE
A philosophic and scientific method
combining agriculture, social design
principles and natural ecosystems.
Permaculture is a philosophy of working
with, rather than against nature. It
involves thoughtful observation not
thoughtless labor, looking at plants and
animals in all their functions rather than
treating many areas as a single product
system.

4. FIVE SUSTAINABLE METHODS
1. Make a plan for your garden and
environment
2. Build and amend the soil - Composting
3. Control pests through Integrated Pest
Management
4. Methods of Gardening
5. Conserve water

5. 1. Make a plan for the garden
• Purpose
• Budget
• Make an assessment - walk the land
• Consider the Environment (ecology, circle
of life, directions, levels)
• Water resources and surface water runoff
• Soil
• Position of the sun
• Direction of the wind
• Check location of utilities
• Zones (frequency of human, plant, and
animal needs)
• Guilds (interdependence of plants)

7. WIND DIRECTION
UTILITIES?
WATER RUN
OFF
CONSERVATION PLAN

9. SPRING 2012 SPRING 2013
Many Cedar Trees Paths and Beds In Place

10. JULY 30, 2018

11. 2. BUILD AND AMEND THE SOIL
1. The shape, or soil structure, depends
on both the soil’s physical and chemical
properties. (Amount of clay, silt, sand
and humus).
2. Shrinking and swelling due to weather
(wetting and drying as well as freezing
and thawing).
3. Add earth worms
4. Add compost

12. PRODUCERS DECOMPOSERS CONSUMERS

13. COMPOSTING (SIX STEPS)
1. Make a bin from wire
or purchase a high-
rise or tumbler
composter
2. Choose a shady
location
3. Add brown organic
matter (hay, straw,
old leaves, sawdust)
4. Add green materials
(table scraps,
grass clippings)
5. Cover pile with a tarp
to preserve moisture
6. Do not add meat and
fish, diseased plants,
weed seeds

14. 3. CONTROL PESTS BY INTEGRATED
PEST MANAGEMENT (IPM)
1. Mechanical Control
Use hands to get rid of pests, Row covers, fences,
netting
2. Cultural Control
Clean up debris, Plant resistant varieties of plants
3. Biological Control The use of living organisms such
as predators, parasitoids and pathogens, to control
pest insects, weeds, or diseases.

15. LABELS: ORGANIC OR MADE WITH ORGANICINGREDIENTS
• 95% ingredients must be organic, the remaining 5% can be
non-organic only if no alternatives exist.
• May not be genetically engineered, irradiated, or grown on land
fertilized with sewage sludge.
• No chemical fertilizers or herbicides for at least three years before
a crop is harvested.
• Label reads “made with organic ingredients,” the food must
contain at least 70% percent organic ingredients.
USDA STANDARDS, (2002)
ORGANIC FOODS

16. ROW COVERS, COLD FRAME AND RAISED BEDS

17. ATTRACT BENEFICIAL PREDATORS
1. Lady beetle
2. Ant lion
3. Parasitic fly
4. Assassin bug
5. Parasitic wasp
6. Brown lacewing
7. Praying Mantis
• Kill and consume many prey
• Generally larger and faster than prey
• Kill & eat prey to survive &
reproduce
• Many are easily recognized
• Built to kill
• Removes the evidence

18. USE NATURAL OR BIOLGICAL PESTICIDES
Pyrethrin (extracted from a species of chrysanthemum
(controls aphids, scales, mites, beetles)
Neem (produced from the bark of a tree native to
India) an oily extract that can repel insects, stop
their feeding (controls aphids, scales, mites, caterpillars
and sawfly)
Rotenone (alkaloid extracted from roots of
tropical plant) moderate impact on beneficials.
Kaolin Clay Spray (Rodale) - spray fruit trees
Dormant Oils – spray fruit trees
Homemade sprays – Poison Ivy – 3 c. vinegar, ½ c.
salt, 1T. Dawn Liquid Soap

19. 4. METHODS OF GARDENING
1. Plant seeds indoors
2. Transplant seeds outdoors
3. Use and caring for tools
4. Prepare garden soil
5. Care of plants-
water, fertilize (modern
compost tea)
6. Maintenance-
Pull weeds, dead head
7. Water plants
8. Use organic sprays

20. EQUIPMENT
FOR INDOOR
GARDENING

21. Transplanting & Trimming Seedlings
1.Moisten media
2.Gently separate
seedlings
3.Poke hole in media
4.Place seedling
5.Firm soil
6.Trimming

24. MAINTAIN HEALTHY
PLANTS
1.Water plants during the
morning
2.Use natural fertilizers
3.Remove diseased leaves
4.Use mulch around plants
5.Provide air circulation by
not crowding the plants
6.Disbud and deadhead
7.Avoid planting tomatoes in
the same place
8.Avoid monocultures

25. USE NATURAL FERTILIZERS
1.Grass clippings on lawn,
adds nitrogen
2.Manure
3.Compost
4.Fish oils
5.Modern compost tea

26. COMPANION PLANTING
1. Native Americans found that corn provides a
structure for beans to climb. Bean replenish the soil
with usable nitrogen and other nutrients, and the
large leaves of the squash provide a living mulch
that help conserve water and provide weed control.
2. Trap cropping, for example, cucumber beetles,
which transmit bacterial wilt, prefer squash and
pumpkin plants over cucumber and melons. To
protect melons and cucumbers and are willing to
sacrifice squash and pumpkin plants, plant them
close.

28. PLANTS THAT HELP
Four-O’Clocks draw Japanese beetles which eat the
foliage. The foliage is poisonous and kills them. But
plant them away from the roses to draw them.
Garlic repels aphids and is good to plant among your
roses. Garlic also repels Japanese beetles, root
maggots, and carrot root fly.
Basil helps repel mosquitoes and flies. Plant it near
your door or patio.

29. PLANTS THAT HELP
Catnip deters flea beetles, Japanese beetles,
squash bugs, ants, weevils and mice.
Marigolds help deter whiteflies when planted
around tomatoes.
Nasturtiums deter wooly aphids, whiteflies,
squash bug, and cucumber beetles. Plant them as
a barrier around tomatoes, cabbage and
cucumbers.

30. NATIVE PLANTS IN ARKANSAS
1. In Carl G. Hunter’s book, Wildflowers of
Arkansas, there are a total of 504 species
of wildflowers covered in his book, and a
total of 80 families.
2. Many explorers in the 1800s made
comments in their writings about
wildflowers in Arkansas
3. First professional botanist to live in the
state was Francis L. Harvey teaching at U.
of A. (1875-1885).
4. 1891, first comprehensive checklist of
Arkansas plants published by Branner and
Coville.
5. Most significant workers in the early
1920’s were Delzie Demaree and Dwight
Moore, U. of A., later in 1977.
1984
The Ozark Society Foundation

31. Tickseed- Coreopsis and
Quinine- Parthenium
CONE
FLOWER -
Echinacea
Milkweed-
Asclepias
Bee Balm-
Monarda

32. 1.Drip hose
2.Rain barrel
3.Irrigation
4.Divert water to garden
5.Rain garden
5. CONSERVE WATER

33. Managing Storm Water Runoff

35. RAIN GARDEN
1. It is a shallow depression in your yard that is planted with
native wetland or wet prairie wildflowers and grasses.
2. Collects water that runs off from your roof, rainwater on the
ground or is discharged from your sump pump.
3. Increase the amount of water that filters into the ground,
which recharges local aquifers.
4. Help protect streams and lakes from pollutants carried by
harmful substances that wash off roofs and paved areas.

39. MY PERSONAL RAIN GARDEN
Loose Strife Lythrum
Rudbeckia-
Echineacea

40. Blue Stem grass, Sedges
Queen of the
Prairie
Filipendula
rubra

41. Sedges
Monarda

42. KEY HOLE GARDENING

47. METHODS AND EQUIPMENT
1. Site
2. Container
3. Wire Basket for compost
4. Materials to fill container

52. INNER BASKET
• Fill basket with alternating layers of green and brown, also
use kitchen scraps and compost.
• As this inner basket decomposes, with the help of bacteria
and fungi, it provides water and fertilizer for your plants by
turning the wastes into nutrient-rich compost.
• Water this basket every week. Discipline your plants by
going as long as you can without watering them. This will
force their roots downward into the layers of compost and
the inner basket where moisture really resides.
• Use a ratio of 3-1: 3 brown to 1 green throughout the
summer.

53. 5. LAYERING

54. METHODS OF LAYERING
Line the inside of the outside wall with cardboard. This is to
keep any soil from creeping out over time. Then fill the
entire inside of the garden with alternating layers of
compostable stuff.
1. First layer on the ground should be more cardboard and 3
inches thick (considered brown).
2. Green leaves also 3” thick
3. Brown layer- dried leaves, twigs and small branches for
air pockets.
4. Add 3” of soft green prunings or lots of grass clippings
5. Sawdust or shredded newspapers.
6. Within a month add more soil since soil level will drop.

63. 1. Recycle our organic rural and urban
wastes --do not pollute our environment
2. Avoid a “zero kill” pest strategy -
killing only produces more resistant
pests, (IPM)
3. Develop plant population that is
resistant to insects and disease
4. Follow the principles of ecological and
permaculture theories.
SUMMARY: EIGHT POINTS
Practice Sustainability of the Environment
and Garden

64. 5. Avoid large monocultures- they increase
the potential for a disaster from a new or
more virulent disease or insects.
6. Rotation of crops is an effective solution.
7. Amend the soil- add compost, allow
microbes and earth worms to grow,
do not cultivate the soil.
8. Conserve water