2. Calculating food needs for my husband and I has been a valuable and eye-
opening experience. It’s nice to have an easy and simple way to go from
servings per year to amount of garden space needed for each crop. This
really helps when planning since I have nothing to start with on my
homestead site. Using these numbers to provide for our yearly needs seems
more challenging. I imagine the transition from consumer to producer will
be a slow one, happening in small steps over time. I would like to start by
meeting all my needs of a few things rather than producing a little of
everything. Starting with the crops I have experience with, I will work to
gradually establish new beds and increase production. My homestead site is
approximately ¾ acre which Peter Bane deems a Microfarm in The
Permaculture Handbook. He writes that this amount of land “can achieve a
significant fraction of self-provision with some surplus for local trade,
barter, and supply to neighbors (p. 111).” One challenge will be keeping up
with all the plants once I start producing most of my own food. I want my
homestead to produce as much as possible while staying well kept and
organized for visitors. The opportunity I am most excited about is using
skills learned from this class and my own creativity to design different types
of beds that are both useful and visually appealing.
3. Crop Servings/y
ear
Pounds/
year
Number of 100
square foot
beds
Broccoli 104 34 1
Carrots 104 37 ½
Garlic 52 1 *
Green Beans 104 24 1
Okra 52 10 1
Onion 52 3 *
Peppers 52 9 1/8
Tomato 208 90 1
* Requires a very small amount of space. I could just plant these
crops at the edge of a bed or where there is room left over.
7. “Permaculture applies a fundamental pattern to
organizing living systems for people called
zone-and-sector.” (Bane, p. 35)
This principle is especially helpful as I begin
to design the production areas of my
homestead site. Considering every factor that
might influence crop productivity is difficult,
so analyzing zones and sectors provides a
starting point.
8. For example this chart on zones suggests that labor
intensive crops be kept close to the house, fruit
trees slightly further away, and staple crops further
still. Combining this information with a sector
analysis of my property will help determine where to
place beds and specific crops to achieve a high
enough yield to sustain my family.
Chart from The Permaculture Handbook p. 54
