No video :(

What Does it Mean to Have Enough Surplus to Maintain and Replace the System Over Its Lifetime?

Подписаться 197 тыс.

Просмотров 17 тыс.

50% 1

Students of Geoff’s Online Permaculture Design Course have question-and-answer sessions where Geoff fields a number of questions every week and answers them via videos. This question was pulled from the 2021 collection. For an in-depth dive into all things permaculture, check out the free Masterclass - www.discoverpermaculture.com
Question
What does it mean to have enough surplus to maintain and replace the system over its lifetime? If the system is a closed-loop system where nothing is lost (except water and the sun's heat, which are replaced naturally) we will never get more than comes in right? Are we simply forcing the rest of the system to also bear the weight of myself as a human manager of the system or does this diverse and balanced system need to produce even surplus in spite of being a closed system? When Geoff says "you need to link up to living systems" to create surplus does he mean linking up in some special way? Wouldn't I still have to bring in unsustainable inputs if I am trading part of the surplus as outputs?
Key Takeaways
You can get much more than a system starts with because plants and animals produce offspring: that’s vegetables, trees, and animals. Natural systems produce surpluses naturally, and that energy is banked in the soil, the base resource. With permaculture designs, you want to align systems together with productive/convenient components that might not occur naturally but behave as if they were conceived that way. The sunlight will continually give the energy necessary to create the living systems we have facilitated with design. Then, the living systems can produce more than is needed to support themselves.
To support us in making more videos:
► Sign up for our newsletter and the Permaculture Circle-Geoff's curated collection of 100+ free videos: start.geofflaw...
► Like us on Facebook: / geofflawtononline
► Follow us on Instagram: / geofflawtononline
► Subscribe to our RU-vid channel: / @discoverpermaculture
► And most importantly, enjoy your permaculture journey!
About Geoff:
Geoff is a world-renowned permaculture consultant, designer, and teacher that has established demonstration sites that function as education centers in all the world's major climates. Geoff has dedicated his life to spreading permaculture design across the globe and inspiring people to take care of the earth, each other, and to return the surplus.
About Permaculture:
Permaculture is conscious, intentional design in which diverse, stable and resilient ecosystems are assimilated to help people provide their food, energy, shelter, and other needs in a sustainable way, abusing neither the planet nor the humans relying on it. Permaculture focuses on a variety of topics, including agriculture, forestry, water harvesting, renewable energy, eco-building, waste management, animal systems, economics, technology, & community development.
#permaculture #permaculturedesign #whatispermaculture

Опубликовано:

18 авг 2024

Ссылка:

Скачать:

Готовим ссылку...

Добавить в:

Мой плейлист

Посмотреть позже

Комментарии : 39

@danielhughes6896 3 года назад

It's not a closed system, when you grow plants they capture carbon from the air, when you compost that plant and put in it the ground you have extracted carbon from the air and put it in your ground. If you grow legumes, you capture nitrogen from the air and put it in your ground. As long as you export at a slower rate then your plants are capturing then you are regenerating your soil not depleting it.

@Tehcarp 3 года назад

it's so far from a closed loop system. You are right. Constant input of solar energy, water from elsewhere, carbon from the air. You are also likely/hopefully removing things from your system as you harvest animals and food. Permaculture needs more people who are specific on definitions. I want it to be appreciated for the science and art that it is but too many of the people doing it are bad at keeping the principles in mind.

@bte_permaculture 3 года назад

I beg to differ. A closed system is one where everything circles in an indefinite but variable loops hence examples are nutrient or gas cycles. Carbon is not fully brought back or sequestered to soil some of it is lost as Co2 during composting. Decomposition produces gases too, which are released back to the atmosphere by the microbes. In all cycles consider the part of microbes too. So better to let the soil digest the nutrients just like it's supposed to. Would love to hear you thoughts. 🙏❤️ From India

@platypus6523 3 года назад

Hey Geoffrey, I have a suggestion: You could ask your community for some of their designs and you critique them. It would teach us alot!

@thitranlanh1302 3 года назад

Excellent Geoff. We are waiting for whever Covid 19 allowed, we will invite you to Vietnam to see many young who love Permaculture and wanting to practice from yours. Keep energy forever Geoff. We love you so much and best regards to Nadia and yours farm and your network in over the world.

@marcogallazzi9049 3 года назад

I live in Chile, a country that is in a heavy drought for more than 15 years now. We have no politics about the issue, just waiting for rain to fall and naively expecting things to be better tomorrow. I hope more people see your channel and understand the profoundness of the issue. Thanks Geoff for beeing, and beeing you ❤️

@bte_permaculture 3 года назад

Maybe we can do something there. Geoff has turned Deserts into food forests. Did you look into Dryland agriculture? It's too bad, will pray it rains there soon👍

@mojavebohemian814 3 года назад

For example, a garlic bulb has many cloves. You harvest some, replant some, some very small ones break off when you pull it up. Nature design of surplus. And you can eat the flower stalks (scapes), which you cut to promote bigger bulbs. Just a sample...

@ryanlove8242 3 года назад

I love that you ended with a quote from Bill. You are so blessed to have been taught by the master himself. What an honor and a privilege I'm sure. Any time i need inspiration i just watch in grave danger of falling food or your greening the desert videos. My mind gets blown every time and it never gets old or ceases to amaze me.

@pixogreystudios6884 3 года назад

Dear Sir, First of all let me say that I'm a huge fan of your channel and yourself. Respect and all good wishes from India. I know this may not be the right platform to ask you this question, but could you make a video explaining if COVID-19's Black Fungus infection which currently is the scare accross the globe really comes from farm, soil, cattle droppings, etc.? And if yes, how should a farmer or people living around farms be safe from it? Thanks, Mohammad

@EmilHasanovPermaculture 2 года назад

I liked how Geoff stressed the fact that you cannot create anything, only facilitate.

@PeteGA 3 года назад

There are literally nutrients in the air, for people who are wondering where this “extra” comes from in the cycles.

@bjornnilsson2941 3 года назад

Yes, the nitrogen fixing bacteria (and the legumes that promote them) will provide nitrates to the soil from the air. Other nutrients like phosphorous are a bit more tricky, though to some degree the slow withering of bedrock can help with that. To be fully sustainable though, the breakdown products from what is grown on the land should be returned to it. But unless you are living in a closed bottle that could just be imported (fully organic) compost that offsets what you export from your plot.

@PeteGA 3 года назад

@@bjornnilsson2941 On Earth the phosphorus sink is the lithosphere. Insects, which live in the soil usually accumulate phosphorus. That is why insect eating animals are valuable because they are basically a way to capture and concentrate phosphorus. That is why dovecottes where used in the past, for the accumulated manure.

@FarmerBrownGrows 3 года назад

Great questions. Probably one of your best Q&A bullet points up to this point. Always great to see family working with you.

@livefromplanetearth 3 года назад

picking and choosing natural processes in complementary function to each other that itself may not necessarily be found in nature. cooperation at its best

@susanaquezada7671 3 года назад

Very, very interesting

@RifaTzAhin 3 года назад

Hi, Geoff. Please tell us about microclimates. How do we take advantage of microclimates? Can we create microclimates? How to identify them?

@mojavebohemian814 3 года назад

Thank you Mr. Lawton!

@violettaschmieder2096 2 года назад

We presentl live in a very wasteful world, and at least in 1st world countries, we have a lot of animal waste, or other waste to go around, to replenish nutrients. In the same way im dunpster diving and feed myself off that in the city, and in the same way u can upcycle and recycle materials in your farm, you will propably find things for free or for very sustainable to replenish whatever you lose over time. Maybe ask people in a nearby village to give their composting garbage to you. Have a fest for everyone and show them your ways, theyll shit into your compost toilets. Forage for wood outside of your property, many public forests allow it. Barter and exhange or buy and sell locally to favor low carbon impact exchanges. You can create links with communities around you too, society is an ecosystem too. Theres so many options available to you to reach your goals, and behave ethically, that dont involve being a 100 percent close loop.

@jesse6468 3 года назад

I see how for example carbon in the soil can be replaced with carbon from the air, but there are certain minerals that are taken up by plants. It seems to me that if you don't keep all the produce for your own use, collect humanure to fertalize and have your body buried on site after you die these nutrients will not be replaced. When you transport produce off the site you also transport some of the minerals that originally have been in the soil and have been taken up by the plants that are transported away right?

@drawingmomentum 3 года назад

Raindrops have a sort of pocket of nitrogen around them that plants capture. And some plants whose roots go very deep, bring up new nutrients to surface. All rocks have these (micro)nutrients, so there is definitely no shortage!

@Rootsman417 Год назад

I think the bulk of the plant matter comes from the air (carbon, nitrogen) and water (hydrogen) the minerals come from the soil and are probably plenty?

@NashvilleMonkey1000 3 года назад

Geoff, in an emergency declaration, all of humanity is making you the President of the World, in concordance with a Dr-Who episode, I hope you don't mind~

@RyRy2057 3 года назад

It's easy to forget, with all the talk of "closed loops" and degrowth in our economy, that biological organic life _exists to expand and grow and reproduce itself_. Now, whether we like the philosphical connotations of that for us as biological beings with a civilization, the biosphere we live inside is always trying to expand! It wants surplus! Evolution rewards those organisms that can more effectively use resources to expand and produce more to grow the biosphere! So we has a species, who've always been gardeners and environmental maintainers at heart (or at least for the last few hundred thousand years), are not just making a surplus for ourselves and our society when we maintain and develop biological production, but the ecosystem as a whole, because our society is completely within the global ecosystem!

@peterellis4262 3 года назад

The Earth as a whole is a largely closed system, with the obvious input of Solar energy that drives everything, and the ongoing loss of hydrogen out into space, which is largely irrelevant, certainly on a human scale it's irrelevant. But no natural site on Earth's land surface is a closed loop to any meaningful degree. The atmosphere moves freely over the earth, carrying many things into and out of locations. Water is never a closed loop on a site, it both enters and exits with the atmosphere moving and through ground water movements. Once a permaculture design is well established, you will have surpluses that can be traded to other sites in exchange for things you may not have, and you won't be putting yourself into a deficit so long as you're responsible about identifying what is actually a surplus. I might argue that until you have enough to replace the system, you don't have surplus, but that's not enough to replace the entire system all at once. I could likely grow far more tomatoes in one season than I needed to feed myself, exchange a bunch for offsite materials and still double my tomato planting next year ;) But my Chestnut and Walnut trees are going to be a much longer cycle of building to surplus and replacement - but they can.

@unnikrishnannambiar3904 3 года назад

Hello Geoff , will permaculture work in laterite soil? We have a 15 acre plot however its laterite soil with rocks. From India

@iteerrex8166 3 года назад

There are things that is not produced by the sun, rain, biology and so on. For example iron, and if the products are sold out, after some time the ground is gona become iron deficient. I think Matei's question is referring to this type of a situation.

@Space_Trucker 3 года назад

I think that's what he may have been getting at as well. I bet the answer would be similar though, don't a lot of soil deficiencies come from over-harvesting mono-cultures with chemical fertilizers? In theory wouldn't this surplus that Geoff is describing also give back all kind of nutrients to the soil, including iron?

@iteerrex8166 3 года назад

@@Space_Trucker There are many things that are produced, but minerals are not, and I would like to know how they would increase. One way I know of is dynamic accumulators which brings up nutrients from deep below ground, but they would run out as well. It's not like nitrogen that is replenished. So unless the minerals are returned, they are gona run out.

@davideforesti7556 3 года назад

No resource is lost. Those minerals “mined” by plants gets eaten by human and other animals, they circulate in the ecosystem. Adding animal products waste in the compost ( e.g. bones ) should help in returning minerals to the system. Cities should work with farmers returning their compost in exchange for production, I do agree with Matei partly. On the long run and at a large scale, when synthetic fertilizer and mined soil amendments will not be anymore a viable option, we will need more collaboration in closing the nutrient circle between producers and consumers.

@PeteGA 3 года назад

@@davideforesti7556 They aren’t lost, but if too much becomes captured in the form of tools and machinery, there is a point when the soils will be depleted of minerals. Although, I don’t think we know yet what that point is.

@iteerrex8166 3 года назад

If the product are sold then it IS lost from your land, and ends up somewhere else. I guess if you bring in manure mulch compost and such to replenish what is lost, then yes the ground would increase in fertility.