Processes and  Elements of the La Boca Permaculture Master Plan   The planning process is a synthesis of many wholes into mutually supporting patterns of design.  Specific planning steps will include such process steps as to:   Describe vision, mission, and goals along with noting available resources and assets.  Details Base Plan ~ draw up a scale plan of everything that is on the land we are working with. This includes all structures, paths, vegetation,  power lines & boundary. Leave a good - sized margin for the recording of the sector analysis (step 4).   "Listening to the Land". Observe & record.   In this step we observe and discover what the land is doing and what it wants to do.   In this step we continue observation by watching  for the comings & goings of birds & insects. When are they around? What are they doing? Identify them & find out about their life cycles. This info will aid us greatly to design in good biological balance.   Look at the weeds/plants/trees. Wind shearing indicates strong prevailing wind. They can also tell us of soil types & moisture levels. Light levels & microclimates. Plants won't grow where it doesn't suit them!   Look more closely at the structures we have mapped. What resources do they provide? Water catchment, shelter from wind, thermal mass, light reflection, greywater, kitchen scraps? What microclimates do they provide?   Check out the resources we can find within & without the boundaries of our land. List them all. For example lupin bush, gorse & broom provide nutrients & can be cut before flowering & laid as mulch around trees & shrubs or composted in a slow composting system. Rocks, bricks, tin, wood, lawn clippings, branches to prune are all resources.   Off site ~ materials from the verges (includes propagation material), organic material from cafés, restaurants, sawmills, gardening business', organizations for shredded organic material, people for help in various ways, markets for income.   Sector Analysis (centers/wholes) ~ record all the incoming & out going energies affecting the land ~ winds (are they strong & cold bringing rain/ hail or hot & drying?) & what direction they come from & when. Maori peoples used the Ti tree to tell them which direction the wind was blowing. They saw how her hair was parted by it. You may remember which windows are rain spattered or have hail beating on them. Remember that there can also be benefits from some winds as they bring rain. How does the sun move from season to season? How water moves on &/or off the land. Which direction would fires/floods come from? How does the surrounding landscape affect our plot? Do we have rain shadows, steep slopes which speed the winds up? Where are the views &/or noise pollution coming from? Are there any existing wildlife corridors? This knowledge enables us to harness, modify or enhance the energies. It also helps us to plan zone placement & the placement of many elements.   Elevational planning looks at our site in profile which is useful when assessing slope & aspect which affect airflows & can aid the flow of energies including ours.   Data overlay is where we use a technique such as laying transparent sheets of paper over the base map/sector analysis on which are mapped the info on soils & microclimates we collect. It is a way of building up a picture of our plot. Aerial/topographic/cadastral maps can be useful too especially if we have a large area as they can, at a glance, give options not easily seen from the ground. They do lack detail & conditions may have changed since they were made e.g. pollution, erosion.   Microclimates: identify the small climates we find within our plot. There will be many differences. Here's an exercise we can do to gather info about the various microclimates. Go to different areas of the land & close eyes. Use all of our senses. Our skin will pick up subtle temperature changes & air movements. Feel the soil beneath us for moisture, texture, mulch & temperature. Squat as well as stand & move around. Plants can be smaller than we are! This info will enable us to use these areas & enhance/modify them if necessary.   Soils: take a spade & go over our plot digging down to the spades depth. This will give us a basic idea of some of the different soil types we will be working with. We need at least 30cm of good topsoil to enable healthy plants to grow. Some deeper rooted plants/trees/shrubs will require more. We will like to take advantage of a soil analysis, especially since we are considering commercial ventures and wanting to grow plants which require specific soil types &/or minerals.   Analysis. This tool enables us to create the beneficial relationships that are central to good Permaculture design. It leads to a great deal of creation! These relationships echo those we find in Nature. The principles of "co-operation not competition" & "observe & interact" apply here. Take an element that we want in our design. Look at all its needs & what it gives ~ eg. a pond needs: shelter from wind, some sun, a water source/catchment, plants, fish, and aeration. It provides extra humidity & light to the area surrounding it, moisture to the edges, thermal mass (holds heat & radiates it out in the evening), food & beauty. Its needs will be met, if placed in good relationship to other elements & in return their needs will be met by it. Look at other elements that we have or need, in the same way & see how we can place them so that their needs & yields are met by each other. Cycles of energy are enhanced & created this way.   Deductions from nature or gardening by analogy. Here we look at nature to gain various ideas for strategies. How can we imitate nature? For example ~microclimates in nature. Native plants on a windy site will have various ways to survive those conditions such as small leaves to reduce moisture loss. We can choose plants with similar characteristics for our windbreaks. We can look for differences & ask ourself "why"? Look at forest edges on windward & sheltered sides. What are the differences in the types of plants that grow there? How are they placed in relationship to each other? This will help with windbreak design. Shady gullies ~ what are the plants, soils like here? Look at disturbed areas & the changes that occur over time. How does this happen? What prepares the way for the next succession? What did it provide?   Zone planning (centers/wholes). Even on a small section all zones from 0~5 can be included.  Zones are about creating & placing areas of activity in good relationship to their needs & yields. Eg zone 1 is traditionally placed as close to the house (zone 0) as possible, as it needs lots of visits to care for & harvest from it. We can see ourself as a yield of zone 0! The orchard or food forest needs less & is tended to on a more seasonal basis & so can be placed further away. Look at how the needs & yields of each of these zones can be met by each other & zone 0. Good placement once again enhances energy cycles & creates energy efficiency. Zones are concepts, their boundaries blur as they are designed to ours & the land's needs & develop & change over time.   Flow diagrams. Look at how we move across the land. How could this change when our design is implemented? Make the pathways multi - functional. We are a flow of energy in a Permaculture system! eg. We leave the house with the compost bucket & a basket & on the way back from the compost we can collect the eggs, & pick some herbs/veges & maybe grab a few pieces of wood or kindling from the woodpile. In the house look at, for example the steps we take to prepare a meal. Place the various workspaces & storage spaces so that the work flows & your energy is saved.   Guild Design.   Next we take the elements and resources we have collected and look at how we can beneficially relate them together in Guilds.  This results in sets of patterns we will use to create combinations of elements that mutually cooperate and support each other.     For example, make 2 lists of elements & put another list of connecting words in between them. Then have fun joining them up randomly! It can take some time to break through the “wanting things to make sense” way of being, but some very good relationships can happen that never would have occurred otherwise. Pond behind ducks Vege. patch on fruit trees Chicken coop in pigs Woodpile under water tanks Toolshed above seat Glasshouse through compost Play area next to rabbits E.g. compost under rabbits ~ there’s your manure on site where it’s needed & you don’t have to cart it! Random assembly. This is a fun way to find some really creative ideas. It breaks up the logical way of thinking!