As a Permaculture design feature how could we use 'Patterns in Nature' practically?

Question

Patterns in Nature is a Permaculture Design Feature. How can we use them practically? That is in real life designs?

Answer 1

I am not sure I really understand what you are asking although I do beleive in Permaculture..

Using trees to give natural shade to those who like shade?

Answer 2

I am not sure if I understand what you are looking for. While I was in Rome, I was amazed at a temple (Ara Pacis..Altar of the Peace) that was build more than 2000 years ago. It  displayed some beautiful and intricate panels, next to them where pictures of flowers and animals that where depicted on them, it was amazing to see all the labor that when into using the forms, sapes and patterns found in nature. I don't know if this can help you....I hope so...here's one link to the Ara Pacis...perhaps you can find something useful.

http://www.dl.ket.org/latin2/historia/em...

Answer 3

This isn't going to be very deep or well-informed i'm afraid.  I tend to think the priority is to have some access to land or a similar resource, and unfortunately most of the time in this country that means access to money, which i've never had, so it's been a long time since i've thought about permaculture.

Having said that, i suppose there's more biodiversity at the borders of two habitats, so a situation where there's an irregular boundary between a body of water and an area of land or, better, an interface between three habitats such as water, forest and grassland, there would be a larger number of species and it would be easier for a human to find an ecological niche.

Practically then, i'm thinking of a small area i know where there's a weir, a reed bed, a small area of woodland and a less advanced area of land next to it.  In that area, there are reeds, rushes, some algae, swans, geese, moorhens, tea roses, meadowsweet, brambles, horsetail (old railway line), nettles, elder, willow, hawthorn and a few other things.

Due to the serious issues i had trying to use land sustainably, my approach is to forage sustainably, and because i'm vegan i'm not going to consider the direct use of living animals or their eggs, but there are a lot of resources there i have actually been able to use.  I'm a herbalist, so i tend to look at things in that way.  I've dyed with the nettles, hawthorn and elderberries, used fibre from the nettles and i could use the whole lot nutritionally.  I could also use the rushes for lighting and the reeds as pens, having derived tannins from somewhere - there's bound to be a plant somewhere with it and it could be combined with soot and the water.

If you modified the shape of this environment by digging a few channels out of the water, you could increase the biodiversity and there would be more of these organisms.

I feel i'm missing your point entirely.

I suppose you've heard of herb spirals?  Is that the sort of thing you have in mind?

OK, so what have i got in this house and backyard i can use (please bear with me, i'm trying hard here)?  I have considered putting sea water tanks inside the house, basically saltwater aquaria, and growing seaweed inside them.  I specifically thought about rhodophytes because they need less light and are still nutritious.  I think there would probably need to be some animals in there as well to provide nitrogenous waste, although our own urine could provide that.  The other idea for the inside of the house was to use solutions high in sugar and other nutrients to make the household self-sufficient in yeast.  My Holy Grail would be spirulina and chlorella, but i understand there are problems with that.

In the back yard we have quite a few herbs, though not in a herb spiral and not in large quantities, although we do have mirrors reflecting sunlight onto herbs in places and we also use grey water.  It's a bit dodgy out there though because i use it for making soap from old cooking oil, which is in the wrong zone of course, but i'm not going to splash caustic soda around in the house when there are children about.

We've lifted slabs in various places, which is how we grow the herbs.  It's not nearly enough even to supply a business as tiny as this practice though.

This is the point really.  We have to work with what we've got, which in this case is a vanishingly tiny income of a few hundred quid a year, no prospect of increasing that income and consequently no access to significant areas of land.  We could theoretically do it communally, but that's not going to increase productivity per person significantly.  Basically, the only way this sort of thing can be done is by selling out and doing something to generate a large income so you can buy land, otherwise you're just playing at it, but if you do that, whatever it is you do to generate that income will do more damage than the good you will ever be able to do with any land to which you have access.  Grants or loans don't work either because they make you beholden to the organisation which provided the money in the first place.

Sorry to be so negative.

Answer 4

Patterns in nature from a permaculture perspective is observing how different species & landscapes and understanding how they interact to benificial effect, eg the edge effect.

So observe how a wild chicken behaves in a forest, then design the chicken "cage" to maximise the natural processes with water, fruit trees, roost space but still giving your desired output, eg scratching, bug eating, emitting heat, CO2, and toxic poo.

Or think of the way water flows to provide guidance on swales across the crop fields, micro reservoirs & aquefers etc.

Answer 5

go to an garden or someplace with lots and lots of plants and look at their leaves or flowers. notice something? they are simitary(i m not good speller just sound it out.) or have same pattern of both side if you fold them from middle. use that as your next project or design.

Answer 6

A difficult question .a bit like the chicken and the egg

Because patterns are results ,but they also in turn cause patterns

We find patterns everywhere on surfaces, with in shapes,

from the microscopic, to the landscape as seen from space.

And the unseen patterns ,with in the air or water ,which in turn

make patterns on what they touch.

And in different time frames or/and dimensions .

The climate is a pattern ,as a whole ,over a year ,many years ,causing further patterns in the way things grow.which  in turn cause other ones ,such as the rings of a tree.

Or the shorter view,Night and day,Winter and summer

patterns from things in motion ,the air or water currents making the markings on the sand ,

The meandering of a river ,which gets its movement from the Moon ,sun ,night day,and the rotation of the Earth itself.which patterns the shore line

And also patterns resulting from things being in the way ,like a line of trees causing patterns in the air (the Ekman effect),by putting diversions in to the airflows.

A rock in the river causing unseen patterns in the water.

A branch hanging in the water causing rippling from the flow of water.

And patterns don't stay with just shapes they also go into colors and sounds.

The irregular  sounds we hear in nature but still there is a rhythm of sorts

The  blotches on plants or animal markings that become a pattern collectively

All seems irregular up close ,but becomes a rhythm,or pattern  from only a bit further away

The shape or pattern of power is a mushroom ,jelly fish are this shape ,(maybe they form very quickly

Nuclear explosions form a mushroom,And the mushroom itself is something that shoots up overnight ,If we blow air through a small tube into water it forms a Mushroom shape .try it with ink

One can write a book about what all has patterns and where they come from

The Bottom line is that nothing in Nature is straight

or even colored,everything is wobbly,curved, blotchy .varied or spiraling

Humans go dead against this and design roads ,cities and towns in straight lines ,straight canals ,straight houses ,And invented the level .

Even though everything in nature has been build forever with out one .(this must be a part of our alienation from nature program)



But there is a lot of sense to having things bent

(lol)

The waters from heavy rains arrive to fast at the end of Straight canals causing floods ,

the same way too much water reaches the bottom parts if the mountain slopes are deforested

A practical application of shape or pattern can be in the design of buildings

The floor plant of our garden kitchen is mushroom shaped ,the bulb part in the back is where the cooker is .

The curved wood stove and curved working area are on the sides,and the head  forms a  large serving front ,halfway  around is the Bar ,covering a large area.

When it comes to path ways  ,they are always curved (this way they meet up with another curved one automatically)

Branching of the roads and pathways should be  rhythmic or regular,so that the resulting plots in between also end up evenly spaced ,

The width tends  to be twice the length of the rake ,so that one can rake everything from the paths .but all paths,meander like a river .

Creating  a pattern ,then bound by them , creating more

My plots are always round or oval ,and the roads do not have rectangles ,so that wheel barrows can race along the pathways,driven by other guys (not me).

But they are also easier on the horse or the bike .

So Following HARMONY (or balance)we end up with a patterned garden ,because everything else follows the initial shapes . One curve being half a shape,2 curves meeting make a  plot.(up close uneven but from afar a pattern)

There are some very sound reasons for the undulating shapes

Like the edge of a pond becomes twice as long if it is serrated

And the more edge the better.http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...

A garden with an undulating border ,which has key hole pathways ,going into the deepest parts becomes accessible every where with the least number of path ways.

So here we have pinned down another practical application of patterns to design,namely - accessibility

If we plow the fields in straight lines the wind speeds up along the furrows ,robbing the topsoil to deposit it somewhere else.

However curves and pockets especially when they have been planted with bushes ,trees ,or anything else--Trap airflows with anything they may carry as well as heat ,moisture and so forth --turning the place into a mouth rather than an a**s.

Another practical application receptiveness with GAIN instead of LOSS.

This multiplies hundred fold  In the big picture by the way we lay out the whole landscape,where we plant the tree lines harvesting the forces of the airflows and redirecting or influencing them so that we can even manipulate the movements of the clouds

So Patterned planning in a big way will have big benefits all around.

I even used anti clock wise spiral movements of all the one way traffic ,when i was building a path way system and dams, for a 4 hectare park ,with over a thousand people ,working in HARMONY .

Nobody bumped into any one else ,no accidents ,and for supervisors it was very easy directing ,walking against the flow ,seeing every bodies faces.

I am sure they employed similar disciplines when building Pyramids

So we have Pattern applied to psychology and method of operation,(most peoples right foot is bigger, hence the anti clockwise,this is the natural direction we curve when walking)

It is why the Naztec lines were such a mystery because they are in straight line,which is unnatural

My Dams (the most recent ones ) are also anti clockwise spirals because they are easy to dig and easy to bring the sand out with a continuous road leading  out

I had a straight fast road out or in depending what went on to keep the flow one way

The masters of using patterns with design must have been the ancient central Americans,their buildings literally talked.

Patterns that had linguistic meanings as well as symbolic,were incorporated in the stone work .

Even the very shapes and layouts of the buildings had meaning.

The Toltecs made spiral gardens that had as much symbolic meaning as they were practical.

Their way of depicting speech in their drawings was with  spirals drawn in front of the faces.

How did these people know that sound waves are shaped like that ,we have only discovered that a few decades ago.

Have a look at the European Royal gardens ,(photo in my blog,links on the bottom of this text), Nothing but patterns in the design.

There must be thousands of ways patterns from nature are applied knowingly and probably more often than not unknowingly . by people, with design as well as application.

We find patterns from nature depicted on  all native ,or just about anybodies Art  .

The decorations on a didgeridoo in Australia,within   Egyptian or American hieroglyphics.

There is no end to it,the more you think about it ,the more you see.

Answer 7

We use natures designs everyday and in a practical ways. Basic concrete structures are based on tree limbs (overpasses, etc), airplane wings, fur and down to keep you warm, underground homes, etc. I am just to stupid to actually name the multitude of things that come from nature.  Nature isn't a newly discovered thing, it has been used through out history!

Answer 8

naturally occurring patterns are beautfiul yes, but look past the aestheitcs and realize that they are survival strategies as well. geography is no accident in the natural world:  organisms thrive where they can, and don't have the unfortunate capacity that man does to exert force on their environments (at least not on the same level.)

windbreaks are features found across the american plains... hedgerows planted deliberately to shelter a home or a crop from the prevailing winds.  this prevents erosion, shelters other species, creates microclimates, etc.  this strategy is seen in naturally occurring circumstances as well... trees growing along the edges of streams and rivers, cooling the water, providing anchor for the soils, habitat for a variety of creatures whose livelihoods depend on the quality and presence of the water.  perhaps this observation is where early settlers gained the idea for windbreaks.

byderule speaks of spirals in designing and contouring the land... a wonderful use of space and time.  again, watch the flow of water... many rivers running lazily through flat lands zig and zag, meandering their way as their channels allow, increasing the available shore area and slowing the speed of the waterflow.  shapes and structures of nature... again imitated by man.

i do not know of the names you quote, but the principles put forth in imitating patterns in nature to design functional effective and beautiful systems for use by humans are worthwhile:  honeycomb style building strategies to maximize space and heating?  sheltered canopies (as found in jungles) to grow varieties of crops at different heights on smaller parcels of land?  naturally occurring compost heaps that accumulate in (therefore dictating) fertile places?

as byderule says... the more you look the more you see.   follow the waters... a good place to begin.  what do you see?