Gaia's Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture
by Toby Hemenway with Forward by John Todd
Softcover, 222 pages.

In the 1960's and 70's when Bill Mollison and David Holmgen developed the ideas that have since become a worldwide movement called Permaculture, they envisioned nothing short of a way to recover a world on the way to ruin and move toward a sustainable future. The broadness and scope of their vision and teaching has led to many projects of consequence and has influenced ecological design over a broad spectrum. (see Andrew Jones in eNewsletter 34)

Permaculture, short for permanent agriculture (or culture), has spread throughout the world as a serious force for bio-remediation and ecological, socially conscious development. The concept is essentially to begin with protracted and thoughtful observation, and emulate the diversity, stability, and resilience of natural ecosystems while developing and implementing design methodologies and practical systems for providing food, energy, shelter, and other needs in a truly sustainable fashion. Emphasis is placed on water conservation, local food production, and regional self-reliance as well as ethics and social justice.

Many volumes have been written to flesh out these ideas. First and foremost is Permaculture: A Designer's Manual, Bill Mollison's seminal work and still a mainstay of the movement. Scores, if not hundreds of other books as well as a few periodicals have followed as the body of Permaculture knowledge grows in proportion to the amount of serious students and practitioners forging there own pathways to sustainable design.

While the movement has flourished in many ways, it is only recently that it has begun to find its way into mainstream thinking. This is primarily because most of the literature has dealt with design on a scale that speaks to the broader ecological design community or to specialists in various aspects of sustainable design. When Toby Hemenway developed the ideas for his book on the subject he set out to change that. Many who have read his book and acted upon their new-found knowledge would say that he has succeeded in large part.

In Gaia's Garden, Hemenway builds on the seminal ideas of Mollison, Holmgren and others, while applying a wealth of experience, as both a designer and teacher, to make the wisdom of permaculture accessible and relevant to even those with the smallest suburban lot. Why, he rhetorically asks, if nature can create self-sustaining environments that are abundant in biodiversity, should our yards and gardens be collections of disconnected plants that are heavily reliant on physical labor and outside inputs. His vision is for a backyard ecosystem that emulates the beauty, resiliency, and productivity of nature while providing food, flowers, medicinal and culinary herbs, and habitat for beneficial insects, birds, and wildlife.

From soil ecology, to water harvesting and reuse, to the symbiotic relationships between plants (guilds), Hemenway backs theoretical concepts with plenty of examples, as well as simple projects that you can do right away to get yourself started on the permaculture path. One of my favorites is the creation of fast growing, dynamic edible polycultures from annual plants such as mustards, lettuces, calendula, fava and bush beans, carrots dill, and cabbage. Other projects are more long-term, such as developing multi-storied, perennial forest gardens that may take a decade to fully thrive, but will ultimately yield large volumes of food per square foot with less annual care than the average yard with a lawn and typical decorative plantings. The extensive plant list at the end of the book is an extremely useful tool for planning your own unique Permaculture garden specific to your site, climate, and needs.

With Gaia's Garden Toby Hemenway shows us how, through thoughtful design and plant selection, we can create a sustainable garden oasis; one that is a beautiful environment for us and our families, a rich and diverse source of food and medicine, and a gift to the ecology.

Reviewed by Scott Vlaun, Editor