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- The Permaculture Zones
Despite the weather warming up soon I wanted to hit on one more permaculture concept before we go into full foraging season: Permaculture zones.
What are “Permaculture Zones”?
Permaculture zones are a commonsense way of laying out features on your site to emphasize space efficiency and mobility.
These “zones” are labeled from 0-5 with zero representing the highest energy area on your site, and 5 representing the lowest energy area.
These labels help us understand how to plan out the landscape, and design more intentionally as well as save time in our daily routine.
Yeoman’s Keyline Scale of Permanence
One related concept that you may want to consider is the scale of permanence. This is the order in which features on the land are most easily changed and which are the hardest to alter.
Some things can be very easy to change like your soil, and others can be nearly impossible to alter like climate (although as we saw in my article on microclimates, it can be changed to some degree).
This is an important consideration when laying out zones and planning where everything will be especially on property where there’s already existing infrastructure.
Zone 0: Home Base
Zone 0 is the most energy-intense zone on your property. This is always going to be where your home or main base is on the property.
Everything should be centered around this main point since it is where you will be returning to most often.
Usually zone 0 will be your home, but if there’s no home or multiple homes, find the point that you will be spending the most energy at.
Zone 1 Visit daily
This is the next most intensive section of your site. This zone encompasses areas that require constant observation and frequent visits (often multiple times per day).
Some examples are:
Wash-Station
Walk-in Cooler
Compost Pile
Intensive Annual Gardens
Egg Boxes
Zone 2 Visit Frequently
This section is for the less intensively managed areas.
Some examples might be:
Livestock
Greenhouses
Outbuildings
Propagation Areas
Some Plant Guilds
Zone 3 Visit Occasionally
Zone 3 is visited somewhat infrequently and does not require as much energy as the first few.
In this zone you’d likely see:
Orchards
Grazing Animals
Windbreaks
Swales and Ponds
Zone 4 Visit Rarely
Zone 4 is one of the least visited zones and is for wild food harvesting, wood for fuel, and water storage.
In this zone you might see:
Ponds
Some Wildlife Habitat
Coppices
Lumber Crops
Limited Tech (Hydro generators, micro wind turbine, springs etc)
Zone 5 Observe
This is the final zone and the least intensive of any other zone!
Zone 5 is all about the unmanaged natural areas. The main two functions are to serve as wildlife habitat and to act as a place to act on the first principle of permaculture which is to observe & interact.
Examples of what you’d see here are:
Wild Woods
Most Wildlife Habitat
Ungrazed Pasture
Wetland
Maybe you’ve gotten through this article, and you don’t know where to start. Maybe you’ve read it all and you realized you have accidentally done everything correctly (congrats!)
My recommended first step would be to make a map of your property. It doesn’t matter how large or small your property is, you can always use these concepts to suit your needs!
Next I would start laying out where your current “zones” are and that should give you a good idea of how to go about changing the layout.
I should also note that not every zone will be equal in size and shape! On the contrary, most zones will be abnormally shaped and irregular in size. I have even seen properties that have more than one of the same zones that are separate from each other (which is less common).
It may also be that your property is small enough that not every zone will be physically on your property! Often in urban areas zone 5 might belong to a business or neighbor nearby and not be part of your backyard.
In any case, these are guidelines for space efficiency, so don’t feel like you have to squeeze your context into a box.
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