Greetings from Southern Oregon

[WaterBaron]

Hi everyone! I'm really really fascinated by the idea of permaculture. I can't remember where I came across the term, but it's been breaking into my daydreams more and more frequently. The ideas of forest gardens and incorporating ecological checks and balances to minimize labor are very intriguing to me. I don't have much of a background in gardening or farming, but I've grown up in the forest. I know a lot about general ecosystem structure and root/sunlight niches, so I have a little to go off of for when I get started. My biggest shortfall at the moment is my very minimal knowledge of what plants do well in my region.

Does anyone know where I could go to find useful plants organized by climate? and what kind of things besides rainfall, winter minimums, summer maximums, should I be concerned about?

and any other resources for a beginner that you'd like to help me out with would be great!

but most importantly, Hello!

[sun burn]

Hello waterbaron

Apart from doing a course, the obvious thing to do is find some books to read. I use a website called Tropical Permaculture which has a good description of some of the key principles. I would just google for others that might be suited for your area with regards to plants. The web is full of resources including videos. On the ground you should speak to local farmers, farm/seed suppliers and nurseries and other gardeners or permies if you can find them to find out what grows well there. I suggest you start gardening as soon as possible too as you learn fast about how to grow vegetables that way. One book that has been excellent for me has been a book about composting. You probably can't get the same one over there but there should be others. I use gardening websites to find out what vegetables i can grow. Look on organic gardening for important tips.

[WaterBaron]

Thanks a lot! That tropical permaculture website has been really neat to look at. I just finished their page string on design concepts.. It was fairly enlightening.

[9anda1f]

Welcome to the forums WaterBaron!

You don't say which side of the Cascades you're on in So Oregon ... big difference! Being newly transplanted from the west to east side of Washington, I'm finding out just how big the differences are.


Does anyone know where I could go to find useful plants organized by climate? and what kind of things besides rainfall, winter minimums, summer maximums, should I be concerned about?Local nurseries might be a good place to start for plants friendly to your local climate, keeping your eye out for native species both in the nursery and in your surrounds. Get a "Native Plants" identification book for your area ... the descriptions will help when you start visiting various plant source websites and receiving catalogues. I spend an inordinate amount of time perusing the Raintree Nursery catalogues http://www.raintreenursery.com/ and have gotten a feel for what they mean in their descriptions. For instance, "Full Sun" is often listed as a siting parameter but over here full sun can fry plants that need full sun on the west side of the mountains. So there's a little "reading in between the lines" necessary.

Most enlightening to me has been to get an idea and "just try it".

edit to add: Just found this site http://www.agroforestry.net/aflibr.html which may be useful (I know I'll have some reading to do!)

[WaterBaron]

Thanks so much for the welcome! I'm from the much greener Southwestern Oregon. I always forget that the eastern halves of Washington and Oregon exist. The respective state legislatures seem to share my negligence ^_^ .. those halves should prolly secede or something. hehe.

I'm a bit of a drifter, so I can't follow your 'just try it' advice. I'm mostly in an intellectual curiosity mode until I can get a hold of some land to take care of. I'll be sure to see if I can get any use out of any of the links you posted. Thank you very much for them :)