Bioshelter Market Garden: A Permaculture Farm

by Darrell Frey

To ensure food security and restore the health of the planet, we need to move beyond industrial agriculture and return to the practice of small-scale, local farming. Bioshelter Market Garden: A Permaculture Farm describes the creation of a sustainable food system through a detailed case study of the successful year-round organic market garden and permaculture design at Pennsylvania's Three Sisters Farm.

At the heart of Three Sisters is its bioshelter—a solar greenhouse that integrates growing facilities, poultry housing, a potting room, storage, kitchen facilities, compost bins, a reference library, and classroom area. Bioshelter Market Garden examines how the bioshelter promotes greater biodiversity and is an energy-efficient method of extending crop production through Pennsylvania's cold winter months.

Both visionary and practical, this fully illustrated book contains a wealth of information on the application of permaculture principles. Some of the topics covered include:


Design and management of an intensive market garden farm
Energy systems and biothermal resources
Ecological soil management and pest control
Wetlands usage
Solar greenhouse design and management
Whatever your gardening experience and ambitions, this comprehensive manual is sure to inform and inspire.

Darrell Frey is the owner and manager of Three Sisters Farm, a five-acre permaculture farm, solar greenhouse, and market garden located in western Pennsylvania. Darrell writes extensively on permaculture design and ecological land use planning and has been a sustainable community development consultant and permaculture teacher for twenty-five years.

Genres: Gardening, Nonfiction, Food, Reference, Agriculture

480 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 2011

Reviews

[Crystal · Rating 4 out of 5]

Technical read for the more advanced permaculturist

[Justin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read a review that said that this was a good book on permaculture.
Personally, I think this book doesn't go into enough detail to rival a good resource like the ones by Sepp Holzer or Bill Mollison. That doesn't mean this is a bad book. It seems to be a good resource for bioshelters, but then again I am not ready to build a bioshelter so my opinion isn't particularly great in that regard.

[Karen Mahtin]

This book was REALLY long. The project that they describe would cost millions (at least in California) today, so it seems a bit irrelevant. There are some interesting garden tips here and there.

[Stephie Jane Rexroth · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Humility regarding limits of our knowledge about nature's processes is perhaps the most critical principle in permaculture design."

"A permaculture farm is created with an awareness of its relation to the larger environment; it is itself an ecological system nested in the web of life."

"Patterns are forms created by energy interacting with matter. Nature is manifest as patterns: spirals of tropical storms and galaxies, branching of trees and rivers, hexagonal beehive cells and snowflakes, sine waves of rivers and radiant energy, elliptical orbits and fractal coastlines — these are all patterns of nature. Nature gathers and scatters, random chaos leads to new order, new order to chaos. Each ecosystem is nested in larger systems. The great diversity of life is, at its base, simply variations on the patterns set by the ladder-bonded double helix of DNA.

"Time is also an element in patterns of nature and design. On the farm, interlocking patterns of daily routines, seasonal change, and ecological interactions define our world. Much of good ecological design is working with these patterns in order to increase both the productivity and stability of the farm ecosystem. The patterns of our days and seasons and the pace of our lives make or break the success of the permaculture farm."

"Humans evolved on the edges of forest and grassland. Our original habitat, the savannah, gave us access to the resources of the grassland and the fruits and shelter of the forest. The permaculture landscape can mimic the savannah, providing us with a mix of trees, shrubs, pastures and cropland to forage and tend."

"Phenology, the study of how plants and animals interact with seasons, also provides insight into design development. When spring peepers sing their spring song, it is time to prepare the beds to plant peas, spinach and onions. We try to be sensitive to the spring fluctuations and cycles of the place. We are trying to develop the native language that is lost to many modern farmers. Eventually the need to 'design' is superseded by a cultural knowledge of the land and resources. We must begin somewhere. Humility as to our own ignorance of nature's complexity will lead to the true permaculture farm. As a new traditional wisdom replaces design, we can find our way back to a deep knowing of the place as Indigenous cultures."

"The best homestead gardens mature over time. The interweaving of the gardener's spirit, the soil's fertility, and the garden's unique characteristics manifests as a new tapestry each year. A garden landscape often tells the tale of a gardener's journey."

"The natural world is the foundation upon which we all depend. Stewardship begins in our yards and gardens, and it extends to the choices we make in what we consume."

"Design and planning for small-scale intensive agriculture enterprises is a hopeful and creative process. My childhood memories of walking the nearly dry bed of Glade Run, picking mulberries and raspberries while the hummingbirds and honeybees foraged the orange blossoms of the jewelweed, is also a vision I have for urban children today. Parks, garden lots and other green spaces in a permanent culture will provide wild places for children drawn to foraging—place where they can endure thorn-scratched arms and legs and purple-stained fingers and lips in exchange for eating their fill of abundant blackberries.

"The myth of Eden is a primal memory of our evolutionary past, at a time when we foraged the seashore, rivers and forest edge for Nature's abundant food. We must begin to forge a new myth that allows humans to be redeemed in the eyes of creation (or manifest universe, as you will) and regain our place in the garden of our own design."

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This 400+ page tome is stuffed with information about market gardening, permaculture, bioshelters, rotational planting, composting and much more. Although a bit dense at times it is a fabulous study of permaculture principles played out over 10+ years on the Three Sisters Farm. My only complaint is that I think I would restructure the book a bit. Some of it just didn't make sense until later in the book when another piece fit into place. I might also include some more diagrams, charts and pictures that better illustrate the points being made. Overall, very helpful and worth keeping to re-read!

[LeeFrances · Rating 2 out of 5]

Technically, I only made it to page 182, but it was due back at the library so it'll have to wait. I just want it off my "Currently Reading" list.