Have you ever found yourself in the position of wanting to grab a few herbs from the garden to garnish the dinner with and then changed your mind because it was too wet, too dark or too far away to bother? How about the garden itself? How far away is it from the kitchen door? Siting and zone planning your gardens is of great importance in Permaculture, and good design will surely help you to get the most out of your gardening experience. With a site analyses you will see possible pitfalls before anything is implemented thus avoiding heart break and costly mistakes. When designing your zone areas you will need to decide which elements are needed closer by the house for convenience and which other elements can be sited further away. For example you probably wouldn’t want a frog pond right under the bedroom window but having said that, a few frog ponds strategically placed around the garden areas might just be a great inconvenience for would be intruders! Anyone can design and plan their gardens with a bit of knowledge and some keen observation. Just take some time out and get ready to make some drawings on paper as you walk around the yard and step out possible garden areas, the chook pen, compost heap, worm farm etc. It would be good to have the chook pen uphill from the garden so that the nutrient flow will be caught into your gardens and the worm farm will need to be situated underneath a tree to keep the little darlings away from extreme heat. It isn’t difficult to do but it can become complex as elements will need to linked up as much as possible for everything to have multiple uses.
