2.9 – Cycles: A Niche in Time

Learning Objectives - At the end of the video you should be able to:
- Interpret cycles as the permaculture outlook on time
- Paraphrase how cycles may occur in the span of a day (in a public park)
- Give an example of using cycles in a permaculture design

Brief Overview:

Cycles are how we look at time within our designs, and they are recurring events that happen within systems. They disrupt entropy (loss of energy) by occupying materials, nutrients, and energy for certain amounts of time. So, in our designs, we don’t just look at space; we also consider time. Increasing cycles is another way of increasing yields.

Niches of time occur in many designs. Take a standard public park. It goes through many cycles in a day. Early morning hours might be the time for joggers. Mid-morning, mothers with young children bring them to play or stroll. Pensioners come for midday sunshine. Families arrive after school lets out. Young couples take early evening walks, Even, after dark, homeless people use parks as a place to sleep. Good design accounts for these sorts of cycles in time.

With food production, we might think of time cycles as applying to animals and land. It’s good practice to graze different types of animals over the same piece of land in a useful sequence, as they eat different parts of grass or brush, keeping the vegetation maintained. Using poultry between grazing animals can help the soil stay naturally tilled and the pest problems down. We want to use natural and sensible time cycles, like this, to make our designs function at a higher level.

Key Takeaways:

- Both space and time are important elements in permaculture design.

- Cycles are recurring phenomenon, such as decomposition, which disrupt entropy while life (or death) takes its course.

- By utilizing niches in time, we can change from having too little to having high quality, efficient cycles.

- Like filling the different niches in space, doing so in time, also creates diversity, allowing more species to use the same piece of land during different cycles.
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2.10 – Industrial Methods of Producing an Egg

What does it take to produce an industrial egg? We need a battery chicken factory. It’s a horrible place that also produces volumes of contaminated waste. The factory is built of metal components, mined and manufactured. A power station to keep all these factories—the chicken, the mining, the metal smelter, and the component production—running. To run the power station, we’ll need an oil rig supplying an oil refinery. We need trains to carry grains, tended with heavy tractors on large monoculture grain fields treated with biocides and fertilizers, which come in plastic packaging. There are boats taking fish from waters, the fish then having to be processed in yet another factory, to be turned into pellets for chicken (for their protein instead of ours). The feed has to be trucked to the battery chicken factory. What have we forgotten? Trucking to supermarkets, antibiotics…
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2.11 – Permaculture Methods of Producing an Egg

A permaculture egg comes from a healthy, low-energy environment. Some metal is required for things like roofing, guttering, a water tank, and wiring, but this is so minimal it could be possibly produced with renewable energy. The chickens will live in a forage food forest with all they require: hard seeds (legumes), protein-rich fruit (mulberry), greens (comfrey), insects, and grit. Clean water is caught from the roof and dispensed through the catchment tank. This arrangement allows them to lead healthier lives for longer and with less stress. This more natural existence produces more nutritious, chemical-free eggs: Permaculture eggs.
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2.12 – Niches in Space and Time: Schedules

Designing for niches in space and time takes many aspects into consideration. The vertical layering of vegetation, the slope of land, the flow of energy, and the orders of streams available all factor in. The different permanent and migratory species that occupy different sites on the land (when they do occupy those spaces) create niche opportunities. The edges and boundaries always matter, as do seasonal climate changes and vegetative flare-ups that occur with them. By accounting for the evolution of the whole system, there are always ways to enrich the diversity present.