Integrating indigenous plantings and permaculture food production in the Cape

Ecology in a context that includes and transcends

Not too long ago nation states were seen as billiard balls, hitting up against one another and sending each other on new trajectories, depending on which state was the larger ball. It was all about power.

Yet this perception has evolved, and now we perceive a web of interactions where there were hard balls. Scholars came to understand that government was just one sphere of influence, and even then, interactions created connection and connections created unique and complex influences. Power took many forms.

In migration theory, assimilation, or absorption into a new culture, was seen as positive and inevitable, until we realised selective acculturation— where a person took on some aspects of a their new cultural context while retaining aspects of their original language and context— was associated with better mental and physical health outcomes.

Rather than domination and absorption, family groups and individuals navigated migration in a million unique ways. And rather than one fixed notion of a culture, our understanding has evolved to see that culture is constantly changing. We are co-creating our culture, here and now.

Our old perception of both culture and politics was based on a fairly narrow understanding of power and domination. Yet we are porous beings, taking in, changing, evolving, and influencing the environment around us in unexpected ways. Of course, there are cases where money and power creates outsize influence, but perhaps that is part of a continuous story rather than a single event.

I think these ways of understanding might be helpful in thinking through our own evolving knowledge of ecology, growing, and our place in the world. Rather than there being an absolute “right” way of knowing how to build good ecology, I wonder if learning and growing has to be much more iterative.

We can’t wait to act until we know deeply, we have to come to deeper knowing through continuous action and observation.

Permaculture tends to focus on observation

Permaculture tends to focus on disturbed environments (our acre was port jackson when we started out). How do we improve a disturbed environment?

Toby Hemenway argued that sustainable food production in one’s home environment means land elsewhere does not need to be converted to farmland. Taken out of context, this approach can overlook the geographical origin of plants, towards a focus on what function they provide an environment. Permaculture sometimes even considers invasive species as a type of helpful pioneer.

In focusing on the functioning of an environment, we place ourselves in the position of curious observer, and this takes us on a journey that is ideally non-judgemental and involves deeper and deeper knowledge of small differences in both species origin and their function. We can’t see everything, but the act of engaging with curiosity is everything.

Focus on both origin and function.

If we focus on planting only endemic species, we may miss out on the richness and importance of providing for our own nutritional needs. In a disturbed environment that is under our care, we can notice the impact of a plant, and look to gradually improve diversity.

For example, Osteospermum moniliferum (bitou) is from the W. Cape, but it can also take over in our area. At an early stage of our farm, it was really helpful as a windbreak and a replacement as we tried to remove port jackson. It is also a helpful food for our goats, habitat and food for birds and insects. But later on we needed to cut back most of our bitou plants to allow for more diversity. Over time, we noticed and cultivated one or two subspecies of bitou that are much less inclined to take over.

I doubt I will ever understand the full scope and complexity of our endemic species. Still, because we are in the game— actively working on growing— I propagate and plant hundreds of indigenous plants each year, and then watch to see how they do in our environment. Every year the diversity of plants, insects, birds and animals on our farm increases, as we learn more and people bring plants or seeds through.

This is an evolving process, a type of give and take in which we stay engaged, and try to propagate certain species we see on our nearby mountain, while managing the port jackson there. We cannot remove ourselves from the environments in which we live, we can co-evolve. In our co-evolution, we’re then able to propagate with more specificity and knowledge.

Some easy indigenous companion plants for the Deep South

Pelargoniums— there is tremendous diversity here, and I think it is ok in spaces you actively mange to just keep trying different species. They cross with eachother naturally, but it’s hard to know pelargoniums until you start growing them and interacting with them, so if you find one is taking over, you can just cut it back.
Salvia africana, Salvia chamelaeagnea, Salvia lanceolata
Metalasia muricata
Tetragonia
Wild Rosemary
Agathosma— betulina and crenulata
Milkwood
Euclea racemosa

In general, the leucadendrons, leucospermums, and proteas tend to be produced in just a couple of large nurseries in the W. Cape, where they’re often hybridised. I tend not to understand this too well, so I don’t plant them much. That’s for the next stage in my learning, and I am grateful for locals like John in Capri who are propagating local species at a small scale.

You can grow food and indigenous plants together

I just want to encourage you today not to worry too much about having all the knowledge or all the right opinions on difficult topics. If we can just keep learning and stay engaged, I am sure we can keep improving our environment, our skill and our approach to the difficult questions of how we live in this world, in these times.

When I feel a tension between different priorities, I want to try to stick with the tension a while and not jump to resolution. Usually there’s a way forward that avoids false dichotomies and doesn’t seek to be “right”.

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