Oct 11

Designing With Water - Notes from our Permaculture Course

Updated: Nov 30

by Natalie Armitage

The following are reflections on designing for water in permaculture from a participant in One Regenerations's 2024 Caribbean Permaculture Course + Retreat staged in Jamaica.

"Where water runs, make it walk." - Masanobu Fukuoka

We can't control how the water drops from the sky onto us. How much of it. When it comes. How fast, how hard, and when it doesn't for a long time. We surrender to the skies, completely. When it inevitably lands on earth we can plan for it. We can guide its course and nurture how it flows through our landscapes.

In the tropics, we deal with an onset of a large volume of rain during rainy seasons, mixed with hurricane and winds. We also deal with drought. If we are in a relationship with water, we can understand and learn from it, allowing it to teach us how to work with it. Creative solutions are almost always found within the problem.

Slow it. Sink it. Spread it. - Permaculture Tools for Water

Slow it

Water slipping down a hill fast and quick takes all the nutrients from the soil with it and can lead to erosion. We want to sloooowwwwww it down. How?

One design option is through swales. Digging swales that follow the contour of the land, is just one way of doing this. It isn't the only way- but for an example we can see how that digging a swale is already slowing the water, also catching it, and giving it more time to be absorbed on the way down. What it also then does, is really enrich the burm (the part after the swale) with water and nutrients caught. This is a great place for a tree and plant guild!

Spread it

As humans, water is essential for our hydration, sanitation, food and agriculture. We depend on it, and we interact with it. In this process, it is really helpful for us to catch and store some of it for us to use. Once you have manipulated your rainfall to a place, you can actually store it in a pond. Designing to create ponds to catch some of the water, can be used for sustaining life, increasing biodiversity and for you to collect from!

Rainwater can be spread across your daily life. It could be used for supplying household appliances and in the garden. A filtration and purification system is needed in order to ensure drinking water is safe, but that is possible too! Rainwater is most commonly harvested by collecting rainwater from the roof guttering into barrels or tanks, and from areas of paving or tarmac.

Greywater is the “waste” water that comes from all household plumbing that is not a toilet. This includes, the shower, bathtub, sinks, and hoses. In most of the contemporary world, greywater is seen as wastewater and is combined with sewage to be chemically treated and dumped into the nearest waterway. In the average household, non-toilet uses make up around 2/3 of water used. Greywater’s cousin, blackwater, which is the water used by the toilet, makes up the rest of the water used in the typical household.

Sink it!

There is much to be said about the intersection of soil and water. In some eastern philosophies it is understood and regarded as sacred. Mulching is a way of covering the soil to retain moisture inside of it and improve soil quality. Less water evaporates this way, also preserving the quality of the soil. It also looks after it with water, so that it doesn't erode it too much.

Composting toilets

Flushing toilets can take gallons of water. This is a large amount of blackwater not being reused. Compost toilets are more of a cultural mindset to overcome, but an excellent example of what is possible when we become conscious about the water we waste everyday. There is always an opportunity to re-think how we consume, catch, spread, sink and re-use water. This is a win for water management and soil fertility. The intersection of life.

At Durga's Den in Jamaica they have implemented creative solution. There, you can see a great example of how to manage little water. Here, you can see how it is clean, efficient and restorative back to the earth also.