Permaculture has three ethics and 12 design principles.
The three ethics are:
Care for Earth
Care for People
Fair Share
The twelve design principles are:
- Observe and interact.
- Catch and store energy.
- Obtain a yield.
- Apply self-regulation and accept feedback.
- Use and value renewable resources and services.
- Produce no waste.
- Design from patterns to details.
- Integrate rather than segregate.
- Use slow small solutions.
- Use and value diversity.
- Use edges and value the marginal.
- Creatively use and respond to change.
Stewardship Permaculture Pilgrimage is a project. We seek to build a trail from one of the American Coasts to another one, surrounded by a permaculture food and medicinals forest the entire way.
Stewardship Permaculture Pilgrims are currently headquartered in South Fork, Colorado, where we have permission to guide the flora along Highway 149. We plan to create a trail between Montrose, CO, where we have partners on the trail, and Alamosa, CO, where some of the pilgrims are working on land acquisition, and many existing permaculture projects grow.
The trail will have beautiful signs, explaining the local plants, what's edible, what people are free to take, and what work they can do to give back. We believe in the abundance of nature, and that through permaculture, many people can obtain a yield, process foods under cottage foods acts, and make a living.
Eventually we'd like to have shelters every 5-10 miles for people walking along the trail, making ultralight backpacking possible. We'd like to have a vibrant network of cottage industries and co-created communities for nomads, seekers, and healing people to live in and reconnect with our natural role as stewards of the earth.
What does stewarding the earth mean to you? Do you have a favorite permaculture design principle? Why?