Now about permaculture. To me I view it as common sense but then I've been gardening for many years and I initially came across permaculture when I was reading up on things I was already doing such as increasing the number of perennial plants.
I also get the Permaculture magazine and although I think it could be improved I find the odd useful idea from it. Their online site has a large amount of information though such as these videos from Patrick Whitefield that may be worth looking at: http://www.permaculture.co.uk/search/node/patrick whitefield video
I'm currently creating a garden in a woodland and one day would like to plant up a few acres from scratch. At the moment I've lifted the canopy of some alder trees (left them in place as they fix nitrogen), planted various other edible trees, shrubs, perennial crops and ground cover and I'm having great fun watching it develop whilst getting a fair bit of food.
I noticed the original post mentions browsing animals. I have plenty about from deer to voles but the usual precautions are used, so the area is protected by some recycled deer fence, and I'm trying out rabbit/vole guards and will be trying to keep the number of rabbits, squirrels etc down which provides extra grub!
Any chance of pic's when you can please ? Are Alder's going to remain as the top canopy or do you have some traditional long term timber as standards coming through ?
Haha, I meant selective domesticated browsing !