The Permaculture Design Guild, who make up a proportion of the designers involved in the Permablitz programme, feel it is important to return to see how the owners are enjoying their gardens and to find out what has worked and what hasn’t worked .

Our first visit was to Katikati Motel which was Permablitz # 3 & 4 carried out in spring 2012.
BEFORE

The area we blitzed was originally a swimming pool, which had been backfilled with subsoil. We designed a series of raised wicking beds to enable addition of good growing medium and to keep maintenance to a minimum for a busy couple, Kate and Kent Pfennig, with a young

family and a motel to run.
AFTER

We recently visited Kate and Kent at Katikati Motel to see how their garden is going. This was a unique situation as Kate and Kent wanted this area to be developed for guests at the Motel to also be able to use the fruit and vegetables from the garden.
THIS IS WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE TODAY

This was the first Blitz where we built Wicking beds and these have proved very successful for this busy couple. Kate says “I would do the wicking beds again, that was a definite good thing. They only need filling two to three times a year; at the end of spring, around January, and if very dry, again a month later. They have been great time and water savers when it comes to irrigating the vegetables.

The beds are replenished with fresh compost at the end of each growing season. “The Pfennigs wanted to incorporate chickens into the area so that they could also provide guests with fresh eggs. The  rotational chicken tractor system hasn’t been continued with mainly because it was in the public eye and the area, especially after rain, wasn’t visually appealing for the guests.

However the chickens are now housed elsewhere and when there were nine laying they not only provided ample eggs for the guests but also were fed food waste from the units thus closing the recycle loop. There have been crops of potatoes, corn, beans, herbs, and fruit. Raspberries, Grapes, Citrus, and Jerusalem Artichokes are currently ripe. The Pfennigs have since planted other fruit throughout the motel site. There are Olives as shade trees, more Raspberries against a hot wall,Citrus and Green Tea Camellias.

Since completion there have been visits to this garden by the Tauranga Ooooby Group, a Tauranga Garden Club and Katikati BA5. It has generated a lot of interest and provided a good example of Permaculture in action.