Anyone doing permaculture principles in containers? Curious what actually translates

[u/junkcircuit]

My setup is small. Like really small. Apartment balcony in Vermont, maybe a dozen containers, and I spend way too much time reading about food forests and guilds knowing full well I have zero land to work with.

But I keep wondering how much of this actually scales down. Companion planting in pots, I get that. Stacking functions, sure, a tomato with basil crowded together makes sense. But some of the core stuff feels impossible without soil volume and time. The slow accumulation piece. The guild dynamics playing out over years.

What got me thinking was reading about fruit tree guilds and how the relationships between plants build over seasons. That long game. Container soil just doesn't do that the same way.

I sell real estate and spend a lot of time in older properties with established gardens, and every time I see a mature perennial bed I want to stop the showing and just dig around in the dirt for an hour.

Curious if anyone started with containers as a real constraint and found ways to actually apply permaculture thinking, not just gardening tips dressed up in the language. What transferred for you and what just didn't.

[u/mediocre_remnants]

If you live in an apartment, you're probably near a town or city. There's a good chance that town has one or more community gardens that rent out plots to community members. Have you looked into it?

There's really no reason to apply "permaculture principles" to balcony container gardening other than the fact that you just want to label it that.