9 Understory Plants for a Permaculture Garden

Permaculture is an excellent way to use your land in an environmentally sustainable way. It’s an agricultural practice designed to grow useful plants that benefit people, animals, and the earth. If you want to build your permaculture garden, you’ll need to make a plan for understory plants that add value to the landscape.

The practice of permaculture emphasizes your yard and garden as an edible landscape where you can grow crops that you can eat. But permaculture isn’t just about edible crops. It’s about sustainability and long-term plans for a healthy ecosystem.

Getting Started in Permaculture

The practice of permaculture has many components.

You can start a permaculture garden in a small yard or large acreage. No matter where you live or your climate type, you can start a permaculture garden. If you have shady areas, you’ll want to incorporate shade-loving perennials that thrive in those locations. These plants include trees, shrubs, vines, ferns, or herbaceous perennial wildflowers. 

When you start planning your permaculture landscape, you’ll need some time to gather ideas. Sketch your yard and the existing landscape features, such as trees, structures, or water sources. Decide how much space you have for planting and how many new plants your yard can support. Take some time for the planning process. Then comes the fun part: choosing your plants, planting them, and watching them grow!

Permaculture gardens are compatible with both sun and shade. Be intentional about creating multiple layers of your edible forest, with taller sun-seeking varieties in the top layer and more shade-tolerant species to handle decreased sunlight in the lower levels.  Keep reading to learn about an excellent assortment of shade-loving plants for your permaculture understory.

American Holly

	botanical name Ilex opaca
	sun requirements Full sun to partial shade
	height 15 – 30 feet
	hardiness zones 5 – 9

American holly is a familiar small to medium-sized tree native to the woodlands of the central and eastern United States.  Hollies are easy to grow and low-maintenance. Holly trees grow well in full sun and also in considerable shade.

They prefer average-quality, well-drained soil. Holly has glossy, bright green leaves that stay evergreen throughout the year. The leaves grow densely along many branches, making these plants excellent privacy hedges or windbreaks along the edge of your landscape.

Holly trees bloom in the spring, but the small, white flowers are fairly inconspicuous. After flowering, hollies produce an abundance of bright red berries. Birds and small mammals eat the berries throughout the fall and winter months. Those that aren’t eaten remain on the tree for an attractive display. 

Blueberry

	botanical name Vaccinium corymbosum
	sun requirements Full sun to partial shade
	height 3 – 8 feet
	hardiness zones 5 – 7

Blueberry shrubs make a great addition to a permaculture garden. These plants are native to central and eastern North America, growing in open woodlands and forest edges. Since blueberries are fairly shade tolerant, you can grow them as an understory shrub.

Make sure the soil is medium-moisture and well-drained. Blueberries also like acidic soil with a pH of 4.8 to 5.2. Those grown in the shade won’t be as prolific as those grown in full sun, but they still produce fruits.

Blueberries make attractive understory plants in a permaculture garden. They bloom with small, white, bell-like flowers in the spring. By mid-summer, you’ll be harvesting your first fruits. The little round blueberries are sweet and tasty and can be eaten raw, baked into pies, or preserved. Blueberry shrubs attract pollinators during flowering and birds during their fruiting phase. In late fall, the blueberry leaves turn vibrant shades of orange and red. 

Chives

	botanical name Allium schoenoprasum
	sun requirements Full sun to partial shade
	height 1 – 1.5 feet
	hardiness zones 4 – 8

Chives are a familiar culinary herb in the onion family. They can be easily grown in a sunny vegetable garden, herb garden, or flower garden. Chives are also remarkably tolerant of shade and grow well as a permaculture understory plant in a location with dappled sunlight. Give them medium moisture, well-drained soil. Chives also grow well in containers.

Chives plants are herbaceous perennials that grow from small bulbs. They are easily started from seed or can be purchased as bedding plants. Chives form dense clusters of hollow, tubular, onion-scented edible leaves as they mature. In the springtime, they bloom with beautiful fluffy pinkish-purple flowers that attract pollinators.

Hardy Kiwi

	botanical name Actinidia arguta
	sun requirements Full sun to partial shade
	height 25 – 20 feet
	hardiness zones 3 – 8

Hardy kiwi plants are native to the temperate regions of eastern Asia. Hardy kiwis are fast-growing vines that can grow long and would benefit from a wall, fence, or trellis for support. Give your hardy kiwi average-quality, moist, well-drained soil. They grow well in full sun, but because their native habitat is woodlands, they are well-adapted to growing as a shaded understory plant. 

Hardy kiwi blooms in the spring and has masses of fragrant greenish-white flowers. By late summer, you can start to harvest the tasty edible fruits. This plant also benefits wildlife because pollinators will visit the flowers, and birds will eat some of the fruits. Be sure to keep your hardy kiwi vine well-pruned. These vines can grow very large and thick and are prone to growing aggressively in ideal conditions, spreading by root suckers.

Lettuce

	botanical name Lactuca sativa
	sun requirements Full sun to partial shade
	height 0.5 – 1.0 feet
	hardiness zones 2 – 11

Lettuce is an annual leafy green vegetable at its prime in the cooler spring and fall months. In the warmer months, lettuce typically bolts and then dies back.

While permaculture gardening often focuses on perennial plants, you can incorporate some annuals into the understory mix. Interplant lettuce with other shade plants, and by the time you have harvested and eaten your spring lettuce, the other plants will be ready to take over the plot. 

For the best luck growing lettuce in the shade, stick with the leaf lettuce varieties rather than larger head lettuce varieties. Lettuce is easy to start from seed as long as you can keep the soil moist while the seeds are germinating. Protect your plants from extreme cold and heat; they will thrive in a moderately cool temperature range. Lettuce is also a great candidate for raised bed gardening. 

Ostrich Fern

	botanical name Matteuccia struthiopteris
	sun requirements Full sun to partial shade
	height 3 – 6 feet
	hardiness zones 3 – 7

Ostrich ferns are shade-loving ferns with beautiful green foliage that make a great addition to a permaculture shade garden. Ostrich ferns are native to Europe, eastern Asia, and eastern North America. They grow naturally in moist, shaded woodlands. They tolerate considerable shade as long as they have regular soil moisture and a cooler climate. Ostrich ferns don’t appreciate long, hot summers.

Many people don’t realize that the young spring fiddleheads of the ostrich fern are edible. They should first be cleaned and then boiled or steamed before eating. Deer and rabbits don’t bother ferns, so you won’t need to worry about competition for the tasty greens.

Don’t harvest all the fiddleheads – you will want some to develop into beautiful fronds. Even if you don’t want to eat them, these attractive understory plants will be well-appreciated in your permaculture shade garden.

Pawpaw

	botanical name Asimina triloba
	sun requirements Full sun to partial shade
	height 15 – 30 feet
	hardiness zones 5 – 9

Pawpaw is an understory tree in rich, moist forests of the southeastern United States. Pawpaw does well in full sun and also in locations with considerable shade. This small tree prefers medium to moist soil but will tolerate dryer conditions. Pawpaw is a native tree that is a great addition to an understory forest habitat.

Pawpaw has somewhat unusual burgundy-brown flowers that bloom in the springtime. Pawpaws must be cross-pollinated to develop fruits, so you’ll want to plant two nearby to enjoy some tasty fruits.

Pawpaw fruits ripen in late summer, looking and tasting like a cross between a banana and a pear. Pawpaw fruits are delicious but have soft skins and don’t store well for a long time, so you’ll want to eat them soon after harvesting. Consider them along with other fast-growing fruit-producing trees.

Red Buckeye

	botanical name Aesculus pavia
	sun requirements Full sun to partial shade
	height 12 – 15 feet
	hardiness zones 4 – 8

Red buckeye is a smaller deciduous shrub native to the eastern and central United States. It thrives in moist forests with dappled sunlight. If you have a shaded, medium-moisture location in your landscape, check out the red buckeye for a welcome addition to your permaculture garden.

In the early spring, red buckeye bursts into bloom with a showy spike of bright red, tubular flowers. The flowers are a favorite of early-season hummingbirds and many insect pollinators. Grow red buckeye as part of a shaded hedge row or as an attractive small shrub surrounded by other woodland plants, such as ferns.

Serviceberry

	botanical name Amelanchier arborea
	sun requirements Full sun to partial shade
	height 15 – 25 feet
	hardiness zones 4 – 9

Serviceberry is native to eastern North America and grows up to 25 feet tall. As an understory tree, it will likely stay smaller and more shrublike. Serviceberry is well-adapted to growing in open woodlands and will do well in full sun or partial shade. Soil should be average-quality, medium-moisture, and well-drained. 

In the springtime, serviceberry blooms with a profusion of showy, fragrant white flowers. The flowers attract butterflies and other pollinators.

By mid-summer, serviceberries develop bright red round fruits much loved by birds. If the birds don’t eat them all, you can harvest the ripe fruits and use them for jams, jellies, and pies. Enjoy its brilliant yellow-orange foliage in the autumn months.