Food Foresting 101 By: GingFood Foresting is an ideal example of the theory and motivation behind Permaculture.
As Bill Mollison, one of the co-creators of Permaculture observed, Permaculture starts with earth-care. Food Foresting, and Permaculture, were both inspired in an attempt to imitate nature, to harmonize with nature. That being said, its obvious one of the best (if not, THE best) teacher/ source of the learning of Permaculture and everything sustainable is Mother Nature. It can be a truly rewarding experience to go out into a forest, and just observe the interactions and unity of the forest, and all of nature.
A food forest is a human (and humanely) designed potentially independent harmonious and symbiotic system of plants, microorganisms, insects, animals (including humans), and the earth/soil. A food forest is designed to be a sustainable source of food and other necessities such as shelter, medicinals and timber year after year. This food could easily end up extremely rich in minerals and vitamins, and become an immensely abundant and dependable line of perennial resources.
A Man-Made Forest of HarmonyThere will be a few sections to this write up in an attempt to give it some structure. The video links at the bottom are a great way to
see what im speaking of!
Giving Birth to Soil In this section, I will describe a few Permaculture/Food Foresting techniques and theories that can produce remarkable results for bringing life to soil and can be applied to Food Foresting, such as animal tractoring, sheet mulching, and chop and drop; as well as go into some detail as to how a healthy ecosystem is dependent on the soil life of microorganisms,
*especially* mycelium (the underground portion of a mushroom). I will also attempt to briefly explain why dependent monocultures are unsustainable and unhealthy for all of life.
One may notice the lack of soil life in a stereotypical monocultural system (acres of a single species of plant, dependent on synthesized fertilizers and biocides). In the area in which I live, the soils (dirt may be a more fitting word, if that) of local monocultures are very close to looking like a desert. Average Monocultures are even more negative and destructive than a natural desert in some ways, since the fertility and productivity is 100% dependent on human applied fertilizers and biocides, year after year, for a harvest; raping and raiding the land of its organic matter and natural fertility. If one were to eat a plant produced from a monoculture expecting this plant to benefit ones health, one would be grievously mistaken. It has been said, that attempting to sustain monocultural based plants on artificial fertilizers and pesticides is akin to feeding a child only protein, sugar, and oils, along with the occasional immunity boosting shot (biocides), it procrastinates and intensifies the ill effects of living sick and doesn’t treat the cause, the cause being what the living entity consumes to sustain itself.
A monoculture is the polar opposite of a food forest, in more ways than one.
The soil in a healthy ecosystem contains innumerable microorganisms as well as decomposed, recycled biomass and organic matter from previous generations of life. For instance, a tree grows, dies and eventually falls over to rest on the forest floor. Eventually, mycelium and other microorganisms move in to transform the death of the tree into life for future plants, by breaking down and recycling the tree and turning the tree into soil teeming with microbial life, and eventually, more healthy biodynamic plant life. This general cycle is perpetuated throughout a healthy ecosystem and its parts, causing this ecosystem to be truly alive.
To get into some detail on growing healthy soil, I will bring to light a few sustainable and effective techniques.
The first is called animal tractoring, and I will explain something more specifically called chicken tractoring. It is just a portable electric fence that surrounds the perimeter of a pre-food forest, which has inside something like a portable chicken coop or the like. It could contain a little wagon with solar panels for the electric fence, extra nutrients for the chickens, and of course, chickens. If the chicken tractor is left on a specific space of land for a time that is not too long or short, the chickens will eventually have practically tilled and prepared the soil. They also would have nutrient-rich poo all over, consumed any insect larva or eggs they encountered, and ate some weeds and weed seeds, all while simultaneously making one some healthy eggs. The chickens could then be moved on to another pre-food forest, or to a more stable chicken coop. There is a video at the bottom with more info on chicken tractoring. This can be achieved with various other animals, such as goats, to some degree, as well.
The second, called sheet mulching, is really more for smallish vegetable beds than, say a pre-food forest floor. With that being said, sheet mulching could be very useful in a food forest while planting baby trees. The theory behind sheet mulching is to mimic a forest floor. First soil amendments such as poo, rock dust, compost, etc. are thrown down. Then, something like cardboard or paper grocery bags is placed on top, making sure to thoroughly eliminate any potential sunlight through holes. Then the sheets are covered with organic matter, such as woody mulch, grass clippings etc. There is a video and link at the bottom of this write up with more in depth info on sheet mulching.
Another interesting and intuitive way to naturally improve soils is a permaculture technique coined “chop and drop”. This is a pretty straightforward term. You CHOP a plant, such as pruning a tree or shrub, chop to control vines on a tree, chop to control the ground cover, AND just DROP it; near a fruiting tree, for extra nutrients, if you would like. Chop and drop is pretty much just growing mulch. Chop and drop is quite simple and very effective; a sickle AKA rice knife is great for this. There are specific plants with qualities that could be considered more beneficial than others to chop and drop, such as nitrogen fixing legumes (more info in a bit), comfrey, dandelions, nettles etc.; the reason for this being that these plants (excluding the legumes) have large, deep tap roots, and do something called mineral mining. To chop and drop these plants would result in minerals from the very depths of their deep taproot surfacing and adding organic biomass rich in minerals wherever you decide to drop it. They also generally have many other uses, from organic fertilizer teas, to healing broken bones, to being an overall very medicinal plant to consume.
General Observable Layers of Plant Harmony in a Food Forest
(From the top of a forest, to the bottom and below….) You may notice one day while walking through a forest that not every plant grows in the same specific conditions or in the same manner. For instance, a large dogwood tree, towering over a forest hundreds of feet high, and requiring as much sunlight as possible; compared to something like strawberries, crawling around, only reaching maybe a foot in height, and growing in a way that eventually results in a patch. Like these obvious layers mentioned above, there are many more layers, however I will only mention a total of 7, these 7 being the most fundamental in my opinion. Some of these layers fit loosely and can be intermingled creatively.
However, to make a forest much more sustainable and evolved, at least 50% of the life inside of a Food Forest should be NATIVE to the area. Layer 1: Upper Canopy The upper canopy is the top and tallest layer of trees, consisting of trees requiring full sun, and possibly giving shade to the plants that need it.
Layer 2: Sub Canopy The sub canopy is the layer directly underneath the upper canopy. These trees are smaller than the upper canopy and can generally tolerate less light.
Layer 3: Shrub The shrub layer, or bushy layer, consists of plants that typically are not nearly as large as the canopy plants. They can be shade tolerant, or take advantage of holes in the canopy. These plants usually do not have one single primary trunk; rather, have multiple smaller trunks that branch out more horizontally than vertically (unlike a member of the canopy layer, which would grow predominantly in a vertical direction)
Layer 4: Herbaceous The herbaceous layer consists of leafy plants, such as greens, or really anything that’s not a shrub, tree, or vine. It can tolerate full sun, if there is the right herbaceous plant where there isn’t much of a canopy blocking the sun; as well as tolerating shade, depending on the plant.
Layer 5: Vertical The vertical layer consists of vines that primarily grow upwards and can take advantage of a niche provided by the canopy trees, or anything tall enough. If worst comes to worst and the vine is choking the tree, a quick snip of the vine will fix it (of course).
Layer 6: Horizontal The horizontal layer primarily consists of plants that crawl along the ground (and/or directly underneath the ground) and sometimes form patches, providing an efficient ground cover to protect the soil in whichever spots you allow it to thrive, and potentially fixing nitrogen and biomass.
Layer 7: Root The root layer is, well a layer of roots; fairly self-explanatory. However, I like to consider mushrooms and mycelium something like this layer, although really mycelium, especially, could be a whole other layer.
Plant functions in a food forest A food forest is a system that contains plants that serve many functions, such as support species, pioneer species, and productive species. These individual functions of a food forest work together and depend on each other to become an independent and sustainable lifeline to us humans. With that being said, some species could imitate all of these functions, in a single plant!
Pioneer Species Pioneer species are the fast growing, nitrogen fixing (generally), native plant species that really jump-start a food forest and get it up and running. These species would generally be trees and some sort of cover crop, and maybe some shrubs. The pioneer trees quickly reach up, providing sufficient shade to little trees, so as to not get burned up by the sun and heat.
Support Species The support species of a food forest are generally a member of the legume family, thereby organically fixing atmospheric nitrogen into the soil, caused by a symbiotic relationship with specific microorganisms that colonize root nodules of a legume and exchanges microorganism-generated atmospheric nitrogen for legume-generated starches. Whenever it comes time for the leaves of leguminous support species to fall from the tree year after year, it fixes nitrogen into the soil. Also, after certain layers of support species have become well established, a pruning/chop and drop of certain support species that can handle it can be done and mulched underneath productive species. This would also proportionally and effortlessly chop and drop the roots of the support species, adding even more nitrogen and organic matter while simultaneously greatly increasing the amount of nitrogen fixing microorganism colonies in the soil. This pruning could be done a few times a year, which could multiply the amount of nitrogen rich organic matter a single tree could produce per season by A LOT. Therefore, I would recommend the food forest consist of at least 60% of the plants to be support species of some sort.
Support species also consists of plants that attract beneficial insects and pollinators, an important role in a food forest. These beneficial insects are generally predators to the pests of the area, naturally taking care of a majority of pest problems, and encouraging bio-diversity and a natural predator-prey cycle.
Productive species Productive species are there to primarily produce edibles and medicinals, however species for timber harvest are also considered a member of this function. This function essentially serves the purpose of a potential harvest of abundance for humans
Native plants
cannot be stressed enough. This will provide a backbone to the rest of the forest, since these plants have evolved and adapted for so long to the specific climate in which the food forest is growing. Also, it is quite fun to really hike around and observe interactions of native plants in your area and how/where they grow; as well as giving a great opportunity for research into an abundance of versatile native plants in your area, quite likely some of which others may consider weeds. A healthy, biodiverse forest would reflect and permeate into the soil, making the soil healthy and biodiverse; and vice versa. Food foresting can potentially be a perennial supply of extremely healthy food, a source of hands on therapy, a great friend, and most of all, an incredible inspiration to the rest of the world of how humanity can harmonize and thrive, while in union with nature.
I believe the majority of humanity is unaware of the potential of union between nature and humanity, how observably harmonious nature is, and how subtle this harmony can be; thereby almost automatically giving rise to pollution and self-centeredness of all sorts. But, on a positive note, that only gives potential for change. A change to harmony, respect and reverence.
“Though the problems of the world are increasingly complex, the solutions remain embarrassingly simple.” Bill Mollison
"You can solve all the worlds problems in a garden." Geoff LawtonVideos and Links
“Food Foresting with Chickens”
“7 Food Forests in 7 Minutes”
Sheet Mulching Tips
https://www.dmt-nexus.me/forum/default.aspx?g=posts&t=48462“Establishing a Food Forest” GREAT video
Zaytuna Farm Tour, AKA the Permaculture Research Institute of Australia ! ! !
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Topic: Food Foresting 101 :) (Read 6841 times)