04/04/2022
Food Forest
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The food forest is the heart and soul of permaculture, a longterm and permanent system of sustainability. According to Project Food Forest in Minnesota, a food forest (also known as a forest garden) is “a diverse planting of edible plants that attempts to mimic the ecosystems and patterns found in nature. Food forests are three dimensional designs, with life extending in all directions – up, down, and out.”
Typically there are 8 “layers” to a food forest, which allow for a greater number of plants to grow in an area without competition for resources, such as water, nutrients, and sun. In this way, we honor the pattern of nature and, as explained by permaculture designer, teacher, and author Geoff Lawton, “We can produce food in the most sustainable way possible with the minimal amount of output for the maximum amount of input anywhere in the world.”
Here's our layering - we'd be interested to learn what is growing at your place :)
1. Canopy. This consists of large fruit and nut trees. At Monticello
Gardens, our canopy trees are pecan, walnut, chestnut, mulberry, and oak.
2. Low tree layer. This includes smaller fruit and nut trees, such as
citrus, peach, hazelnut, almond, loquat, apple, pear, persimmon, and
olive.
3. Shrub layer. This layer is devoted to bushes and berries, such as
blueberry, raspberry, and gojiberry. We are blessed with about 5 acres of wild, delicious blackberries! This layer also includes guava, Barbados cherry, and miracle fruit.
4. Herbaceous layer. This is the layer that contains all the medicinal and culinary herbs, such as rosemary, mint, lavender, oregano, sage, chamomile, tarragon, and so on — the list is really endless.
5. Rhizosphere layer. This layer is composed of root vegetables, such as carrots, beets, and turnips. In the Monticello Gardens food forest,
however, we prefer perennial roots like sweet potato, ginger, and
turmeric.
6. Soil surface layer. This layer lends itself to ground cover which is either self-seeding or spreading, such as comfrey, lemon balm, mint,
creeping thyme, oregano, sage, and strawberry, as well.
7. The climbing layer. At Monticello Gardens, we are lucky to have an
abundance of climbing vines, such as kiwi, morning glory, runner bean,
passion fruit, honeysuckle, and muscadine grape.
8. Mycelium. This underground level is nature’s world wide web — an infinitely intelligent information system. Vital to the soil, the mycelium breaks down organic material, renewing it for continual use in the ecosystem. And wow those chanterelles 😋
