How To Create A Colourful High-Yield, Multi-Layer Forest Garden Ecosystem From Scratch. Designed Using Permaculture Principles, Height, Ground Cover, Fruit, Leaves & Nitrogen-Fixing “Pioneer” Species. This Community-Led Garden Bolsters Local Food Security And Biodiversity Within The Sidford Area.
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The internet is full of gardening advice with pictures professional gardeners achieving perfection. But what is the reality when ordinary gardeners have a go? How successful is it possible to be? Will the ultimate result resemble the pretty plans they start with or will it end up a mess? And how long does it take … on TV they appear to do it almost instantly!
In this article I start by showing you the site we plan to create our forest garden on and over the next months and weeks show how our original plans evolve. And to make it even more interesting I’m going to reveal the cost of creating this garden .. bit by bit as we spend (or save) money.
Throughout the article I am displaying the images full size so don’t forget to scroll past them once you have looked at them.
Assessing a Forest Garden Location
Let’s start with our site. It is quite large by the standards of many gardens. It is about 333 sq metres when measured on Google maps and is adjacent to our community food forest. As the photo shows we have planted it with a number of small apple trees and these will be used as the skeleton of the forest garden.
The site is bordered by the food forest to the north west, a sports field to the south and a lane to the north east. There is a hedge between the lane and area we are creating our forest garden on.
The site gets plenty of sun and the soil is of reasonable depth. Though alluvial in nature it is a little heavy when dug. We are 80 m from the river but the area doesn’t flood.
Food Forest or Forest Garden
Before writing more I wanted to explain the difference between a food forest and a forest garden.
There is no one correct black and white answer to this, opinions vary. But I explain not as follows. A forest garden is a multi-layered, low-maintenance ecosystem mainly with perennials. It is often more decorative or ornamental than a food forest. A food forest emphasises the production of (mainly) edible crop yields within a biodiverse planting that mimics a woodland setting and enhances nature. They do of course overlap in many ways but the forest garden I am describing in this article is very much a decorative garden …but one that produces food and encourages biodiversity.
Starting With a Bare Canvas
The photo says it all. It was a dull grey day in January as I took this photo of the main path through our mini orchard. The apple trees were planted as whips just two years ago and we maintain the grass with a couple of cuts a year, in spring and autumn. The exception is the path which is cut so as to allow people to wander over the site. The path is straight and one of the first things to consider is whether we should add a few sinuous curves to make it more interesting. Once planted with some taller plants it would be good if we couldnt see the whole site at once, but had to wander through to see what is beyond.
Being Creative With Our Imagination
I started with a list of the plants I thought we might plant along the path and tried, in my imagination, to crate an image of what it might look like in its basic form.
With a straight path it might look something like this image, in its early stages. It is certainly an improvement but could be improved with a curving path and a bit more height and colour. in the following images I will expand on this.
Preparing to Plant ..With a Woodchip Mulch
In the adjacent food forest awe use woodchip t control the grass and to improve the soil. It makes sense to repeat the idea here, especially as w have a pile of woodchip just a few yards away. And the good news is the woodchip was free, given to us by a tree surgeon who would have to pay to dispose it if we didn’t take it! Free woodchip is a good start to the forest garden. There are a lot of woodchip myths and I have written about them elsewhere .. follow the link.
The benefits of woodchip in this forest garden are explained in the image below.
Thinking in Forest Garden Layers
Food Forests are generally regarded as having seven layers, starting with canopy trees. But in a garden mature canopy trees are often absent. As in this case we might have newly planted or even established fruit trees and they can then become the bones in which we drape the body of the garden.
This specific garden was stimulated by Three Layer Forest Garden designed by Pippa Chapman. Layers are sometimes ambiguous and the infographic below mention s five layers. We don’t intend growing many root layer plants, except perhaps Jerusalem artichokes and the apples are already there, so we are only going to be adding three additional layers.
The choice of plants to grow in a forest garden is huge. Here I am focusing on colour, including winter colour, simply because I love colourful winter gardens … and because they also contribute both edibles for humans as well as wildlife.
Focusing on Edibles … & Edimentals
Edimentals are edible ornamentals … some plants are multi skilled. Below are some very useful edibles that can provide food in various seasons and provide colour AND texture the garden palette.
A Living Carpet For All Seasons
A Spring Flower Tapestry
Weaving in Colour With Tracery & Pollinators
Keeping It Simple and Easy To Plant
It isa easy to make a chore out of gardening. But if we adopt an efficient way of designing and doing things it is much easier. By easier I don’t mean lazy. Lazy gardeners don’t bother, efficient gardeners think and plan to make life far more pleasant!
Latest Design Thoughts
Having delved through the possibilities, though my ideas are still evolving, I am beginning to see the direction that this garden might go. The next image isn’t the finished concept, but is getting closer.
More To Follow … But For Now
In the next post about this forest garden I will provide our full planting list plus some costings. Watch this space. For now .. happy gardening!
Tag: Creating a Forest GardenStarting with aBare Canvas
