I
have made allusions to the idea that I have a forest garden going and I posted
my research paper that first motivated me to start forest gardening; yet, I
have never actually described my garden. Here is my attempt to explain what I
have going on, where my knowledge is currently, and some directions I want to
head in. I split this into four parts. Part
one is the first year I tried to implement some forest garden concepts. Part
two is the second year where my efforts looked more like forest gardening with
the planting of trees and plants that would serve as my backbone of sorts. Part
three is my current year of tending my forest garden and the insights I have
gained. Finally, in part 4 I listed my goals for this year and posted some
pictures of my current garden.
Two
years ago in spring of 2010, I took over the management of an L-shaped garden
space. This space was previously organically cultivated with typical row vegetables
like corn, peppers, tomatoes, squash, etc. A few months prior to this time I had
written my research paper on forest gardening so I was very excited to put into
practice what I had learned… which as it turned out barely scratched the surface
:).
I
cleared out a section of weeds and proceeded to seed in a 10’x10’ section of
corn, sunflowers, beans, and squash. I was trying to grow the traditional three
sister’s crop, corn, beans, and squash that I wrote about in my paper. I was
also growing the sunflowers for their added shade and to experiment with a
rapid, mini-upper story. Those plants were very brave… For the rest of the
growing season they only received supplemental watering once a week and they
had weeds knocking on their doorstep as constant companions. I was admonished
to pull the weeds, but my newbie research led me to believe that all weeds were
good, that they had just as much right to live as any cultivated plant, that
they would help rather than harm, etc. I now realize that not all weeds are
good, that it is ok to direct their growth habits, that they provide excellent mulch,
and many other things about weeds; but I also admit that I have a lot of
learning in this area. As for the water
thing, I was convinced that plants could live without supplemental watering…
Little did I know that this is only true if I put time and effort into sculpting
the land to hold the water. Ooops.
Well,
by the time fall came I had a garden full of weeds, none of my plants could
produce anything beyond some attempts at upward growth because they were so
dehydrated, and my first attempt to forest garden was an utter flop. When the
leaves began to drop from the trees and all the weeds died back I attempted to
put down a kill mulch of several layers of newspaper; needless to say the wind
had other ideas so it was a mulch that never was. I did, however, make my first
real attempts to nurture some perennials. During the summer a strange tree
started growing off to the side of my garden space. I was told to cut it down
because it was one of “those pesky trees” that lived in a grove behind our
house. I liked it and those trees as well. I said I was keeping it. I carefully
wrapped its trunk in newspaper to officially mark it as my tree. I said it
would be the upper story in my garden because it would reach 50’ or so if it
were one from the grove behind our house. It did not occur to me until later that
the upper story did not have reside in my small garden space. Just prior to the
leaf drop I also rescued some baby trees from a grove of walnuts and peaches
that was cultivated on an adjacent spot to my garden. I transplanted a walnut
and two mystery trees. I also wrapped around their trunks at the base. With
that I put my feeble attempt of a forest garden to bed for the winter. I am not
a master gardener so I did not mulch or “cleanup” my space of dead debris. In
part two I will discuss my 2011 planting year.
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