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How to Create an Endless Supply of Free “Woodchips”

by papprentice Leave a Comment

In this post, I’ll outline a cost-effective and sustainable method of obtaining woody mulch for your food forest.

For this ‘workflow’ to work, you need to have a source of woody material on your land. This can be a forest or other (unwanted) woody vegetation growing on your property that you can then selectively clear and, after a period of “maturation,” use as mulch.

By sourcing this woody material from your local biome and incorporating it into your food forest as a mulch, you do several things:

  1. Save money on bringing in woodchips and/or compost
  2. Build soil fertility and increase organic matter
  3. Smother the weeds
  4. Inoculate the area and the food forest system with microbes and decomposing fungi from the local biome
  5. Plus, all the other good things a mulch layer does: insulation, soil protection, temperature modulation…

I gather this material annually in September (pushing it into October, weather permitting) to top up my woody mulch within the food forest rows.

What I used to do was go to the forest that’s on my land with a tractor and trailer and pick up woody material from the forest floor. However, I quickly found out that it’s not that easy to gather trailers worth of decomposed woody material.

Ideally, you want to gather dead logs, branches, and sticks that’ve been decomposing on the forest floor for two or three years, but the problem is you might need to drive far and wide to gather enough of these.

So, to get enough woody material year-on-year, I developed a process to streamline this as much as possible.

Here’s the rundown:

Step 1.  Find the source of the woody material on your land


The first step in creating an endless supply of free ‘woodchips’ for your food forest is finding the source of the woody material.

This could be a forest, timber plantation, overgrown, unwanted vegetation on the edges of the property, woody regrowth from clearcutting, overgrown hedges and living fences, sporadic native trees and shrubs in the food forest, and other areas of your property.

Ideally, this woody material would be a byproduct of an activity you would be doing anyway, so making these woodchips doesn’t become an additional task on your to-do list. These types of activities could include but are not limited to: cutting firewood, thinning the timber stand or forest regrowth, clearing the site in preparation for planting, maintaining/pruning hedges and living fences…

On my farm, every season, I either cut some firewood in the forest, cut back my hazelnut hedgerow, or cut down sporadic trees that are old and sick. So I always have something that I would do anyway that, in the end, results in surplus woody material.

Note that whatever you choose to do, make sure that you select the spot where when the material is ready for harvest, you can easily access it with a tractor and trailer or whatever other means of transport you are planning to use.

Step 2.  Pile up the woody material


Now harvest the woody material by cutting it with a chainsaw, reciprocating saw, or loppers.

Gather the thicker parts of the woody material for firewood and leave all the rest for the woody mulch.

You’ll want to collect an assortment of bigger branches, smaller branches, twigs, and even some logs (although they will take much longer to decompose, of course)

Find a shady spot nearby and make a sizeable pile. Ideally, this would be on top of the leaf mulch rich forest floor, but any shady location that will help preserve moisture will work.

Shade and moisture + microbial inoculant from the soil will facilitate quicker decomposition. So, the closer you can come to forest floor-like conditions, the quicker you can harvest your mulch.

Step 3.  Cut the pile


This step is optional, but it will help you speed up the process of ‘maturation.’

What I usually do is cut through the pile multiple times with a chainsaw to make the woody material smaller, easier digestible for fungi, and quicker to decompose.

Just be cautious not to damage your chainsaw by cutting into the soil/rocks underneath the pile. I’ve done the learning the hard way, so you don’t have to.

Cutting or no cutting, once in a pile, the woody material is now ready to start maturing.

Step 4.  Allow for the pile to mature


Leave the pile to sit on the ground for at least two years, preferably more. I usually wait for three years because I’m at the point where I have multiple piles going and always something to harvest, so I can wait a bit longer to mature.

During this ‘maturation’ time, the woody material gets ‘infected’ with fungi and decomposes, with smaller pieces starting to crumble.

The longer the pile is exposed to the environment, the more the bigger pieces start to crumble as well and become spongy and all.

After the period of maturation, you’ll get a perfect assortment of woody material with sponge-textured bigger pieces, medium-sized pieces, woodchips, fungal duff, leaf mulch, plus inoculant filled with saprophytic fungi.

Step 5.  Harvest the woody mulch and spread it in your food forest


Now that material is ready, it’s time to harvest it.

I usually gather it with my tractor with a trailer, but you can use an ATV with a trailer or even a wheelbarrow if there isn’t much.

Load the woody material and take it to your food forest. Unload it as a mulch layer around your trees, within the rows, or place it on approximate contours to act as a check dam (helps to stop and pile any material moving down the slope, thus building soil even faster.)

Note that you always want to keep mulch off the stem of the tree; the organic mulches right up against the trunk of the tree will retain too much moisture and potentially rot the tree.

Step 6. Repeat steps 1 – 5 for continuous harvest


To stay ahead and not have to wait for ‘woodchips’ to mature, make sure that you start several piles at the same time. This will ensure that you always have something to harvest.

The ideal workflow is to cut woody material yearly as part of harvesting firewood, maintaining hedges/living fences, expanding the farming space… Then, make new piles for the next batch while harvesting the ones from previous years that have matured.


And bam, there you have it, (almost) zero-cost endless supply of ‘woodchips’.

Sure, this method requires more forethought than simply ordering/getting delivery of woodchips. Still, it’s a relatively easy way to get (almost) zero-cost premium ‘woodchips’ for your trees and shrubs, mainly because the woody mulch is a byproduct of the other activities you’ll be doing anyway.

Hopefully, all of this inspires permaculture workflows on your property.

Keep me updated in the comments below.
Talk soon,

-William

How to Use Forest Fungi to Improve Soil Quality and Bulletproof Your Food Forest Against Disease

by papprentice 2 Comments

Note: this is a rather long post that explores the mysterious world of forest fungi and their practical permaculture application. If you want a shorter, more hands-on cheatsheet that you can print, fold and put in your pocket as you work on bringing the fungi back to your land, click here. 

Think about the last time you were walking in an old-growth forest.

Remember that smell of the fresh forest air, the calming sound of birds, the serene backdrop of leaves gently swaying on the wind, and the sun’s rays peeking through the lush canopy? Remember how with each step you took, you could feel the twigs and branches crunching and your feet sinking into the soil sponge of old fallen leaves?

Well, what you saw, heard, and felt was only half of the story. Underneath your feet, there was a vast fungal network that has a mind of its own. It’s so pervasive that just the imprint of your foot, extending down into the soil, contains enough fungal cells to stretch 300 miles (480km!) if placed end to end.

It goes mostly unnoticed, but you can see hints of this sentient network if you look under logs lying on the forest ground. The fuzzy, cobweb-like growths you can find there are called mycelium, a fine web of cells that, in one phase of its lifecycle, fruit the mushrooms we all easily spot.

This overall fungal network has been called nature’s Internet or the ‘Wood Wide Web’. Like the Internet, it has a network-like design, where individual fungal cells merge together to form what Paul Stamets would call a neurological network of nature; a network that, like the human brain, is aware and reacts to change, but unlike ourselves, has the long-term health of the host environment in mind.

Today, with ever-increasing technological progress and deforestation, we are dismantling the neurological network of nature at an accelerated pace and, thus, in a sense, destroying our life-support ecosystems.

Sadly, we humans show little respect to the elders we owe our existence. In what way, you may ask? Keep reading; this will blow your mind.

Fungi – the architects of our existence

Forest Fungi
Fungal mycelium up-close and personal

Fungi are ancient organisms. They inhabited the earth billions of years before humans ever came into existence. In fact, you, I, and all humans and animals alive today originate from fungi. It’s not just that we share a common ancestor with fungi. They are the common ancestor from which all animals (hey, that’s us) came to be. But wait, there’s more…

The kingdom of plants was, and still is, totally dependent on fungi. The first plants to make the transition from the sea to land some 450 million years ago did so without roots, relying totally on fungi to bring nutrients and water for growth. Moreover, as you’ll learn today, millions of years later, most plants still rely on their fungal partners.

So, to say that fungi are important to all the complex life on earth is an understatement. They are pivotal! We know today that fungi are the grand architects of our environment and, consequently, our existence. They are creating the landscape and engineering our ecosystem for all other organisms to live. Here’s what I mean…

Fungi are generally multi-cellular organisms with a nucleus and a single cell wall made of chitin, and, like all other organisms, they are on the constant lookout for food. They obtain their nourishment by sending strand-like parts of their body, called hyphae, directly into their food, secreting chemicals to break it down into simpler molecules and then absorbing the juice directly into their cells.

The body of a fungus is made of many such threads of hyphae, collectively called mycelium. So, the mycelium is, in essence, a fusion between a stomach and a brain. It’s aware of its surroundings and responsive to changes in its environment as it searches for food.

But, since It’s just one cell wall thick and in direct contact with a myriad of hostile organisms, it constantly produces strong antibiotic and antiviral compounds to protect itself and ensure its existence. You’ve heard about penicillin, right? Well, that’s the fungus protecting itself from bacteria…

So, by selecting the microbiome of bacteria and other organisms in its surroundings, the mycelium network is creating the habitat and setting the stage for an ecological evolution. First, the selected microbes feed the plants, and then plants feed the animals, and, finally, humans get the whole ecosystem services served on a plate.

Ultimately, the mycelium prepares its immediate environment for its benefit but creates the entire soil food web, with trillions upon trillions of critters that consume organic matter and each other releasing nutrients that fuel mycelium growth, plants, animals, and the entire ecosystem. I told you this was going to blow your mind…

That’s why, if you want to engage in any landscape regeneration, you’ll need help from fungi. In this post, you’ll learn how to work harmoniously with them to establish your thriving food forest.

First, however, let’s consider the fungi you’ll need…

Want to improve your soil and protect your food forest against disease using native fungi?

Great! Grab a copy of my free “Forest Fungi Protocol” to transplant and grow native fungi on your land. (Click here to download)

Types of fungi you’ll need in your food forest

We place fungi into four basic categories: saprophytic (decomposing), parasitic, mycorrhizal, and endophytic, depending on how they nourish themselves. But, some species employ more than one strategy, making them difficult to categorize.

Although parasitic and endophytic fungi play an essential role in plant and ecosystem health, in this guide, I will concentrate on the benefits of decomposing and mycorrhizal fungi since we can cultivate them easily and understand them far better than the other two categories.

Decomposing fungi: nature’s recyclers

Oyster mushrooms decomposing wood

Decomposing fungi are those we humans primarily cultivate. You are probably already familiar with many gourmet and medicinal mushrooms, such as shiitake, oyster, reishi, lion’s mane, and chaga, to name but a few. Very tasty and healthy indeed, thank you fungi!

These fungi are wood decomposers and generally operate on the soil surface. So, when organic matter falls from the canopy of trees and plants overhead onto the forest floor, the decomposers that are in the soil and on the surface process this newly available food.

From dead plants, these fungi recycle carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, phosphorus, and minerals into nutrients for living plants, insects, and other organisms sharing that habitat. They play a key role in the operations of soil food webs.

Building soils is the primary outcome of the activities of the saprophytic fungi. They create brown rot, remaining in the wood, which acts as a nutrient sponge that holds a wealth of roots, microbes, insects, and water. Remember that sponge-like topsoil when you were in the forest? That’s it!

We’ll work in partnership with these fungi to kick-start the entire process of landscape regeneration and soil creation on your land…

Mycorrhizal fungi: fungus and plant partnerships

Forest Fungi
Mycorrhizal fungi attaching itself to the root tips of a plant

Next up are the soil fungi. Mycorrhizal fungi work in unison with the root systems of almost every plant on our planet. Some 80-95% of all terrestrial plants form symbiotic relationships with these fungi. Without these mycorrhizal relationships, most plants would probably not exist. Let that sink in for a second…

In these relationships, the host plants supply the mycorrhizal fungi carbon-rich sugars – the product of plant photosynthesis – and, in return, the fungi decompose plant litter and soil pools (soil particles, rocks…) to help roots obtain the water and nutrients (phosphorus, nitrogen, trace minerals) that the plants require.

As these fungi grow into the soil, their long-threaded hyphae extend in all directions, creating a fungal network that enables a plant’s roots to access 100,000 times more soil than it would be able on its own. All the plants in the local environment can tap into this mycorrhizal network. The fungi mastermind the whole scenario by redistributing nutrients where they are most needed and even giving plants the ability to communicate with each other via this biological communication network.

Every plant involved in this mycorrhizal relationship is better able to supply its nutrients and withstand drought and other environmental stresses, root pathogens, and other diseases. Mycorrhizae also improve soil structure and give it porosity, aeration, water retention, and, ultimately, a platform for a diverse range of life forms.

Mycorrhizal fungi are commonly divided into two groups according to how the fungal cells associate with plant cells, namely endomycorrhizal (the hyphae of fungi penetrate the cell wall) and ectomycorrhizal (the hyphae of fungi do not penetrate all the way through the cell wall). Now pay attention here. This is important; here’s what I mean.

The endomycorrhizal (endo) type most often associate with the roots of vegetables, grasses, flowers, shrubs, and fruit and ornamental trees: some 95% of all plants in the world are compatible with these fungi. The largest functioning group is the arbuscular type of mycorrhizae (AM), and these AM fungi are the ones you’ll need for the roots of your fruit trees and shrubs.

The ectomycorrhizae (EM) always work in partnership with woody plants, generally trees, primarily with conifers, but also some deciduous trees such as oaks. Only around 5% of terrestrial plants form ectomycorrhizal associations. Many of the EM fungi are mushroom-forming species, including highly prized edibles such as chanterelles, morels and matsutake, and truffles. These are the fungi you’ll need for your nut trees.

Okay, so now you understand why fungi are important, so why would you ever try to establish a food forest without your fungal friends? Right, let’s look at some practical steps to introducing and working with them on your land…

Want to improve your soil and protect your food forest against disease using native fungi?

Great! Grab a copy of my free “Forest Fungi Protocol” to transplant and grow native fungi on your land. (Click here to download)

How to use native fungi as your ally in your food forest – the forest fungi protocol

Forest Fungi
We get our inspiration for regenerating the soil and establishing a food forest from nature

The dream of a food forest and an abundance of food from a healthy, self-sustaining, low-maintenance stand of trees and shrubs is impossible without fungi. No food forest is complete without our fungal partners.

Our goal with a food forest is to imitate nature and how trees and shrubs grow in the wild. Currently, what most of us do is successfully imitate the structure of a forest edge with trees, shrubs, and other perennials of varying heights planted in guilds. But that’s only half of the story.

What is as important as imitating the structure right is replicating what takes place in the forest soil with the fungi and the rest of the soil food web. While we won’t neglect the rest of the microbes, here we’ll primarily be focused on fungi since, according to Michael Phillips, who wrote The Holistic Orchard, the food forest soil ideally contains ten times more fungi than bacteria.

So, in the process of reintroducing the fungi to our land, we’re going to observe what nature is already doing and mimic, amplify, and repeat it in our food forest and, in a sense, help nature reclaim what it lost.

The quickest and easiest way to succeed in introducing fungi into your soil is to use native fungi from your local ecosystem. Think about it, they are already there in your neighborhood, and it would anyway be only a matter of time before they would arrive on your land – so why not give them a head start?

But more importantly, as Peter McCoy would say, local strains of fungi show local resilience, and they are well adapted to your climate and to the habitat that’s teeming with competitors (remember the engineering the microbiome thing from the introduction?). By introducing them we are working with the natural tendencies of the land.

Okay, so, with that in mind, here are the steps you need to take to successfully transplant and grow native fungi on your land:

Step 1. Do the site prep work, earthworks, and cover-cropping to start creating favorable fungal conditions (shade, moisture, food).

Step 2. Investigate your local forest and find sources of decomposing and mycorrhizal fungi you can use to inoculate your food forest soil.

Step 3. Introduce the saprophytic fungi to your land to kick-start the fungal activity and soil creation process.

Step 4. Introduce the mycorrhizal fungi to create a sentient underground network that will help your food forest plants to grow and thrive.

Step 5. Make a compost tea from healthy forest soil and spread it all over to bring other native microorganisms that will help fungi and plants grow.

Step 6. Keep adding woody debris in the form of mulch, logs, and hugelbeds to feed the fungi and ensure good growing conditions.

Right, so let’s begin!

Want to improve your soil and protect your food forest against disease using native fungi?

Great! Grab a copy of my free “Forest Fungi Protocol” to transplant and grow native fungi on your land. (Click here to download)

Step 1. Do the site prep work, earthworks, and cover cropping so that you start creating favourable fungal conditions (shade, moisture, food)

Covercropping (perennial rye and red clover) a swath for the tree-row-to be, these are the beginnings of my food forest.

Now, depending on your site conditions, your overall fungi strategy might vary, but here I’ll just assume that you’re starting from scratch, with bare land, a pasture or a depleted cornfield.

Bacteria dominate bare land and disturbed soils (if there is any biology left after the years of abuse, that is), and you’ll want to start the transition towards a more fungal-dominated soil by creating a more fungi-friendly environment.

Fungi need shade, air, moisture, and food; even before they are introduced into the system, you want to start establishing favourable fungal conditions. At this stage, you can do that by earthworks (if necessary) and cover cropping.

You see, some subsurface flow of moisture, even if it is only occasional, goes a long way in fueling the mycelium and, of course, plant growth. Water propels fungal lifecycles and plant photosynthesis, drought stress shuts down overall plant and fungi metabolism, and subsequent carbon trading between them. That’s definitely not what you want…

Some sort of earthworks might be necessary to slow, spread and sink that water so it doesn’t just run off to your neighbor’s place before infiltrating into the soil and fueling that fungi growth. If you can’t perform any earthworks, at minimum, what you can do is to set up some drip irrigation systems.

Now, as you’re performing earthworks or some soil disturbance, what follows naturally when soil is exposed is the spreading seed of cover crops. Cover crops will help reduce the competition from unwanted plants, improve the soil, and help with the fungal progression.

So, following your initial soil disturbance, either by earthworks or just by tillage, stir in a mix of oats, red clover, and tillage radish. This recipe comes from Michael Phillips’ new book the Mycorrhizal Planet, and as he explains, oats serve as biomass and a nurse crop in sheltering the smaller clover seedlings. Tillage radish increases soil’s organic matter content and drills deep to take up its share of the space between clover plants, while red clover fixes nitrogen and has a strong affinity for mycorrhizal fungi.

The cover crops are here performing several important roles. By cutting or leaving them in place to decompose, we’re building organic matter, and clover root systems are in place, improving the soil fertility and waiting for their mycorrhizal friends to arrive. Also, by introducing plants of various heights, we are creating favorable growing conditions for fungi above ground by providing shade, with humidity levels increasing nearer to the ground.

Step 2. Investigate your local forest and find sources of decomposing and mycorrhizal fungi you can use to inoculate your food forest soil

Forest Fungi
Going into my local forest and spending a day harvesting chestnuts and fruiting mycorrhizal mushrooms is a day well lived in my book.

Okay, so now when you’re improving your soil and have to wait, use the time to go to your local or regional forest and survey it for native fungi species. These fungi and other resident microbes living in the soil are nature’s recommendations for your food forest soil restoration. 

For this entire process of introducing the fungi from the wild, you’ll have to learn how to find, transplant, and then nurture wild spawn or mycelium. You can grow wild spawn by transplanting wild patches of mycelium, germinating mushroom spores, and regrowing stem butts. We are searching for all three plus the rest of the soil food web team…

Putting this into context for your food forest and the type of fungi you’ll need. Specifically you’re looking for:

  • decomposing woody plant litter on the ground – this will be your source of decomposing fungi
  • wild fruit trees growing in the forest or on the forest edge – the soil around these trees is infused with the mycelium and spores of arbuscular mycorrhiza – for your fruit trees
  • big old forest trees with fruiting mushrooms underneath – the soil around these trees is infused with the mycelium of ectomycorrhiza fungi plus mushrooms are full of spores – for your nut trees
  • a healthy stand of forest soil – this spongy, leafy, humus-rich layer is filled with the soil microbes that you’ll need for the compost tea

Decomposing fungi are easy to find in a forest. Almost anything on the forest floor is subject to these decomposition fungi. Practically any fallen tree or piece of wood lying on the ground for a few months will host mycelium in it or on the underside and, in all likelihood, inside the wood. 

The mycelium of these fungi pulps the wood over time, slowly digesting its primary components, lignin, and cellulose. Now, identifying mycelium without its mushroom is difficult. Still, you can be confident if you find a pile of decomposing wood on the forest floor and dig into it, you’ve found your decomposing fungi spawn.

Mycorrhizal fungi are soil fungi. While we might find their mycelium beneath fallen logs, or indeed in piles of leaves or wood twigs and chips, to be sure you obtain your mycorrhizal, you need to look for specific types of plants and geographic locations that might have these symbiotic fungi.

Here, we again have to make a clear distinction between endo and ecto mycorrhizal fungi since each is more suitable for symbiosis with a different types of trees. The roots of fruit trees are considered to be entirely endo; arbuscular (AM), while nut trees are mostly ecto (EM), so that’s why we can’t just grab any mycorrhizae.

For your AM, the ones for your fruit trees, there’s no better place to go and find your appropriate inoculum than healthy fruit trees in a wild setting. If you can’t find a wild fruit tree, a forest-edge ecosystem with berries, goldenrod, meadowsweet, and the like will feature a diverse mix of suitable fungi.

AM fungi reproduce asexually below ground by producing spores, so you won’t find any mushrooms above ground. But, by digging some 4 inches (10 cm) deep, you’ll be gathering spores and hyphae fragments, and that’s the soil duff you’re looking for…

Unlike AM fungi, most EM fungi, the ones for your nut trees, reproduce sexually via fruiting bodies: mushrooms, puffballs, and truffles, making them easier to spot and obtain the spores and wild spawn.

To find your sources of ectomycorrhizal fungi, look for a healthy stand of big old hardwood or conifer trees. Think deciduous if your nut trees will shed leaves, and think coniferous if your nut trees are evergreen. If the mushroom conditions are right, you’ll probably find fruiting mushrooms there. If not, then simply scraping the ground, again some 4 inches (10 cm) deep, will provide you with hyphae fragments.

Finally, you’ll also find your healthy living soil containing other soil food web microorganisms in this stand of big old healthy forest trees. This is the soil that hasn’t been disturbed for a long time. Just a few scoops of this soil should be enough to make the compost tea later.

With that, you’re ready to start bringing fungi to your future food forest site…

Want to improve your soil and protect your food forest against disease using native fungi?

Great! Grab a copy of my free “Forest Fungi Protocol” to transplant and grow native fungi on your land. (Click here to download)

Step 3. Introduce the saprophytic fungi to your land to kick-start the fungal activity and soil-creation process

Forest Fungi
Gathering and transporting decomposing wood from a nearby forest. I’m lucky that the forest adjoins my property and I’m sure a little bit of biomass democratization won’t hurt it. We’re are fighting the same battle anyway…

Okay, so in the last step, you’ve found your sources of decomposing fungi in the nearby forest. As discussed, almost anything on the forest floor is subject to these decomposition fungi.

By bringing this decomposing wood (logs and branches) that’s infused with wild spawn and fruiting mushrooms onto the site, you’re inoculating your site with decomposing fungi and starting to rejuvenate your land.

You see, in forested land, after catastrophes strike, the saprophytes (the decomposing fungi) lead the way toward renewal by supporting the construction of complex life-supporting soils. These fungi decompose and recycle dead wood, building humus and freeing up nutrients locked in the wood, making them available to the rest of the soil food web – bacteria, protozoa, insects, plants, animals, and mycorrhizal fungi.

By recycling woody debris and creating the soil, these pioneering fungi are setting the stage for all other subsequent generations of organisms. Once other organisms enter the landscape and become engaged in the soil, nature will steer the habitat toward self-healing.

Here we want to emulate that process; your land is stressed, once it was a forest, but now it needs rejuvenation. By bringing the inoculated woody debris and encouraging selected saprophytes in this stressed terrain, you’re creating a favorable environment for the rest of the soil food web organisms and also building organic matter in soil that helps to improve moisture absorption, bolster disease resistance, and reduce erosion…

According to Paul Stamets, the best saprophytic fungi for helping an injured (forest) ecosystem recover are turkey tails, woodlovers, oysters, garden giants, and psilocybes (yes, magic mushrooms!). If, like me, you live in a temperate climate, these will be your go-to decomposing fungi species. They love bacteria and attract them as these mushrooms start to fruit. They grow with so much vigor that they suppress any unwanted parasitic invaders by occupying their niche, thus protecting and benefiting your food forest growth.

Saprophytic fungi growing in the wild are some of the easiest to recognize and transplant. The only problem is acquiring enough of the woody debris infused with mycelium. Obviously, there is a lot of debris in the woods, but you’ll need piles of the stuff.

What I do is every time I’m in the forest gathering my firewood, I make a huge pile of leftover branches, cut through the pile multiple times with my chainsaw to make them smaller, more digestible, and quicker to decompose, and then leave them there on the floor to become ‘infected’ with fungi for at least 2 years. After a while, the pile will decompose, the branches will start to crumble, and you’ll obtain your perfect inoculant filled with saprophytic and even mycorrhizal fungi.

Once you have the mycelium of the saprophytic fungi on your site, it’s all about giving it a new, friendly environment – something I’ll discuss in greater detail in Step 6. Before that, however, let’s introduce mycorrhizal fungi and the rest of the forest flora and fauna.

Step 4. Introduce the mycorrhizal fungi to create a sentient underground network that will help your food forest plants grow and thrive

Dipping hazel roots into an ectomycorrhizae spore-rich slurry. The best time to introduce your mycorrhizal fungi is during planting.

Okay, so now you have decomposing fungi working the surface, decomposing the woody material, kick-starting the fungal activity, and paving the way for the rest of the fungi and microbes.

Now you should start introducing the mycorrhizal fungi into the soil to create that sentient network that will help your plants with an increased uptake of nutrients, resistance to drought, and resistance to root pathogens… All that good stuff you are not otherwise getting.

The hyphae of these fungi – compared to decomposing fungi, which generally operate on the surface – grow long distances underground, wherever there is food and wherever there are plant roots. It’s so pervasive underground that it can connect all of your plants into a single mycelial network, allowing communication between the plants. That’s what we are aiming for…

These fungi can make up as much as 50% of the microbial mass in a given volume of soil. Their presence not just helps plants to thrive but it also greatly improves the soil organic matter content, soil aggregation, aeration, and drainage.

Let’s now look at the different ways of introducing these fungi to your food forest, again paying special attention to AM and EM fungi, since they connect to different types of trees: AM with fruit trees, EM with nut trees.

Inoculation with wild spawn — the easiest method — for both AM or EM fungi

The easiest way of transplanting mycelium is to scoop it up from your “secret location” in the forest and move it to your food forest. If you place the transplanted mycelium, so-called virgin spawn, into contact with the right mixture of materials, they will regrow, expanding the colony. Again, AM and EM have different preferences, so make sure to match them to fruit trees and nut trees, respectively.

It doesn’t take much soil to introduce these hyphae fragments into the ground back home. Michael Phillips recommends one scoop of soil duff per tree or shrub will do, whether at the time of planting or tucked near roots beneath a recently mulched tree.

Inoculation with mushrooms and mushroom spores — for EM fungi

This is a method for inoculating your nut trees with EM fungi, and it’s relatively easy for a beginner. Here, you collect the fruiting bodies, such as mushrooms, of EM fungi from your nearby forest and use them as propagules, either by using their spores diluted in water or the whole fruiting body.

So pick your mushrooms, remove the spore-bearing surfaces from the fruiting bodies, crush them, and immerse them in water and some clay. Thousands of spores will be washed off, resulting in rich inoculum for your nut tree seedlings. A spore-mass slurry from a single mushroom, diluted in a 5-gallon (20 l) bucket of water, can inoculate a hundred or more seedlings. Hint: you can also use the same slurry to inoculate your seeds.

Tossing spores using water as a carrier on the ground above the root zones of an already-established tree is another method that takes little time and effort. Moreover, if you really can’t be bothered with making the spore slurry, the simplest, but maybe not the most effective, way of inoculating would be to cut the fruiting bodies into small pieces and mix them into the soil when you’re planting your trees.

Inoculation with cultivated root fragments – for AM fungi

In this method, which admittedly requires a bit of practice and knowledge, you’re going to cultivate the AM fungi. But, you’re going to take the soil containing spores or the mycelium you found in the wild, grow it in a pot throughout the season, and then harvest the roots and the mycelium at the end of the season. These colonized root fragments are the inoculant you apply to your fruit trees the following year.

Since AM fungi are generalists and associated with the vast majority of plants in the world, you don’t need any expensive tree nursery type of operation to cultivate them. You take your soil containing wild spawn or spores of AM fungi, mix it with compost and vermiculate, and add non-woody perennial host plants such as bahiagrass or annual rye.

These grasses are ideal because they develop fibrous roots that fungi can colonize, and they aren’t winter-hardy. Therefore, if you prepare your pots in springtime and allow enough time for fungi to colonize the roots, by wintertime, you’ll have your colonized root fragment ready to harvest, plus the perennial grasses will die off once the winter chill strikes them.

You can find the whole procedure for On-Farm Production of Inoculum of Mycorrhizal Fungi from Rodale Institute here.

Now, let’s see how to bring the rest of the soil food web team on board…

Want to improve your soil and protect your food forest against disease using native fungi?

Great! Grab a copy of my free “Forest Fungi Protocol” to transplant and grow native fungi on your land. (Click here to download)

Step 5. Make a compost tea from healthy forest soil and spread it all over to bring other native microorganisms that will help fungi and plants grow.

Brewing a fungal dominated compost tea…

Your healthy food forest soil requires the presence of the whole soil food web. Fungi are an integral part of it, and they are keystone species, but the picture is incomplete without bacteria, protozoa, nematodes, microarthropods… The role and function of all those organisms are essential for nutrient cycling and growing plants. 

In addition, certain EM mushrooms won’t grow without their microflora. People usually try to grow truffles, chanterelles, maitakes, etc. but fail because the newly introduced mushrooms lack their bacterial associates. Consequently, if you want to grow truffles with those hazels, inoculated roots are only half of the story…

Okay, up until now, in your food forest, you should have decomposing fungi on the surface and a slowly expanding mycorrhizal network underground. Now let’s see how to bring other organisms into the mix. Fungi are at their most animated when bacteria join the food forest party, but overall, we can say that the more diverse the food web, the more diverse the fungal diet, and thus the healthier the soil.

You don’t have to go far or think too much about where you’re going to find this massive diversity of microorganisms that your plants and fungi need. Instead, you’re simply going to use the healthy forest soil you found in Step 2 and make yourself a compost tea out of it. Think of compost tea as liquid fertilizer and an inoculant.

By brewing and spreading compost tea across your site and around your planted trees, you’ll be inoculating the ground with the indigenous microbes and helping fungi and plants grow. This is a simple yet brilliant means to distribute diversity further and help nurture your food forest.

Making compost tea requires a compost brewer. In short, if you want to make an aerated compost tea, you’ll need some bucket, an air pump, a mesh bag for containing the forest soil, and a food source for your microbes (humic acid, seaweed, fish hydrolysate, molasses…). You fill the bucket with water, place the mesh bag inside, turn on the pump, and add the food source. This then starts the process of aeration and multiplication of the micro-organisms.

Once you’re done, wait for 24h, and you’ll have compost tea ready to be applied. To learn more about how to make compost tea, I recommend that you watch this video.

Also, don’t forget that you can grow your fungal compost from this forest soil. This way, you be ensured of a perfect inoculum of indigenous organisms and an almost endless supply of composted soil for the compost tea.

By putting the forest soil into a compost pile and giving the microbes the right type of foods (10% nitrogen material, 30% green material, 60% brown material) you’ll be multiplying the resident forest microflora and fauna in both volume and number. Plus, you don’t have to go to the forest every time you need to brew a compost tea…

All right, now for the grand finale and making sure the fungi are here to stay for a long time…

Want to improve your soil and protect your food forest against disease using native fungi?

Great! Grab a copy of my free “Forest Fungi Protocol” to transplant and grow native fungi on your land. (Click here to download)

Step 6. Keep adding woody debris in the form of mulch, logs, and hugelbeds to feed the fungi and ensure good growing conditions.

Forest Fungi
Building some hugelbeds…My recommendation is just keeping on bringing woody materal and pile it up within the tree row.

Now you’ve come full circle. In Step 1, you started with creating a fungal-friendly environment with cover crops, and we’ll now close the loop in this step. The primary goal with early cover cropping was to get more organic matter in place (food and nutrients for fungi) and to prep the soil for trees and their mycorrhizal partners.

The secondary goal was to create a microclimate of shade and increased moisture for the decomposing fungi that live on the surface and other fruiting mycorrhizal mushrooms. Perennial grasses, with their long vertical shoots, provide shade right above the ground, and the stems act as conduits for collecting condensation, sending water droplets to the soil level where mushrooms like to form.

Now that we’ve introduced the decomposing and mycorrhizal fungi and the rest of the resident forest micro-organisms, it’s time to keep feeding them and promoting the environment they need to flourish. You can keep cutting your cover crops and leaving them to decompose in situ, but that’s not enough for fungi. For them to grow, you should keep adding woody debris in the form of wood chips, logs, and hugelbeds.

Our goal is to create fungal duff, that litter layer where mineralization and humification take place. In essence, you want to emulate the forest floor conditions with natural twigs, logs, and leaf fall all around. This is what fungi need in terms of both food and those favorable conditions of shade and moisture.

Now, whether you use whole or fragmented wood will affect the rate at which nutrients return to the soil. For example, fungal mycelium quickly consumes wood chips, whereas logs decompose much more slowly. But you want both, and in-between, variably sized fragments will let mycelium quickly grab and invade the wood and act as mulch, and wood fragments with greater surface areas are more likely to have contact with spores or mycelium and also can be buried underground.

First, the mulch layer: the ideal mulch, according to Michael Phillips, is the ramial chipped wood, i.e., twigs of wood that are less than 7cm in diameter coming from deciduous trees and woody shrubs. This is going to be the main course for feeding mycorrhizal and saprophytic fungi and a great means of creating the increased shade and moisture conditions they need.

You can put down anywhere from 2-8in (5-20cm) deep of these woodchips and create “shade” for fungi and, of course, suppress unwanted competing plant species. Suffice ito say, young trees will love you for helping them to reduce the competition from weeds. Nonetheless, be careful not to go overboard and pile mulch too deeply, as this suffocates aerobic fungi, the fungi we’re trying to grow.

Now with your log layer on the surface, it’s hard to go overboard. Keep bringing logs and bigger branches from the nearby forest, or use the leftovers from maintaining your food forest and getting the firewood. Just be careful not to obstruct your access within the food forest.

Leave them sticking out everywhere, put them in the tree row, or use them to make contour beds that catch the organic matter runoff. In so doing, you’re creating different microclimates and random places for the wildlife to stick around and help you out with pest control. If that wasn’t enough, you might get some fruiting mushrooms…

Also, burying logs or woody debris and thus creating hugelbeds is a great way to promote fungi growth and soil creation. This creates substantial pockets of organic matter where fungi will prosper for years.

The wood in the soil is like a sponge and acts as water storage. This is incredibly important in drier periods, but fungi and other microbes need moisture for decomposition and their metabolism. So conditions for all sorts of fungi are ideal, and, over the ensuing years, fungi will digest the wood and provide a constant source of water, nutrients, and warmth to plant roots.

With that, you’ve provided the fungi with their food and favorable conditions so they can flourish and ultimately help you have that low-maintenance abundant food forest you always dreamt of.

Want to improve your soil and protect your food forest against disease using native fungi?

Great! Grab a copy of my free “Forest Fungi Protocol” to transplant and grow native fungi on your land. (Click here to download)

Take Action! (Get your free Forest Fungi Protocol)

Using fungi as a tool for ecological restoration is a relatively new concept borrowed from the age-old methods of nature. Today, we know that the strength and health of any ecosystem is a direct measure of its diverse fungal populations and their interplay with plants, insects, bacteria, and other organisms.

With this guide, I wanted to create a protocol that mimics or replicates what forested land would do after some sort of catastrophe, i.e., how it would heal itself, but, of course, all of this is applied to a food forest out in the open sun. So, in summary:

1. We started the whole process by having the right conditions in mind. Fungi need shade, moisture, and food, and we’ve started to create these beneficial conditions for both the fungi and the trees with some earthworks and cover cropping.

2. We found local strains of fungi and other microorganisms in the nearby forest that you can cultivate and use to inoculate your food forest soil. You don’t have to reinvent anything, do what nature does and use what nature would in your local ecosystem restoration.

3. First, we introduced the saprophytic fungi to your land; these are easiest to recognize and transplant (think fallen logs in the forest). Introducing these pioneering fungi will begin soil creation and trigger a cascade of activity by other organisms.

4. Following this, we introduced the mycorrhizal fungi to the system, whether by using wild spawns, spores, mushrooms, or cultivated root fragments. Once in the ground, these fungi will improve the soil and help your plants grow and distribute the nutrients and water where they’re needed the most.

5. Next, we made a compost tea brew to bring other symbiotic organisms to help fungi and plants grow. Fungi will grow better if you bring the rest of the forest soil microbes, especially bacteria. The most effective way to do this is to brew some compost tea and spread it everywhere.

6. Finally, we continue to promote the fungal environment with woody debris. With everything in place and your food forest growing, you need to keep adding woody debris in the form of wood chips, logs, hugelbeds if you want to keep the fungal biomass growing.

There you have it. That’s how you partner with fungi to help your food forest grow!

Let me know your thoughts on the protocol in the comments section below.

Want to improve your soil and protect your food forest against disease using native fungi?

Great! Grab a copy of my free “Forest Fungi Protocol” to transplant and grow native fungi on your land. (Click here to download)

Everything You Need to Know About Growing Trees From Seeds

by papprentice 28 Comments


Want to grow your favorite tree from a seed? 

If so, you need to know what are the ideal conditions for the seed to germinate. Download this free cheat sheet and I’ll show you exactly what to do (Click here).


Growing trees from seeds is the key plant propagation method from a permaculture perspective. Here’s why…

When I grow old, I want to spend my days walking through acre upon acre of a fully-established, mature food forest, picking fruit from trees I planted 40 years ago, watching branches slowly swaying in the gentle breeze, and listening to birdsong.

For my dream to become a reality, I will need huge amounts of trees – and not just any generic cultivar, which will last me only 20 years or so. I will need trees with the genetics that will allow them to thrive on my site without me begging and pleading them to flourish.

I have no interest in unproductive trees, susceptible to diseases, or requiring special types of fertilizer. I am interested in trees that will shout, ‘hell yeah! I like your shallow, alkaline soil and these pests and diseases. Is that all you got?’

In a nutshell, I want to figure out what works effortlessly on my site and then run with it. This is the basis of restoration agriculture and the essence of the permaculture principle of working with nature instead of fighting against it.

However, to start, I will need to perform my test runs and find the strongest trees suited for my soil, climate, pests, and diseases. To achieve this, I will have to grow many of my own trees from seeds.

This romantic ideal of growing trees of my own making is a simple concept in itself but requires some basic understanding of seed biology and the environmental conditions that tiny seeds need to become huge majestic trees…

So, let’s take a closer look…

The wonderful world of seeds

Oak sapling; Quercus robur
Oak sapling; Quercus robur – Photo by David Chapman

Growing trees from seeds is both fun and interesting. Seeds are cheap, and you can get as many free trees as you want or can handle.

This is great if you’re concerned about the economics of obtaining significant numbers of trees for your site, then growing trees from seeds will save you plenty of money, but it’s not just that…

Growing trees from seeds is particularly important because you have the advantage of selecting the strongest seedlings, and there is always that chance of creating something new.

But first, let’s look at the practicalities…

Because only species ‘come true’ from seed, a plant grown from seeds gathered from your favorite apple cultivar is unlikely to have exactly the same characteristics as its parent.

This is because seed-grown plants are almost always genetically different from their parents, but why is this the case?

Well, most fruit-bearing trees require cross-pollination to produce a crop. This means the seeds in your favorite apple cultivar will be a genetic combination of the cultivar and whichever pollen donor fertilized the flower.

So basically, most apple trees grown from those seeds won’t be true to the parent’s characteristics unless you are prepared to grow thousands of seedlings and find the offspring with most of the mother tree’s genetics – this now becomes a number game, but that’s how it’s done.

If you want a predictable result from your cultivated apple trees, with the fruit being a specific size and with known average production rates, the only way to ensure this is by making a clone of that tree – this is achieved by grafting.

So what should you grow from seeds?

The short answer is everything, but…

There are certain plants that, when grown from seed, will have fruits or nuts as good, or better, than the mother tree, meaning you don’t need to grow as many of them to achieve the desired result.

Some examples include species of walnuts such as heartnut, and even apples such as the ‘Antanovka’ apple (yes, you heard that right!) are one of the varieties that will grow true from seed.

Moreover, something I discovered when researching the subject of growing trees from seeds is that if a tree is a self-pollinator, there is a good chance that you will probably get true-to-type seeds, provided there are no other pollinators around in your orchard…so that’s good to know!

All of your N-fixing trees can be easily grown from seed – black locust, honey locust, seaberry, alder, the list goes on….and you’ll probably need a lot of those.

And the list goes go on …

Want to grow your favorite tree from a seed? 

If so, you need to know what are the ideal conditions for the seed to germinate. Download this free cheat sheet and I’ll show you exactly what to do (Click here).

Ok, so now you know that it’s definitely worth growing trees from seeds, and you even have a list of trees to start out with. Now let’s see how you can grow all the trees you can handle.

How to get all the seeds you need

My recent order of N – fixing tree seeds.

The first thing you could do to get the seeds is to gather them from their natural environment…

This is the easiest way. For example, in my area, I found a few naturalized varieties from which I took seeds.

Although their fruit is not that tasty, these will be a good rootstock as they already display the characteristics I need, i.e., the ability to survive in my climate, grow well in my soil, and are pest and disease resistant…

When you’re taking seeds, choose a plant that displays the characteristics you’re looking for. It is important to check for health and vigor. Taking seeds from weak plants results in weak offspring.

Collect your seeds after they’ve matured, generally in autumn, and then clean and dry them. Nuts and pods are easy to clean, but many seeds in fleshy fruit need little more cleaning. In case you’re wondering ‘how to’ here is a great video to explain it.

Now you can use newspaper and kitchen towels to dry your seeds…

Voila! You have your seeds …

Alternatively, you can just buy them…

But where from?

Luckily, seeds are easy to ship and can be delivered from anywhere in the world. Of course, certain restrictions and conditions have to be met when importing seeds, so you might want to check first.

Buying seeds can be tricky because you’ll need a reputable source. In my example, I ordered my seeds from Balkep, a nearby permaculture project in a similar climate. If the opportunity is available, you can do the same and find someone in your area/region/state from which to order.

I also ordered my Antonovka apple seeds on eBay and received them surprisingly quickly. In a virtual world where everybody can leave feedback on a product, you can easily know who can be trusted on these sites.

If you’re after a specific seed and you can’t find it online, look at The Seed Search Book, this is an excellent resource that offers a list of places where you can find any kind of seed imaginable.

Once you got your seeds, store them in sealed containers in a cool and dry area until you’re ready to sow them. Just remember that seed potency is reduced by 10-20% annually, so you’ll want to use them as soon as possible.

Ready to start growing trees from seeds? Here are some of your options

Generally speaking, there are two ways of growing trees from seeds: the natural way, which often includes sowing the seeds outside in autumn, or through “assisted” germination, which is initially done indoors.

The first thing you need to know is that seeds from many species of trees and shrubs are dormant and require a period of stratification before they germinate.

In short, stratification requires cold, moist conditions, although in some cases, sometimes, it’s preceded by a period of warm, moist ones (more about that later).

However, for now, all you need to understand is that the seeds are expecting to go through a winter and germinate in the spring. Without these cold conditions, some seeds will not germinate at all.

Sowing outside in the ground would obviously give these seeds the cold they require, but natural cold stratification usually results in the loss of many seeds due to rodents, unreliable cold winter conditions, and so on.

This is why plants that rely on seeds for reproduction produce so many of them. It’s their insurance policy…

On the other hand, growing indoors gives you the opportunity to control the environmental conditions and help to germinate many more seeds.

Let’s go through both options, and you can choose the most appropriate one…

Want to grow your favorite tree from a seed? 

If so, you need to know what are the ideal conditions for the seed to germinate. Download this free cheat sheet and I’ll show you exactly what to do (Click here).

OPTION#1 The natural way of growing trees from seeds

Seeds have been sprouting into trees for an extremely long time without any help from humans. Just look at your local forest, and it can help show you the way.

The “natural way” to germinate tree seeds is to allow nature to take its course. When sown in autumn without any pre-treatment, most seeds will begin to germinate the following spring. It can’t get easier than that…

With autumn planting, seeds are planted outside, sometimes directly in the ground, but more often in containers, before the temperatures fall below 8° C/45° F.

Here are some of the best practices…

  • Buckets/Pots/Boxes
growing trees from seeds
Mark Shepard’s 5-Gallon Bucket Technique

This is a very simple process. You sow your seeds in plastic nursery containers or buckets like Mark Shepard and mix them in some potting soil (see step 3 below). Check out Mark’s example to see how he does it. That’s pretty straightforward…

Just place this container outside in a sheltered area out of the wind, but somewhere it will receive direct sunlight. 

You don’t have to worry about the snow, the cold, or the freezing conditions. This is exactly what your seeds need for their outer coating to soften and germinate in spring.

Cover the container with wire netting to protect the seedling from birds and animals. Check regularly and water if necessary.

When your seedlings are large enough to handle, you can transplant them individually into cells, trays, or small pots and take them into a greenhouse where you can protect them. Later, plant them on your site as described in step 6.

This method is recommended for large seeds, for example, chestnuts (Castanea spp.), oaks (Quercus spp.), and walnuts (Juglans spp.).

However, such seeds don’t store very well and become less viable as they dry out. Sow them directly into deep containers where you can grow them for most of the season.

  • Seedbeds/Nursery beds

Planting seeds in seedbeds.

You can sow some seeds, particularly those native to your area, outside in raised seedbeds. First, you’ll need a sheltered site and, if needed, erect a windbreak or shading.

It is helpful to build a wooden frame and a raised bed to raise the soil level by 8 inches/20cm to improve drainage. 

Make sure your seedbed is free of weeds. Seeds require fine tilth and moisture-retentive surface soil that consists of small, even particles. This fine tilth ensures good contact between seeds and soil so that moisture can be absorbed for germination.

At this stage, you can also incorporate well-rotted leaf mould, which helps because it contains mycorrhizal, i.e., soil-born fungi that aid seedling growth and improves soil structure.

Finally, always ensure some protection from animals, and remember not to allow germinating seeds to dry out – cover with fleece or lose leaves to reduce the chance of heaving.

Leave the seedling to grow for a while in the seedbed and transplant it when ready on the site, as described in step 6.

For more info about this method and others, check the AHS Plant Propagation book, which details all aspects of plant propagation.

  • Direct Seeding On the site – Sepp Holzer style
growing trees from seeds
Sepp Holzer’s direct-seeded apple tree.

This method of growing trees from seeds involves seeding out considerable numbers of seeds in the area you want your trees to grow. Here is how Sepp Holzer describes the method in his book …

His first step is to prepare the soil with soil-improving plants. For this purpose, he uses green manure plants. Once he has prepared the soil, he loosens it for sowing by allowing pigs to graze and dig the green manure plants, and this prepares the area for fruit trees.

His next stage in the process involves sowing the plants. This is performed by spreading and leaving pomace to ferment for about four to five weeks (pomace is the pulp left over from pressing fruit for juice or cider). During fermentation, germination inhibitors are broken down, and trees begin to germinate.

As the seeds sprout, many will die off, with only those best suited for the site surviving. Because trees grow in their intended location from the outset, they can naturally adapt to the soil and climatic conditions. Later, Sepp selects only the best ones for grafting and transplants those growing too close to each other.

This is the simplest and the most economical method for starting out, and you end up with the strongest trees adjusted to your local conditions. Can’t get any more permaculture than this …

There, this way of growing trees from seeds was pretty easy, huh? If you don’t need the advanced stuff, you can stop reading here. However, if you want to know how to grow even more seedlings, read on….

Want to grow your favorite tree from a seed? 

If so, you need to know what are the ideal conditions for the seed to germinate. Download this free cheat sheet and I’ll show you exactly what to do (Click here).

OPTION #2. A more controlled way of growing trees from seeds: mimic nature and assist the seeds to grow

Although natural germination is a great way to start most tree seeds, you can often achieve better and more consistent results through “assisted” germination.

This means using various techniques to mimic nature’s role in causing tree seeds to germinate.

In this way, you can control when your seeds germinate by initiating the pre-treatment and stratification at precisely the right time.

However, first, you’ll need to know what kind of treatment your seeds require …

Step 1. Work out what treatment the seed needs

Different plants have different needs, some seeds like warmth, some require cold, and some have to be germinated with light.

You have to figure out which ones like what … Luckily, numerous online resources help you with that. The Plants for the Future database has an outline for the propagation of temperate climate plants.

PFF
Plants for the future database.

Another great resource is Backyard Gardener, which gives handy advice on what seeds need to germinate.

Note what kind of treatment your seeds would need and for how long they need to be treated. If, for example, you’re planning on planting seeds outside in the spring, then timing is essential.

Just count backward on your calendar from the day you intend to plant outside. If the seeds need three months of stratification, count backward 90 days from the day you would like to plant and start treating seeds on that day.

Step 2. Treat the seeds to stimulate the germination process

Many seeds require one or more treatment steps to stimulate the germination process. These steps include 1) Scarification, 2) Cold Stratification, and 3) Warm Stratification.

Scarification

scarify

Some tree seeds (such as black locust and others in the Fabaceaea family) have hard seed coats that prevent germination until the coat is broken down to admit moisture to the seed.

Nature softens the coats of these hard seeds by subjecting them to warm, moist conditions in spring when bacterial activity is at its height. This is, however, a prolonged process and can take up to two years before the outer coating is softened up enough for the seeds to germinate.

You want to accelerate that process, and to do this, you can use sandpaper or soak the seeds in hot, but not boiling, water for up to 48 hours.

For this, run hot water from the tap, fill a cup, drop your seeds in, and simply let them soak while it cools.

Soak for 24 hours first; after that, they should be swollen with absorbed water. Repeat the process if needed for another 24 hours – here is a video explaining the process.

Cold Moist Stratification

growing trees from seeds
Chilling the seeds in the fridge.

With cold, moist stratification, you’re emulating winter conditions. Here is what I mean, when seeds fall to the ground in autumn, they are covered with leaves, snow falls over them, and they’re kept moist and cold until the spring – this is exactly what you want to replicate with cold moist stratification.

By the way, this is the most common technique you’ll be using for your seeds and involves chilling the seeds in a refrigerator at 34-41° F 1-5°C.

To chill a small number of seeds, soak them in water for 48 hours and allow them to drain. Next, place your seeds on a paper towel, moisten it with water, and fold. Put the moist paper towel in a labeled and sealed plastic bag and refrigerate for 4-20 weeks before sowing. This generally takes an average of 12 weeks but depends on the species.

For larger numbers, store the seed in a plastic bag filled with peat or a mixture of equal parts peat and sand or vermiculite. This should be moist but not wet. You should periodically turn the bag to circulate air and avoid a build-up of heat or CO2 released by seeds.

As spring approaches, start checking for germination inside the bags in the fridge. If your seeds start to germinate prematurely, sow them at once.

Warm Moist Stratification

The seeds of some trees, for example, hawthorn, lime, and mountain ash, require a period of warm stratification prior to cold. They are ‘doubly dormant’ and germinate naturally after 18 months, or in the second spring, after ripening, with only a few seeds germinating in the first spring. 

The warm stratification stage is designed to replicate the seed’s summer dormancy when it is often embedded in warm damp soil or mud.

For warm stratification, follow the same steps outlined for cold stratification, but place the plastic bag in a warm location at, or slightly above, room temperature of 72 to 86°F, 20-25°C.

Keep them warm for up to 12 weeks and then cold-stratify in the refrigerator. Occasionally check the seeds for signs of early germination. If the seeds begin to germinate, then plant as normal.

Step 3. Prepare your seed potting mix from these ingredients

soil

While you’re treating the seeds it’s time to prepare your potting mix. Any propagation medium must be moisture retentive but also porous to keep it aerated. It must be sufficiently free draining so it doesn’t become waterlogged but not so much that the medium dries out.

Your seed potting mix should also have a fine texture to ensure good contact with small seeds. Nonetheless, it generally doesn’t need to contain a large supply of nutrients because the seedlings won’t be left in it for very long. 

For making this kind of a ‘special’ medium, soil mix is usually preferred to garden soil, most frequently equal parts peat moss (or substitute coconut coir) and perlite, with a pinch of compost to give seeds something to chew on.

Want to grow your favorite tree from a seed? 

If so, you need to know what are the ideal conditions for the seed to germinate. Download this free cheat sheet and I’ll show you exactly what to do (Click here).

Step 4. Sow the seeds and make them germinate by providing the right conditions

growing trees from seeds
My black locust seeds germinating in a closed plastic case

You are now ready to sow your pre-treated seeds into individual containers or seed trays.

A rough ‘growing trees from seeds’ rule of thumb from Martin Crawford’s book Creating a Forest Garden is that seeds under about 6mm (0.25′′) across are fine to sow in a seed tray, but any larger ones should be sown in a deeper container. This is because the fast-growing taproots on larger seeds can easily get broken when transplanting.

Be careful that the seeds are planted at the recommended soil depth. Most seeds should be planted just below the soil surface, at no more than twice their thickness.

These tiny seeds don’t contain sufficient energy to dig their way through dense soil, and some actually require light to germinate. That means the seeds need to be on top of the soil. If you bury them, they’ll sit there forever.

Give the seeds warmth, moisture, and light…

Generally, seeds require water, warmth, air, light, and sometimes nutrients to grow. Therefore, after planting your seeds, gently water them and keep them moist but not wet.

Maintaining high moisture and relative humidity is critical to germinating seeds. You can increase the humidity by enclosing the seed tray in a closed case, ensuring the vents remain closed until the seeds have germinated.

Warmth speeds germination, so try to give your seeds bottom heat of about 21°C (70°F) if you can, although 18°C is a good average for root growth.

You can achieve this with heating mats. On this occasion, I ordered one from eBay, but alternatively, you could work on a heating bench where the warmth is provided by flexible heating cables embedded in a layer of sand.

Keep the trays in a warm but dimly lit location. Germination can be as quick as a few days or as slow as several months, depending on the species and the environmental conditions.   

Once the seeds germinate, move the seedlings to a brighter location. If you have the setup, place them under the grow lights, where they should be cool and at room temperature. Set the timers to give 12 hours of light and twelve hours of darkness.

Step 5. Transplant and harden off the young plants

Rootrainers Racking Station/Greenhouse
Rootrainers Racking Station/Greenhouse

In the early stages of your seedlings, most of the nutrition will be provided by the seeds themselves, at least for the first month or so of growth. You can even add ½” of compost on top after the young plants get up to 3-4 inches to offer extra nutrition while in that growing stage.

However, after a month, you might consider repotting or planting out to avoid a pot-bound root system. You’ll need larger, deeper containers and fresh soil mix…

Your potting soil mix should release nutrients slowly because you’ll probably need to grow your seedlings for at least a whole season before they become sturdy enough to plant out.

To do this, use the seed mix you made before and add a slow-release fertilizer with trace elements to provide a gradual supply over a whole season. Mix mycorrhizal spores into your seed soil mix and feed your seedlings from time to time with a homemade liquid fertilizer made from nettles and comfrey soaked in water for four to five days.

Martin Crawford recommends transplanting tree and shrub seedlings into deep-cell containers called ‘Rootrainers’ because these create an excellent branched root system and prevent any circling roots. I haven’t tried this yet, but they’re in the post!

Now you should gradually expose your plants to outside conditions so they can harden off a little before permanently putting them outside to brave the elements.

Set the small plants outside in dappled sunlight, sheltered from the wind for one to two hours on the first day, and then increase the outdoor time by an hour each day. Acclimate plants to sunlight by gradually moving them into a sunnier location after a few days.

Step 6. Plant on your site in the desired location and select the most adapted ones

growing trees from seeds
Mark Shepard’s apple trees.

When to plant on your site?

Sometimes seeds germinating in the spring establish themselves well and are ready to plant in the autumn of the same year. However, this is subject to species hardiness and, of course, the weather conditions in a given year.

A height of 40-50cm is just about OK for planting out, but at less than this, it would be a good idea to grow the plant for another year. Very small trees are easily swamped by weeds or damaged by pests unless you provide some form of protection.

Whether you decide to plant in the first year or second, in this step, you’re ready to plant the young trees in the desired locations.

You can do this by planting way too many, way too close – as per Mark Shepard’s STUN method recommendation – let them grow and then remove the losers.

To remove the undesirable ones, you’ll need to work out how you intend to evaluate your seedlings as early as possible. This means having a list of desirable features you wish to aim for (resistant/immune to major local disease, early fruiting, tasty fruit …)

The losers will end up as firewood, wood chips, and shitake mushrooms…

Want to grow your favorite tree from a seed? 

If so, you need to know what are the ideal conditions for the seed to germinate. Download this free cheat sheet and I’ll show you exactly what to do (Click here).

Need help starting out? Here’s a free checklist to help you implement this article.

Whew. Congratulations, you made it. You now understand the art of growing trees from seeds – the permaculture way.

You have two options when growing trees from seed: The natural way, which often includes sowing the seeds in the autumn, or through “assisted” germination, which is initially done indoors.

Of course, the easiest way is to sow outdoors in autumn and let nature take its course, but if you want to be serious about growing your trees, you’ll need to be familiar with both ways.

Once you plant your seedlings on your site, you start the development of fruiting plants ideally suited to your local area. This is a lifetime of work, but with great personal rewards.

If you want a fully mapped-out cheat sheet of how I grow my favorite trees from seeds at our farm, check out the detailed guide I put together.

It is completely FREE, just click the link below to unlock it and get started.

Want to grow your favorite tree from a seed? 

If so, you need to know what are the ideal conditions for the seed to germinate. Download this free cheat sheet and I’ll show you exactly what to do (Click here).

How to Create a Food Forest – Step-by-Step Guide

by Pathik Sopariwala Leave a Comment

 

Grow 3-5X More Food with Less Maintenance Compared to Conventional Gardening
(Click Here to Get My Free Food Forest Starter Pack)

We are going to cover a lot of ground in this post, so I put together a free package of resources that will help you implement what you learn in this post. Be sure to grab it before you leave!

Your Free Resources: Download your Food Forest Starter Pack, which includes my step-by-step Implementation Checklist, a Site Survey checklist, 5 plug-and-play Guild examples you can copy and recreate in your food forest, and the exact Layout Planning Guide I used when establishing my food forest. (click here to download).

If you are wondering how to start a food forest, you are in the correct place.

In this post, I’ll outline the exact process to follow to go from an empty field to a fully-functioning ecosystem inspired by forests. You’ll learn how to choose the right plants for your food forest, design your layout, make soil improvements before planting, and much more.

What is a food forest? (aka forest garden)

Caption: Permaculture Food Forest vs. Conventional Almond Orchard

In layman’s terms, a food forest is a type of garden where you grow many different fruits, nuts, herbs, and even vegetables. It is designed to mimic a natural forest and has many different layers, from trees to shrubs, ground cover plants, vines, and more.

These plants all work together, help each other grow, and create a balanced ecosystem that provides an abundance of food and resources for you and an ideal habitat for your wildlife helpers.

Before we dive into the nitty-gritty of HOW to create a food forest, let’s first understand the big picture WHY: Why would you want to plant a food forest instead of a normal garden? In particular, why is it more resilient than other farming methods?

How come wild cherries from the nearby forest do so well while the cherry tree you planted in your orchard five years ago dies miserably?

One of my earliest memories of visiting my grandparents’ farm was playing on the dry stone wall, tossing stones around, and generally fooling around.

Then, looking down, I came across a tiny seedling sticking out the side of the wall, growing in nothing, with barely any soil between the stones.

Out of childish curiosity, more than anything, I decided to set it free from the heavy stones and leave it to grow on its own. That was 20 years ago…

IMG_2303

Today, that seedling is this strapping young fellow on the image left – a European Ash tree.

He has survived the droughts, heavy snows, pouring rains, and sub-zero temperatures all by himself, without anyone taking care of him.

As I sit under his shadow today and plan my food forest I’m curious to find out how trees flourish without human intervention.

How come wild apples, plums, and cherries from the nearby forest do so well while the cherry tree I planted in my orchard five years ago has died miserably? To understand this I needed to return to the place where the seed of this Mountain Ash tree came from and revisit my teacher – the forest itself.

Forests Are Our Teachers

Just by my house, some 50m away, is an entrance to a forest. I visit there often; it makes me feel relaxed. I enjoy the serene sounds of nature, the falling leaves, birds, and other critters. Most importantly, I go there to observe and learn.

food forest inspiration
Entrance to my nearby forest. My source of inspiration and many seeds & cuttings.

You see, given enough time, most ecosystems end up like a forest. This is the endpoint of ecological succession, where the ecosystem becomes stable or self-perpetuating as a climax community. Without any significant disturbances, the forest will endure indefinitely.

This is exactly what you want your own food forest to be like. To achieve a low-maintenance abundance of fruit, nuts, berries, and herbs you’ll want to create a forest-like system where fertility comes from various sources, where you’re greatly aided by fungi, where wildlife is your primary pest control, where soil holds water like a sponge, and where you have a high diversity of plants.

You want a carefully designed and maintained ecosystem of useful plants that emulate conditions found in the forest.

However, the problem is often that you’ll find yourself starting with a bare field, a blank canvas, and the overall plan can feel a little overwhelming. Sometimes even reading books such as Edible Forest Gardens can make things harder rather than easier.

While creating my own food forest, I broke down the plan into smaller, manageable steps. I want to make as few mistakes as possible, and honestly, I don’t have time to make them. 

So today, I’ll let you in on my process and share additional resources that will help you go from that bare field to a fully-functioning ecosystem inspired by forests.

Want to create a food forest and grow 3-5X more food with less maintenance compared to conventional gardening?

 

Good! Grab a copy of my Food Forest Starter Pack. It will walk you through the exact steps you need to take to implement this 5000-word blog post you’re reading (click here to download).

 

Ok, let’s dive in!

STEP 1. Set a Goal: What Do You Want From Your Food Forest?

First, you have to be clear about the ultimate goals of your project.

Why is this important?

You see, with a clear goal, everything becomes more manageable. You know where best to place your efforts and, most importantly, what the priorities are, what to focus on, and what to postpone for the time being.

You have to think are you doing this because of: 1. being more self-reliant, 2. making an income, 3. producing healthy food, 4. educating others, 5. having a fun project for all the family

As you can see, each of these will require different considerations for your precious time and money. For example, if your goal is to create an income from your food forest, you’ll want to focus on researching which tree crops sell well locally and then think about how to grow them in the most efficient manner.

On the other hand, if you want to be more self-reliant, you’ll want to think about creating a diverse food forest with as many fruits, nuts, and herbs as possible to fulfill your needs and stop being dependent on the grocery store.

Don’t overdo the thinking at the outset; just be clear about what you want from the beginning.

STEP 2.  Explore, Sit Quietly and Observe, Analyse

2a. Explore your local forest so you’ll have an idea of what will grow best in your area

Start with taking casual walks in your local forest. When designing a food forest, you want to learn from the local ecosystem and try to emulate it. This is why such observations are important. This is how you discover what plants will grow best in our area.

You’ll want to look around and identify the plants that are thriving. As Mark Shepard would say: identify the perennial plants, observe how they grow in relation to one another, and take note of the species. Later, you can use that list to find commercially productive variants of the wild plants you can grow in your food forest.

This step is crucial because if you want to create an edible landscape requiring less work and maintenance, you need to grow species well adapted to your area, i.e., species that are volunteering to grow around your site.

If you have nature as your ally and use the natural tendencies of the native vegetation, then you’ll be doing considerably less hard work. This is one of the fundamental permaculture principles of working with nature rather than against it.

For example, when I walked in my forest I saw elderberries, hazels, hawthorns, lindens, cherries, apples, junipers, etc. So, guess what I’ll be growing in my food forest?

I’d also take seeds from those naturalized species and use them as rootstock for my plants. But that’s a lesson in itself, so be sure to read my post on growing trees from seeds.

2b. Sit quietly and observe your site

Next, sit at the future site of your food forest. Whether it’s 5 or 50 minutes, just sit there quietly. Brew yourself some coffee or tea, and just be mindful of what is happening around you. Immerse yourself and study the wildlife, feel the breeze, and listen to the sounds of the natural world around you. You can learn a great deal simply by sitting quietly.

One of my best ideas, which saved me a lot of time, came when I just sat down and observed my site. For years, I tried to get a wild hedge under control, and year after year, I cut it, but it kept re-sprouting. This mindless management involved a great deal of work, as I always found myself battling against the hedge’s natural inclinations.

It wasn’t until one day, when I was sitting quietly looking down at the hedge, that I came up with an easy solution to the problem. I asked myself a simple question: How can I let nature do the work for me? As I observed the hedge more thoughtfully, I realized that some of the species growing there were useful, while with others, I had even planned to grow them there anyway.

If I just gave a head start to the species I want there, they would eventually overgrow the ‘non-useful’ ones, and I wouldn’t need to cut down everything each year mindlessly. Sometimes we are just too much in working mode to come up with solutions that are a whole lot easier. Having the time to observe, think and ask the right questions helps us save money, time, and unnecessary labor.

These moments of mindfulness help put things into perspective and reveal a wealth of important information about the site.

2c. Do a site survey and make a basic map

It’s time to put on your permaculturist explorers’ hat and take notes about your site. You’ll want to ‘read the landscape’ and note down everything you can decipher about your water situation, climate, soil, slope, aspect, wildlife…

The landscape you see around you and its resulting ecosystems are formed from the interaction of climate, landforms, soils, and living things. Therefore, to better understand your site, you should analyze these elements, or parts of them, one by one…

At this point, you want to be actively involved and walk the site, conduct surveys, and look at different natural processes. You can use modern technology (smartphones and desktop computers) to help you understand the weather patterns, terrain shape, and water movement across the land.

You also want to get your hands dirty and investigate soil texture, structure, and biological activity. You can also perform some lab tests on your soil and experiment with some basic tests yourself. 

SITE SURVEY CHECKLIST:

There are many things you’ll want to explore during a site survey. Click here to download my free site survey checklist and use it as your reference during this phase of the design.

 

Based on your collected information, make a rudimentary hand-drawn map or use Google Earth as a base layer and annotate the printout with your notes. You can even make multiple thematic maps for each landscape component you’ve analyzed.

From this site assessment map, it should be visible where the site potentials lay and what you’ll need to design for.

Site assessment map: microclimate example

STEP 3. Food Forest Design – Create a Layout and Choose the Plants

Food Forest Design
Illustration from Gaia’s Garden by Toby Hemenway. Excellent reference when designing a food forest.

3a. Choose a general layout – orchard, woodland, savannah

Four basic layouts determine the final look of the food forest: In their book Edible Forest Gardens, Dave Jacke and Eric Toensmeier suggest more options, but I’ll round it down to the basics:

1. Savanna type systems – alley cropping and silvopastoral system – examples: Mark Shepard/Grant Schultz

Food Forest Mark Shepard
Mark Shepar’s New Forest Farm

2. Orchards – woodlands with regularly spaced trees – examples: Permaculture Orchard, David Holmgren

Food Forest Melliodora
David Holmgren’s Melliodora

3. Mid – to late succession woodland – this is what we are trying to emulate – examples: Robert Hart, Martin Crawford, Geoff Lawton

Food Forest with swales

4. Closed canopy forests – the end point of succession, these are mature forests – example: “Your local forest.”

Which layout suits you best depends on your goals and your site’s characteristics (climate, terrain, biome, etc.). Different systems require a different design approach, management, and maintenance….

Savanna-type or agroforestry systems are based on a keyline design and are much better suited for commercial fruit, nut, and herb production. Usually implemented on a broadacre scale, this layout with equidistant rows enables efficient machine harvesting.

The woodlands we call orchards are more of a hybrid system that you can use for both commercial production and home use. The layout also has equidistant rows, but permaculture orchards are usually implemented on a relatively smaller scale.

Mid- to late-succession woodlands offer the opportunity for the most varied, interesting, complex, and productive patterns of trees, shrubs, and herbs. Although primarily geared towards home food production, you can implement this layout in your suburban backyard and scale up to a farm scale.

3b. Start by outlaying your infrastructure first

Start your design with the scale of permanence in mind and plan your water, access, and structures first. It’s best to begin with these essentials because they will be the most permanent elements of your food forest.

This includes thinking about the most suitable places for your water tanks, irrigation lines, and other water elements and planning for the locations of access points, different buildings, and fences.

Water planning comes first, as water is the number one priority for any permaculture system. The water systems you develop in this stage will become permanent land features that other infrastructure components will follow.

Immediately after designing the water systems, consider where to put your roads and paths. Their placement will define your movement around your food forest for many years, so think long and hard about their potential locations. Once they’re in, it’s hard to rearrange them.

The fencing pattern will generally follow access, and you can subdivide your food forest into different growing zones. By doing so, you can manage and protect them separately if necessary. Finally, consider where to put different buildings, if any…

Good infrastructure design is essential to minimize maintenance, maximize productivity, and provide a habitat for beneficial animals.

3c. Make a list master list of plants you wish to grow

Make a master list of plants – your desired species and others necessary to fulfill a specific purpose in your food forest. Think about ecological functions needed throughout the garden, such as food production, gathering and retaining specific nutrients, beneficial insect nectar plants, and ground cover for weed control.

Create a spreadsheet with each of these categories, do the research, and list all the plants you want. Now, suppose there is a desired species that won’t work on your site. In that case, you can always find an ecological equivalent, i.e., an ecologically similar species that fills a similar community niche in comparable habitats.

For this, you can use climate-analogous species. Based on the climate classification of your site, you can find almost identical climates across the globe, and then, by researching plants in those areas, find all kinds of interesting species you didn’t know you could grow.

However, growing plant species that aren’t native to your bioregion can work against the natural tendencies of your site. You can make things easier on yourself and focus only on what works. Here’s what I mean…

Based on the inspection of your local forest in step 1, you’ll know what species grow best in your area. These native and naturalized species are part of the already functioning and thriving ecosystem. All you need to do now is imitate that ecosystem on your site but use the more productive variants of these species.

Be sure to include these plants in your master list!

3d. Create guilds from your master list of plants

Image source: https://www.theresiliencyinstitute.net/

This is the very core of forest gardening. You want to create effective polycultures that share the resources and mutually support themselves. But how can you choose the right combination of plants? Here are just a few of the recommendations from Edible Forest Gardens.

You can build your guild based on what you know or guess about plants, their species niche, and how they interact. In this way, you can also create novel plant combinations through your experiments.

You can create a random mixture. A lot of people will select a group of interesting plants and throw them together and see what happens. However, while sporadically it’s ok to spice things up, if the whole garden is like this, it will probably result in failure.

You can also try to emulate a habitat and use a model ecosystem as a template for design, incorporating species directly from the model habitat. This model habitat could be your local forest.

This is, of course, the easiest way to win. Here, you’re not inventing anything new. Instead, you’re copying what already works in nature. All you need to do is observe how the native plants grow in relation to one another and imitate that in your food forest.

Not sure where to start? Here are 5 guild examples.Download my free PDF with Apple, Walnut, Peach, Medlar, and Oak guilds that you can copy and recreate in your food forest.

 

3e. Do a patch design – define your planting areas and plant spacing

Design your patches one by one; a patch could be a row, a contour, or a grouping of plants in one area. However you decide to tackle the patch design, the most important aspect is deciding on the planting distance.

If you followed the design process and started your design by choosing the overall layout, you should already have an idea of the distances between the patches. Now let’s look at how to space the plants within the patch.

The easiest way to determine this spacing is by using the ‘crown touching rule’ and placing the individual trees a crown’s diameter apart. For this, you’ll have to find the information on the size of the individual mature trees’ crowns and use that as your guide.

Usually, the biggest mistake people make is overly-dense spacing where tree crowns interlock. This is OK when you’re planting a screen or hedge, but otherwise, this will stress the plants and limit their growth.

In his book, Creating Forest Gardens, Martin Crawford recommends adding 30-50% more distance around each woody plant if you want more sunlight for understory plants. Also, you want to plant wider than the ‘crown touching’ distance when soil conditions are limiting to reduce competition between plants for limited resources.

STEP 4. Prepare the Future Food Forest Site

Food forest beginnings
Improving the soil on my site one patch at a time. Hugel swale seeded with mixture of red clover/perennial rye cover crop.

4a. Adapt your site if necessary

If you’re not starting from scratch with a bare field, the chances are there is something already growing there, and you’ll need to adapt your site accordingly. This means clearing unwanted vegetation and leaving whatever you find useful. You can use any available biomass for mulch, compost, wood chips, firewood, and mushroom inoculation….

For example, I will leave some naturalized plums and use a wood chipper to create mulch from the trees and branches I don’t need, plus I’ll also use the wood for my hugel beds.

4b. Shape the earth to your advantage and optimize water retention

After you have cleared the vegetation, you can start the earthworks to optimize water retention on your site. This involves shaping the earth to promote water infiltration, distribution, and storage.

Effectively, what you want to do first is to slow, spread, and sink the water as it falls from the sky into the soil. The soil is the cheapest place to store water and is the largest storage resource available on most sites. To do this, you can use two famous techniques: keyline plowing/subsoiling and swales on the contour. 

Following this, you want to have a way to capture as much water as reasonably possible and store it for dry periods. You can do this by digging ponds that store the water and diversion drains that collect and distribute that water when necessary across the site.

Whether you use one or both of these strategies depends on your site conditions: climate, terrain, soil, your context…One question on everybody’s mind is whether or not to swale it. For assistance, I would encourage you to look at this cheat sheet by Ben Falk if you’re in two minds about doing swales on your site.

4c. Set up infrastructure and put down irrigation, pathways, and fencing

Following the earthworks, begin with the most difficult, important, or permanent elements of the food forest.

Start by putting down pathways throughout your site. They are important as they define and protect your different growing zones from compaction. You want to minimize compaction in the areas you’ll be planting soon after, and having clearly defined pathways keep you on track (pun intended).

A well-built pathway can also act as hard surface runoff and collect the water you can connect with the other water elements you built in the previous step. Integrate rather than segregate!

Fencing the site is the next important thing. I can’t recommend building a main perimeter fence and enclosing your whole site strongly enough. Importantly, there are security issues and protection from theft or trespassing. Moreover, I hear a lot of people regretting not doing this type of fence first to ensure that their trees get protection from wildlife.

You don’t want those deer, coyotes, kangaroos, sheep, or rabbits nibbling on your seedlings.

Finally, if necessary, put down irrigation and install water tanks – you can’t overdo it when it comes to ensuring enough water during a drought.

4d. Build up your soil and improve the soil structure

It will come as a surprise to many, but improving the soil first rather than planting straight away saves time. This is because waiting for a year and simply conditioning the soil during that time and planting in year two yields better results than planting immediately.

To improve the soil in this transitional period before planting, you can add soil amendments such as compost, compost tea, and fertilizers, or use cover crops to improve the soil fertility so that your plants get a decent head start. However, there is a caveat to this soil building…

Ideally, food forest soils contain a fungal presence ten times higher than bacteria. So you should aim to recreate those conditions.

In the beginning, you’ll probably start from a bare field, and you want to nudge your soil towards fungi domination continually. You can do this by inoculating the soil with fungi or cover cropping with green manure crops – Michael from the Holistic Orchard recommends red or crimson clover in preference as these two nitrogen-fixing legumes have a stronger affinity for mycorrhizal fungi. Finally, you want to spread woody mulch everywhere to feed the fungi in the soil.

For more info about improving the soil in your food forest, read my Definitive Guide to Building Deep Rich Soils by Imitating Nature.

STEP 5. Source the Plants and Start Planting Your Food Forest

food forest plants
Here I’m taking some Juniperus communis cuttings in my local forest. I’m sourcing plants the cheap way.

5a. Start a nursery or buy plants

Now that all the preparation work is complete, you can start planting. You have two options depending on the budget: grow your own trees (and shrubs, of course) or acquire young ones.

If you’re on a tight budget, I suggest growing most of your trees. Actually, regardless of your budget, you shouldn’t stray from learning how to grow your own trees. This is one of the most important skills you can have as a permaculturist, and the chances are that sometimes the type of trees you’ll need won’t even be available to buy.

Growing your trees is like printing your own money. It’s actually quite simple, and you don’t even need that much space. You can read about it in my post on ‘How to set up a Small Permaculture Nursery and Grow 1000s of Trees by yourself’ and start your nursery today.

Another option is to buy young trees from nurseries. However, the trees will be more expensive, already grafted, and probably already one or two years old. If you have the budget and don’t have time to grow your own trees or wait, this is how to get an instant orchard without the hassle of setting up a nursery.

5b. Phase your project and plant in stages

Planting a food forest can take place in stages or all at once. However, being honest, you’re unlikely to do it all in one go. More realistically, you’ll plant your food forest in stages over several years. You’ll know where to plant as long as you know the outline of your rows or patches. After this, it’s only a matter of slowly filling the space with plants.

Establishing stages normally involves planting hedges and/or canopy trees in the first year or two, then later shrubs and a ground cover layer. Here is a recommendation from Martin Crawford’s Creating a Forest Garden book:

Windbreak/hedges and edges>>Canopy layer including N fixers>>Shrub layer including N fixers>>Perennial/ground cover layer>>annuals, biennial, and climbers. 

Depending on your layout, you can add annual veggie production. At least, in the beginning, there will be a lot of light and space available for you to use to grow your beyond-organic vegetables.

5c. Finally, put your plants in the ground

I won’t go into detail here on how you should be planting. For a step-by-step guide, refer to my other post.

In short, make sure you dig a large enough planting hole, spread the roots, sprinkle in mycorrhizal inoculant, or dip the roots in a mycorrhizal root dip if required, and refill the hole with the soil you took out.

In almost every instance, you should use sheet mulch after planting to control the weeds. Unless the soil is very poor, do not add extra materials. Most importantly, don’t forget to mulch with the right type of material. Since you’ll be growing woody perennials, you must feed the soil biology (fungi) with woody mulch.

Take Action! (Get Your Free Food Forest Starter Pack)

Creating a food forest is a multi-stage process; you don’t have to go through all the steps outlined above in the exact order. The idea behind this post is to give you a framework for planning and planting your first trees. Aftercare and maintenance will be the subject of another post.

So these were the steps I followed when creating my food forest. I’ve been growing my food forest for a couple of years now. Still, honestly, it’s an ongoing and never-ending project as I always like to expand to more land, plant more plants, and experiment with different plant combinations. With every new patch of land, I follow these exact steps.

I want you to do the same thing and start creating that low-maintenance food abundance today, so I’m giving several bonus resources to help.

In the bonus section:

I’ve documented the exact workflow I use to create food forests and packaged it into a Food Forest Starter Pack for you. It includes the following resources:

  • First, I distilled this 5000-word article you’ve just read into an easy-to-follow checklist to make it simple when you get to the implementation stage
  • Second, I’ve made a site survey checklist that you can use as a quick reference when starting with a new patch of land.
  • Third, I’ve included a short tutorial on the exact design steps I used when planning the layout for my food forest.
  • Lastly, I created a PDF with 5 temperate climate guild examples you can copy and recreate in your food forest.

Grow 3-5X More Food with Less Maintenance Compared to Conventional Gardening (Click Here to Get My Free Food Forest Starter Pack).

 

 

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