My forest garden

Hello again! It has been a while. Quite a bit has shifted in my world in the years since my last post. I figured the best way to reintroduce myself is to show my ongoing garden experimentation.

I finally have a piece of property that I have been working with consistently for the past few years. During the first covid lockdown I helped the then owners of the property, my eldest child and her girlfriend, to convert approximately 80% of the yard space from a lawn to a no till garden. I was able to get a hold of three round bales of spoiled hay from a local horse farm and we laid about 12 inches of hay right over the close cropped grass, with the addition of a couple cubic yards of aged leaf mold I had made over the years. It worked like gangbusters for them.

Fast forward to last year, I became the "new" owner of the property as my daughter and her girlfriend were moving elsewhere. I mostly let Gaia and Sol do as they will with the planting that year, though I did experiment with variations on the Three Sisters garden, mostly with Gaia's help for the squash portion. Anyway, that's a story for another time... So this past fall/winter I had access to the leaf fall from the literal hundreds of trees surrounding and covering one of the properties I manage. The owners just want the ones on their lawn gone each year. They usually burn them, so I raked, bagged and hauled them to my little property. I use my scythe to manage the lawn at the property and was able to make a goodly amount of silage across the course of the growing season of 2021. The yard was buried in leaves encased with silage and the leftover bit of hay I had from 2020.

What follows are some of the photographs I have taken so far this year of the garden. The property is still in a very rough state as I am working to renovate and clean it out. Much work to be done but one step at a time... Hope you enjoy and hi again!

I love what you’re doing with this!  Post more pics when things get growing.

I cleaned up my seed collection recently and had a bunch of old ones that I am unsure of their viability  I decided to try a couple patches of native popcorn seeds with some mixed peas and heirloom beans. I have mostly been planting out perennial wildflower seeds. Experimenting with various planting techniques in relatively deep layer mulch beds to see what works best.

I made this patch by clearing what I refer to as a "birds nest" in the mulch until I was slightly above the soil horizon in the mulch. I have the last of my supply of reclaimed potting soil that I decided to make my seed bed from. A layer of seeds in chaotically spaced layout, because Gaia. Casing layer, then fine Timothy grass hay reclaimed from a spoiled bail that had been thrown away.

This year I am focusing more on experimenting with direct seeding as my time and energy is largely focused elsewhere. I usually use seedling trays and plant out plants, and that is a lot of work! In many areas I am experimenting with just poking seeds down right at the soil interface. Excited to learn what works and doesn't here.

Here's a selection of update photos from throughout the year. I have way more but don't feel like uploading a ton so I only picked a couple highlights here and there. I may upload more later.

Still have a lot of work to do at the transition property.  I am already seeing spring blooming a month plus early. My and my neighbors apple trees already have leaf buds on, my garlic is sprouting already, as are a number of dock crowns and the Canadian thistlebeast that exists across the SW bed.

The porches on both sides are about to be ripped off and reengineered to be more material efficient. The surplus lumber will then be paired with reclaimed material from the torn apart deck of a friend and used to build a new storage shed/workshop in place of the small, sad, rusted out metal shed that has a black locust main leader growing into the back of and crushing...

The new water heater I am constructing for this place is coming along. I am teaching myself welding for assembly of some of the parts. A few more practice sessions and I will start the welding of the tank pieces. So many things to do/build, so little time... Lol

When I said the Cucamelon went wild, this is what she looked like at the beginning of October. We would get our first cold blasts a couple weeks from these photos and kill back a fair portion of her. She didn't fully die until November sometime. From what I am told, there should be a tuber there that will regrow this spring. We will see. If she does, I will give her something to climb on. I plan on constructing a wild fence for the beds anyway so perhaps I can trellis her on to the fence and send her the whole length of the property a couple times. Will be fun to see!

I'm so inspired by your project!  Great job!  I appreciate the curiosity with which you're approaching it...much the same as I am approaching my backyard food forest project.  I have 9 different growing areas (so far), each a little different (based on availability or lack thereof of materials) just to see what works and what doesn't.  I'm looking forward to lots of updates this coming season!  Good luck and happy growing!

I love what you’re doing! But just giving you a heads up… I work for an electric utility company and in my experience, you may have a few issues with the garden being right up to your meter pedestal and right up to that padmount transformer. Our specific company (no idea if this is industry standard or company specific) has a rule of no shrubs/trees within 8’ of any side of a padmount transformer. Just so employees can access, open and work safely in them without hassle. Personally, I’m very respectful of peoples stuff, especially plants, but not everyone is, and technically none of us have to be if its in our way. I dont think we have a rule for a certain number of feet clearance to the meter, but its a similar situation. If someone has to test or exchange your meter and theres a thicket in the way, they will likely hack their way through. Ive had to do it many times myself.

So not telling you you should change what you’ve already done, but just figured I would give you a heads up that there’s a chance you may get a utility worker standing in your beds and hacking their way through to get to their equipment.