Kara Ann

Hey Chance - what a great vision you have - I love the way you are "cross pollinating" with others to spread gardening to people who maybe never tried, or maybe did have some 'black thumb' experiences. These trees seem like a great way to do it, and their productivity is out of proportion to their footprint and effort!
Once you get your little spinney of columnar trees on hand, post some pics to let us know where they settled in.  I planted thyme and chamomile around the base of my tree, even when it was in a pot, and continued when it was in ground. Let's see what your imagination brings.

Also Timothy (looking for online options) I am glad to give a shout out and two thumbs up to Raintree Nursery for the quality and variety of what they offer.

AND - golly I love the idea of a columnar pear. I have espaliered ones, but am thinking the columnar is a great consideration also.

Hey Jay - about the deer - yeahhhhh here too - those critters are completely shameless in defoliating all the plants I love. And a small columnar tree would be very vulnerable to them. They don't even walk away when I holler. They just look at me as if to say that I am clearly not any type of threat, until I actively walk over and shoo them away. (Sigh. Well, hunting season is coming...)

I am sure I am very late-to-the-party on this, but just last week I found a bunch of Paul's info on 'Bone Sauce' as a deer deterrent from Sepp Holzer, (see this thread - scroll down: https://permies.com/t/239042/Defending-apples-trees-hares)  and have been reading about it in Sepp's Permaculture book. Since we have a statewide burn ban, I can't create the bone portion of that right now... but in his book, Sepp says that the burned bones ingredient in the formula can be substituted with Beechwood tar  (https://mydrxm.com/products/kerbl-tarpaste-beech-tar-1-kg)  and burnt hair/hide/pig bristles. Nothing that will offend a burn ban. So I am gathering the tar and the animal hair, rancid oil, slaked lime, cow manure and sand to make up a batch, and I am going to give it a determined try.  I will let you know how it goes for the espaliered fruit trees in particular!  It should be a good protection of vulnerable trees like the columnars.

Sidebar:

How long have you grown your columnar apple and how's it behaved for you?

Hi Chance -
I love the columnar apple, and would definitely recommend! When I bought it, I was in an apartment, and it was in a pot on the patio.
After 1 year, I rented a house where I could "farm" in the back yard.
It is 7 years old now and has been very healthy (and currently quite unhappy after a necessary but bad-timing-transplant to it's new home on the farm - keeping fingers crossed and giving it plenty of arnica and hoping for the best).

I did not keep it closely pruned into its one column shape once I had more space for it, but even with the limbs growing out, they curve quickly upward and are very strong.
The apples cluster well, (I did thin them to balance the load on the tree). The fruit holds tight to the tree, and for such a small footprint, it produces a LOT of fruit without creating  a LOT of shade on the neighboring plants in a relatively limited space. And the fruit is reachable - so I can harvest easily with feet on the ground.

I have attached a picture of it as a 2 year old tree, then more through the years until we pruned it back earlier this month and dug it up for the move.

Do you have any of the columnar trees?

What an exciting adventure - congrats and best wishes for your property!

Joel Salatin teaches three priorities in this order for a new property:
1) Access - getting an access lane on the land that allows you to easily get to as much of it as possible.
He describes it as "If you can't get to it, then it does not exist (in terms of practical farming)"
Figuring this out first helps because then you don't plant trees where you later need to put a lane

2) Water - one of his basic premises is that you can't haul water - it is just not sustainable
So the water source(s) need to be defined, and water distribution needs to be worked out

3) Control - this is about boundaries and temp or permanent fencing.
Setting this up to keep what is outside the farm outside and what is on the farm inside wherever it is planned to be.

This is his take on 'What do I do with 2-5 acres?'  He's got a really practical approach.  Maybe this will give you some ideas

Wooo hooo - my excitement about adding this adventure bundle to my {ever growing and far beyond my capacity to read/view/ponder} library of fantastic resources is teed up now, for right after I finish reading Sepp Holzer's Permaculture book.  Summer is almost over, and before we know it, the LONG DARK will be here with short days and long evenings for reading, watching, studying, snacking on the harvest of this week with a warming beverage.

THANKS to all the authors who pioneered / envisioned / worked so diligently to create these materials.

And thanks (as usual) to Paul for being so {insert adjective of choice here} INSPIRING!

Thanks for posting this - yes RIP Dolly Parton - she was a bright light in the world!

And here is another from someone who left too early  [RIP]  but left this beautiful rendition of an irrepressibly sing-able song

Happy Harvest, Jay!
So many apples, such a wonderful dilemma to have.

After making this rhubarb chutney recipe: https://www.kitchenparade.com/2003/06/rhubarb-chutney.php
I had wondered if a little savory apple butter could be created with the same pattern of cumin / ginger / cinnamon / cloves + onions.

I supposed it could depend alot on the specific apple, but it worked great for my Sentinal columnar apple tree harvest.

Great that you are considering carefully what you would enjoy / be able to manage before you dive in.

In the spirit of letting the animals do as much of 'the chores' as possible, having chickens on deep litter bedding underneath elevated rabbit enclosures creates a partnership that makes fantastic compost for you. Instead of thinking which one animal to begin with, it might be helpful to begin with this pairing.  This is how my farm's rabbitry has been set up. Having the chickens turning the wood shavings (actually I use shredded cardboard most of the time) in the deep litter, continually  mixing in the rabbit manure turns the potential of a smelly maintenance task for you of cleaning/removing manure into the benefit of compost you can use on your homestead. Joel Salatin says the clucking of the chickens seems to provide a good backdrop of sound that calms the rabbits.

There are classes Joel teaches about chickens / rabbits and this combination which he calls a 'Raken' house at his channel and website
https://www.youtube.com/@farmlikealunatic
https://www.farmlikealunatic.com/
and plenty of YouTube examples where people have implemented it in their own way.


Joel's Polyface Designs book gives a clear description of how to implement.

Good luck with the selection process for whatever you decide, and let us know how it goes!

This is a timely topic, even though October is still a way out.
Currently here in Washington there is a state wide burn ban through Sept 30.
(Darn - I want to make Sepp Holzer's 'bone sauce to keep the deer out of my trees, but it will have to wait!)

In a class with Joel Salatin, he told us that the number 1 cause of barn fires was electricity within the structure (faulty wires or heating devices plugged in), so he is a big advocate of off grid barns and other outbuildings, relying on day time sun and night time headlamps as needed instead of being attached to the grid.
Something to consider in planning the farm buildings...

Wow - that is SUCH a great idea about the freezer as storage -  Thanks Ellen and Douglas - I had just been looking to problem solve this, and so this is very good timing

Thanks, Kris!  There are lots of other threads here on Permies that might help you

Composting toilets - in WA there is a statute that establishes standards for legal composting toilets - but not all counties allow it (like Mason county where I live prohibits composting toilets flat out / not negotiable) so the specific county where you settle makes a big difference.  Read more here:  https://permies.com/t/55070/Public-Domain-Composting-Toilets-Legal

Differences by county regulation -   https://permies.com/t/69195/place-move-MT-WA-open