Forest edge ideas - tearing out garlic mustard and cutting back honeysuckle - how to replace?

Southwest Ohio, USDA hardiness zone 6b

So like the title says, I have some permaculture zone 4 type land that I'm working with, or rather it was zone 5 bordering my zone 3, and I am trying to make optimal use of the edge space.

The forest borders my back fence on the South side, inside the fence is sparsely mowable grass and thick mosses, as that part of the yard spends most of the summer in deep shade.

I'm looking into what I can grow there in my zone 3 that would be beneficial to me and stack several functions, including: deterring deer from jumping my fence, feeding us, giving us raw material for crafting, and taking up the rainwater flow from a sort of shallow grassy gully that runs down that side of the yard and drains into our creeklet.

We also like to look at pretty flowers and arrange things to look nice for company, so really any excuse to mow less lawn is good for us.

Honeyberry and spicebush seem like they may be a good option, what would guild with them? I know coneflower and rudbeckia can do well in dappled shade, and I have already seeds for both. From my research it also seems like foxglove (digitalis) and blue lobelia would also be good plants for taking up rainwater, though of those only the honeyberry would really feed me, if I can get some to grow there.

I know spicebush is useful in the kitchen and the pharmacopeia, and I assume various salad greens would do well in dappled shade.

I say dappled shade and not deep shade because on the outside of the fence, and in the front yard as well all along the south side, I am embarking on a mission to aggressively cut back invasive honeysuckle and uproot garlic mustard. Cutting back they honeysuckle will allow more light to filter through. The understory seems to be mostly honeysuckle, though I will get a better view of it after I cut back a large swath of it.

The canopy layer seems to be mostly some sort of maple along with what appears to be American basswood. At the shrub layer I'm seeing lots of mayapple emerging. Other plants I've seen are poison ivy, Virginia spring beauty, and Virginia creeper.

- What can I expect to see emerge, or what should I plant, if I'm aggressively cutting back all the honeysuckle?

- Would elderberry work in this area? What would grow well with it, preferably native to the area?

- Can I use the honeysuckle in a hugelkultur bed, or would it send up suckers? Can I leave garlic mustard to rot in a compost bin?

Three shrub options occur to me, which are edible/useful and should be good in that setting:
Fragrant Sumac (Rhus aromatica) gives you sumac berries and are supposed to be highly deer resistant
Beautyberry (Callicarpa americana L.) for arching voluminous understory, semi edible berries, and mosquito repellant leaves
Blue Elderberry (Sambucus cerulea) for water retention and berries, said to do well in partial shade as well as sun

There are a lot of water gardens in my city but they tend to be pretty full sun when not blocked by buildings. They are planted with lilies (which can be edible), iris, coneflowers, and bee balm (and the occasional stealth tomato plant). The water gardens take on a lot of water at times and these plants seem to thrive there. If I see anything else growing in them that I forgot, I will add another comment.

Hosta is another plant that has edible shoots in spring, grows well in shade, and is visually pleasing as a low profile plant. And I did grow my salad greens under my dense tomato plant foliage (this was in NorCal so a different climate but it protected them from heat and kept them from bolting) and they did well there. Those plants do tend to get a lot of pest pressure though so I would probably tend to plant them as close to your house as I could.

That looks like a perfect spot for elderberry to me.  In Oregon, they tended to prefer a little shade, and they loved a moist spot.

You might find some more good ideas in Steven Sobkowiak's videos (Miracle Farms in Canada, a commercial permaculture orchard), particularly this one where he talks about using plants for deer fencing.

I learn so many neat things from his videos.  In an other video he talks about his favorite groundcover plants for his guilds.  I was astonished to see that one of his favorites is also one of mine - Sylvetta, the perennial arugula.  I was surprised because he's in zone Freeze-Your-Butt off Canada, and I'm in zone 8a desert SW - sylvetta grows great in both places?! Wow.  And on top of that, it grow both in out in the open, desert sun 115F, and also as an understory in a fruit orchard?  (And his orchard understory is quite shaded.)

It's an amazing filler plant.  In the desert here it is edible in two big bursts, well edible to me. It's always edible...but it gets extremely peppery as it starts to bloom (and too hot for me), and it blooms twice here.  It has rhizomes; thick roots weave around under it, and it can withstand significant drought or be sitting in a good amount of wet soil.

But back to his video here, he talks about building fencerows, essentially.  And deer are a big problem for him, too.



And something maybe worth considering... It would take some management, but the food output is so good - an American, Chickasaw or Beach plum thicket.  They can grow at edges and still fruit with a significant amount of shade.  

Here is an article talking about growing American plums:
Akiva Silver, Twisted Tree Farm: Growing the American Plum

And this is what a basket of his American plums looks like!



Good luck and please keep us posted!

I had a conversation with my dad this afternoon and he reminded me of some plants that they use. They have a very similar situation and some similar goals to what you described. My mom plants a garden and they have a lot of deer and rabbits so they do a lot of things to try to naturally discourage them. He mentioned lemon balm and mint (in containers) and said my mom has a lot of those along the "wilder" side of the yard between the woods and the garden. They had a hard freeze that killed their rosemary but are planning to replace it as it was a good deterrent as well.

My dad is slowly eking out a mower-free front yard by planting ground covers and heavily discouraging the existing bermuda grass. He really loves the vinca under the trees out front and is also cultivating a dwarf mondo grass that is spreading really well through the front yard. Both of those are in partial sun and shade too. I have another friend with really lush dwarf mondo in her very shady under oaks areas.

I also know that alliums grow in shade situations and are deer resistant, so a bed of different alliums would be both pretty and effective along the outer edge of the yard.

Another woodland tree that I don't know a lot about but find intriguing is the paw-paw. Haven't I heard of it being found in forests in the Ohio/ Appalachian foothills areas? That could be a cool tree to try to add to the shadier areas. It seems to required a pair of trees to fruit.

Depending on how big those knotweeds are, there's likely not going to be a whole lot of anything coming up from underneath them, once you cut it. I'd suggest being careful, because it's taken almost a full year of constant observation to make 100% sure I got completely rid of the first patch of knotweed I pulled out. After starting the patch last spring, I only just guaranteed within the past two months that it's completely cleared out.

Once it's gone though, things that might grow well there (and quickly) include:

Trees:
Eastern Redbud, Pawpaw, Carolina Buckthorn, Black Elderberry, Chokecherry

Shrubs:
Highbush Blueberry, Blackhaw Viburnum, Eastern Sweetshrub, Goose Plum, Beautyberry (if you're pretty much right on the southern border of the state, but you might be ale to get away with it?), Clove Currant, Illinois Rose or Swamp Rose, Black Raspberry/ wild Blackberry/ dewberry

Groundcover:
Partridgeberry, Jewelweed, any number of other Native wildflowers or grasses, Eastern Yampah

I never count on honeysuckle being dead.
It's so resilient that killing it dead takes too much effort.
Instead I cut it flush to the ground and when it resprouts I chop and drop .
The bigger woody bits can go in a hugel after they are thoroughly dried out.
They also can be turned into biochar.
Making biochar right on top of a stump might kill the stump dead, but I wouldn't count on it until I tried it.

You might be able to trade one monoculture for another more useful one by planting bamboo or willow.
I don't know if either of those plant families can choke out honeysuckle,  but if they can they are definitely more useful.

You could try buttonbush. It likes shade and moisture. It's pretty cool looking too

I agree with William Bronson that willow would be useful for you here, providing lots of craft material and soaking up a lot of that water.  I'd love to plant some in my boggy areas, but worry that the roots will go after pipes in the area.

I have a section of my property that I am battling out Garlic Mustard. It is a hillside so it presents some challenges when physically trying to remove the plant. I have settled into an out-compete strategy of growing things that will shade out the garlic mustard.

Currently I am using a combination to see what works better. On one part, I have wild ginger that had a small established plot. It shades out the garlic mustard so I have been encouraging its spread.

The other thing I am trying this year is rye. I figure if I create a mini hay field that it should shade out the growth. We will see if there is any merit to it this spring.