Aloha! looking for some suggestions regarding planting trees and species for terraced hills.
I have recently purchased 10 hector of land in hilly regions which has slopes ranging from 12 degrees to 19 degrees, the area is between 1600m (meters) - 1730m above sea level. So, it is quiet steep slopes in some places. The lowest temperature in the land in last 10 years was 1 degree Celsius and highest was 33°C, but winter ranges from low 4-8°C to high 8-12°C, whereas summer ranges from low 12-14°C to high 28-29°C, the zone is classified as sub-tropics but is really different landscape than most subtropics like Florida or Sydney. The place has great winter Sun and get around 6+ hours of daily sunlight whereas summer is typically monsoon with lots of clouds and rain and we hardly see the sun, just cloudy days for long stretch.
The previous owners were doing traditional farming by making terraces, their main crops were seasonal vegetables and paddies. The width of terraces range between 1m to 6m. They were not using chemical fertilizers in their land but where buying chicken, goat, cow or other animal manures from anywhere it was accessible, so no way organic, also they were using some chemical pesticides. I am one man army so there is no way I can farm 10ha alone, so my idea is to make it a food forest and grow organic specialty Arabica Coffee (Bourbons and Caturras) in most part and keep around 1ha for growing food and vegetables for me. I asked the organic coffee certifier in the country and they said to have organic certification the coffee must be grown only after 3 years of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides free land. As the coffee is shade loving plants I have 3 years to plant and grow shade trees. My idea is to make food forest with mix of Timber, Fruits and Nuts trees with coffee as main crop and other trees as side hustle to make my living.
I have already planted different varieties of Bamboo (I love Bamboo) for now and looking for ideas. My coffee idea is almost monoculture so I want to diversify with diverse varieties of timber, firewood, fruits, herbs and nuts. I have walked across the forest here to get some native ideas and mostly we have Pine, Spruce, Conifer forest where not even grass grows below the pine trees. I am open to experiment with non-native or exotic plants which can survive/thrive in our location. I am planting Paulownias and Poplars next as fast growing trees to have shades for coffees. I was thinking Balsa too but it doesn't grow in this weather. If you have any suggestions of the plants from different parts of the world that could do okayish in these territory then please do suggest me.
My main concern is the trees plantations in Terraces and make it erosion free. I have searched for ideas in internet but my computer skills are not that great. I have planted in slopes before but never in terraces. Please check the pictures below and suggest if it is okay to plant the trees in such a way to support the coffee plantation as main crop. I want to plant the trees in the edge of the terraces and plant 1-3 rows of coffee depending upon the width of the terrace. 1st one is the example photo of the terrace and 2nd photo is my idea of plantation. The Red circles are the Timber, fruit, etc trees and Blue circles are for coffee. How is this idea, does it increase the chances of erosion or will it lead to catastrophic disaster? Any suggestions is appreciated.
Example Terrace
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Plantation ideas
Please feel free to suggest anything that could be helpful and ask questions if you have any, lets talk.
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