John Wolfram wrote:I believe Stefan Sobkowiak does a U-pick in his orchard. He has some interesting idea regarding how to arrange things so that you get rows that each have stuff ripening at a specific time which is much more conducive to U-pick.
Regarding whether or not U-picks and orchards are conducive with permaculture, it would seem that would depend on the flavor of permaculture you are talking about. The "no-grafting" and "natives only" camps would probably say it is incompatible, while other camps would think it's just fine.
Thank you for sharing that. I'd love to intern for him and learn. I love his membership concept too. Not something I'd thought of before. I've got so much going on. I'm doing animals on 5 acres so I've got that. Then I've got the 35 acres of trees with the nut forest separate from the fruit forest. Nut forest will be pretty small I think. Then I'm doing a super dwarf orchard for elderly and disabled patrons. I'm doing the
berms and swales which has given me amazing results so far. I've go the trees. Next year I'm planting my entire veggie garden amid the trees. This year it was separate because I got my trees in late. The
bees are a plan but I don't think I'll get them until 2016. I was going to get them next year but my trees won't be in bloom yet so no point. I want to do a pagoda and a
pond and I want to build benches and tables for picnics. I need to
fence the entire 50 acres with field
fence and electrify it to let the dogs roam when we aren't home. I've already caught
deer eating my trees which was AMAZING since in 7 years of living here I've never seen a deer once. Build it and they will come......
I'm blathering now. I just have such big plans and such great hopes for my contribution to our area but I also have 2 toddlers and I work a full time job. So I'm limited. I'm limited with my time and my resources. Hopefully I'll be transitioning to staying home but then that limits the resources more. So I really want to get all the trees, fence and animals bought before I quit my job. Too much going on. I should stop talking about it, overwhelming myself.
i suppose before I proceed I should look into the insurance and legalities of having my trees planted in berms with the
swale on one side. I'd really like people to not fall and break legs.