Hi Larry.
I would keep things like
shelter trees. I would be very cautious about taking out too much of the forest all at once. As you are looking to maintain forest ecology for your forest garden, I would suggest selective thinning, with an eye to keeping everything sheltered from dessicating winds.
I would also identify everything, or as much as you can, to determine what you can coppice. That can just be chopped without worrying. Also, if you were to map these out, you could pollard them instead, keeping them as fenceposts while the branches regrow.
Honestly, I
think that if your goal was a return of food, soonest, in the context of a forest garden, I would alley crop a mixed food forest starting from the understory.
My ideal mix starts with strawberries and other herbaceous berries, currants, low and highbush blueberries, and whatever woody and cane berries would be appropriate, right on up to mulberry trees, hazels, stone
fruit trees of all sizes, pear,
apple, whatever works in your area, and a long-maturing, tall, mast-producing tree for the eventual overstory. I would want a nitrogen fixing bacteria host shrub or tree, something that dropped its leaves seasonally, as well as coppices, so you could trim it back at need without worry.
I would also look for something like a sheltered wet spot in the forest plot, somewhere you could essentially culture forest litter, so the healthy soil bacteria and fungal populations inoculate the
mulch you create, so you can spread that around to improve the health of your forest garden.
I think how you proceed depends on exactly what you want to produce. You could theoretically selectively clear trees to increase light levels while maintaining shelter from dessicating winds, and then just carve alleys through it, seeding either side of the walkways with a guild comprising as a main crop several different cane berry types, selected for staggered harvests. With that as a base, you could see fruit within the first two years.
I think we'd all love pictures. Keep us posted, and good luck.
-CK
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
-Robert A. Heinlein
