Hello there,
So I'm new to the Permies forum, the past few months I've been doing a lot of research into natural building and recently permaculture and forest gardens. I'm from the West Midlands, England. Still in university but super excited about all things sustainable, so currently I'm planning the future, thinking about sustainability: food, energy, architecture, philosophy, etc.
One question I've been thinking about recently is what sorts of sites should be considered suitable/best for development into a forest garden/food forest? I've seen a couple of videos from places with temperate climates (from New Zealand to the UK) and some mediterreanean permaculturists that have started from a sort of barren, blank ex-agricultural field and cultivated a flourishing living forest eco system over the course of 20 years or so.
I was wondering whether starting with existing woodland and gradually replacing the existing species with edible plants and trees would be a faster way of creating a food forest rather than starting with a barren piece of land. I'm primarily thinking about temperate climates, UK and northern Europe. What sort of factors should I be thinking about when selecting a site? Obviously there are many sorts of factors highly dependent on individual instance but I'm sure there is some generally applicable wisdom! If anyone can suggest some resources or point me in the direction of some information that would be great!
I'm only a quarter of the way through Bill Mollison's Permaculture: A Designer's Manual so perhaps this sort of thing might be touched on later in that book.
Thanks in advance!
