Purchase 27 acres in Fountain Valley BC. Suburb of Lillooet. Zone 5-6. I'm at the base of Blustry mountain around 1700ft elevation I believe... The house is sited at the base of the property. It is largely covered in fir, with some ponderosa pine and juniper. In the open areas ground juniper, wild sage, wild roses , oregon grape, and blackcaps prevail. We have a large green house to get starts going in. Temperatures reach 40 C in summer and -25 C in winter with a good foot or so of snow to be expected. Most days in winter sit around -5C. It is semi arid here, obviously given the native plants. However we are lucky to have our well terminating in an amazing aquifer. Plus the ability to use gravity. We have a a large slope around 20% just behind the house. It's about 40ft high and then has a nice level bank. that has a lot of moss covering the ground in the shady areas. Good site for a pond me thinks. The lot is 600ft wide and then goes back a long ways. I am surrounded by mountain in all directions but south, with the wind coming predominantly from the South. My plan is to plant orange osage along the front to act as a hedge fence for animals. This I will coppice and use in our wood stove for heat. There are some natural depressions that I plan to create ponds in. I plan to clear a lot of the trees just surrounding the house and the front of the property. The most open and south facing area is also the septic field. It works very well. My plan is to use this area to create a shift paddock system for chickens. Between 6-10 Barred Rock. In those paddocks I want to plant different guilds to include a variety of fruit and nut trees, flowers, herbs, forage, etc. I have a long list of possible plants already. I am very keen on growing comfrey, purple sage, etc. I thought of using a part of the hillside which is east facing to plant pumpkin, squash, cucumbers, watermelon etc. I can harvest what I need and roll the rest down the hill for the chickens. I have a second coop that is already here that I will use for broilers. I thought I would try Freedom Ranger. It isn't an insulated coop but it should work well for meat birds. I'm going to do my best to use no feed. I want to do Hugel beds everywhere! Is there going to be any problem using fir trees for this? I wondered if I could use some of the living fir or even stumps to support the tree stumps for terraces going up the hill. If anyone wants any of the local plants I mentioned. I can do my best to help. Finding orange osage, black locust and such may be problematic for me. Any suggestions, input welcome. My first post written, but hundreds read by now. Thanks for reading. I'll try to post some pics once my camera charges.
