When you grow a food forest, you will have healthy food to eat without much work. Food forests are all about planting nut and fruit trees and filling in the rest of the land from there with berries, vegetables, herbs – whatever you like that grows in your area. Food trees are the best thing to start with because they begin to enrich your soil and enrich the garden for the next wave of food plants.
To start your own food forest, start with a patch of earth and create healthy soil – It’s all about the covering of organic material.
Briefly:
Food forests grow quickly because they work in synergy with nature, which speeds growth along . Here are the basic steps to creating a food forest
Use whatever patch of earth you have available.
Dispose of any trash.
Plant trees – fruits or nuts – whatever you like that grows in your area.
Chickens can help clear out over-populations of weeds and insects, while simultaneously loosening up the soil and adding their waste as fertilizer.
Drop chipped plants and animal manure onto the surface of the soil = Sheet Mulch
Soil covered in Sheet Mulch = Nurturing Soil for Worms + Microbes + Fungi to grow in
Nurturing Home for the Worms + Microbes + Fungi + Rain + Time = Worm Waste + Microbe waste + Fungus Roots = Fertile Soil for Nurturing Plants
Fertile Soil for Nurturing Plants + Favored Seeds – Unwanted Seeds +Time = Vigorous Food Plants
Vigorous Food Plants = Delicious, Juicy Healthy Food to eat + Beautiful and Fragrant Flowers + Medicinal and Useful Plants for Better Health
All of this adds up to healthy land, water, and air, and a healthy environment for creatures of all kinds to live in.
Imagine a planet Earth where gardens abound!
See a summary of how we began here:
This link does an awesome job explaining the benefit of sheet mulch. We recommend you watch it!
This film highlights the importance of living in syntropy with the earth by growing food forests: