I really appreciate this video. I filmed a video on this topic last week and your fifth point never occurred to me, because for me, the reality is I had to work around existing structures and couldn’t move them, so I never even thought about making the really expensive error of putting your house in the wrong place. That is such an important point for folks who are moving on to a plot of land where they need to build their home.
Thanks Angela. FYI for anyone reading this, Angela's video on this exact same topic is fantastic, definitely go check it out. Her entire channel is incredible.
i moved into a house with what FOR ME was an enormous amount of lawn (tiiny by most standards) in a subdivision. so my budding baby food forest is constrained by existing structures, neighboring structures, small space, and a need to look at least reasonably attractive to the nieghbors
Economics was the most important point for me. Just could never buy expensive nursery-quality, standard-grown apple and peach trees, so I started with buying one cheap little £2 fruit bush when out shopping for supermarket groceries. Over my first winter living at my present property, I slowly collected one each of blackcurrant, redcurrant, whitecurrant, thornless blackberry, green gooseberry, red gooseberry, large-fruited red raspberry, autumn-fruiting raspberry and a yellow raspberry. After carefully planting and tending, I didn't so much concentrate on what amount of fruit they would produce in their first year - but how to sensibly propagate them in the autumn so I could multiply harvests in future years. From a few of my original berry bushes, I probably have a total of 100 currants, 400 raspberries, and 150 thornless blackberries. Slightly later, at times when I could afford to, I added a few cheap supermarket bare root apple and cherry trees, blueberries and honeyberries. I grew fruits from seeds, pips and stones, regardless of the knowledge that they commonly revert to parent types or not (because you can always turn smaller, sharper apples into apple cider vinegar, pickle certain others, and use them to add a 'bite' to otherwise fairly insipid dishes. Sharp-tasting cherries can be cooked or added to mixed fruit jams). I looked into fruits that grow wild in my native country but don't normally find themselves grown in gardens as fruit any more - sloes (for jam, my neighbour turns them into gin), damsons, and Viburnum opulus (must be cooked thoroughly for 20 minutes to destroy the poison). Lately, I have begun investing in unusual fruits, as I truly believe that the key to food security is to diversify my collection as far as my location will allow. I now have a total of 53 different types and species of fruit plant, the latest additions being black, purple and peach-coloured raspberries (all having unique flavours), something called an Ugni Guava (looked interesting), 3 teeny-tiny Sumacs, and 3 plug-plant sized Cranberries. But of all things, I think the most important skill for me has been an ability to successfully, efficiently and confidently propagate and prune plants. By those 2 skills, I have totally bypassed the high cost of stocking a permaculture-style garden, and it's now a habit to propagate any pruning materials I have.
Amazing! This is such a great example of how a plan can be TOTALLY DIFFERENT for two different sets of people. One of my consultations was for a newly retired couple who bought land and wanted to transform it with permaculture. They had more money than they knew what to do with, but TIME was the thing they didn't have much of (the husband has a terminal illness). Their plan was the complete opposite of yours, and for obvious reasons. Yours however more closely resembles mine. I have another 2 acres to plant out, but I'm going to chip away at that over a lifetime, using existing plants and TONS of propagation. Amazing comment!
I have a small front and back yard and it's getting crowded with food I'm almost out of room but I've been propagating and slowly taking over my neighbors yards and my moms and my sisters house soon ill have my own nursery selling plants from my driveway to extend my permaculture impact to the rest of the town
I will be 60 in a few months. We have a small tractor, a little back hoe, and my husband is handy. I can usually convince him to help on the property even if he isn’t into permaculture or gardening. We are raising grandchildren (13 and 9). Luckily I’m in good health and I don’t have an aversion to child labor.
When we were children, every yard had a fruit tree in it. And as children we went and picked all the fruit from every yard. None of our parents had to go out and buy fruit. Many even grew their own gardens. So many didn't even have to buy vegetables.
I recall that being part of my childhood as well. Citrus, loquats, mulberries, guava, figs, papayas everywhere. I have no idea what happened to that ? Was that the older generation thing? I feel like it skipped the generation to garden with my mom. I was practically raised by my grandparents and I spent so much time in the garden with them I love it.
A few years ago we allowed some loggers to cut some pines. They failed to get the ones closest to the house which were the main ones we wanted gone. They left the biggest ruts. The area is where I wanted to plant a good forest. I thought for one second about getting my husband to use the tractor to push the dirty into the ruts and then thought better off that! I let them alone. They collect water. One even has cattails growing in it. Have no idea where that came from but I love it. The area is still over grown and may never get my food forest.
We have just moved into a cottage with a huge overgrown garden and are in the process of permaculturing it with a greenhouse, market garden and food forest areas. The woodland is mainly bluebells, brambles, nettles and pine trees but I am hoping to introduce berry bushes and edible mushrooms. It's a rental so we can't completely overhaul it but work with what already exists
One of the goals for me, I’ve discovered, is poly culture. Not because that’s a permaculture principle. But because polyculture is COOL in the summer, I have realized. Front yard still hot because a bunch of it is still grass. But same time of day, I go out back, and it’s already cool outside. ❤️❤️❤️
I hope to start a food forest in my mother's backyard so she can have some food independence and avoid the high cost of groceries in the area. This video is immensely helpful, thank you.
You had asked me what brought me to this video and or Permaculture? I watched a video called Back to Eden. Paul Gautschi changed my whole way of thinking about the way I was killing my soil and I was hooked from the moment the video ended. So I joined the permaculture cult as they call us who don't understand why and will never understand how or why. It has changed my life in such a way and made my garden grow me. No matter how we do it, If it's covered then it has us covered. it really challenges me to work less to produce more abundance over the years. Some say oh that crap takes to long. We have nothing but time. So how's it taking to much time? Over the years I've seen a gradual increase in plant growth and abundance of life. The food is just a perk, watching it come to life and grow from it is awesome! Two words Sustainable Permaculture
If you want some more inspiration, check out David Holmgren, RetoSuburbia The Downshifters guide to a Resilient Future. It's got lots of nifty ideas particularly in the three zones around the house. If you have a larger block look into silvopasture and holistic management by Allan Savory
I am so thankful that I found this video. I will be rewatching it while taking notes. I appreciate you sharing this valuable advice. I also appreciate your thoughtful responses to your viewers and many of their comments as well. Thank you for sharing your time, knowledge, and wisdom!
I've been told that the best way to harvest seabuckthone is to clip the whole branch of berries and put it in the freezer. once it's frozen, you can take the branch and gently whack it in a large bowl. The berries fall off and you can discard the branch - much safer than climbing into the bush for that last berry!
We do that sometimes. I find it doesn't work as well as people say. I think as my named cultivars set fruit, it may work better for those ones. They hold the fruit a little farther from the branch.
Yay for usable nerdy info! I love everything on your channel but I particularly appreciate the detailed, educational, how-to or theoretical systems-thinking videos. Thank you.
You are the man! Thanks for all of this information. I am looking forward to using your videos as my "school". It seems to me that we think alike. However, you have way more knowledge. This is why I appreciate what you have done and continue to do! Also, because you are genuinely sincere,.
I really love your tip you gave at 8:30 I used lockdown time of covid to do that and my garden is doing so much better now that I’ve gotten to know my sunlight 🎉
Awesome. I've also made changes based on watching spring snow melts - where the water pools, where it overflows after pooling, etc. Such valuable information!
Really thank you for this video! This is what I acctually teach my students in school. Set your goal, then learn how to reach them. When in permaculture surroundings, I very much talk in the same way as you do. What do you like to eat? Is this for buissness? Is it for helth? What are your goal? I'm 5 years into my lifetime project. On about 5 acres I have my house, and a combined kitchengarden, foodforest, apiary, medicinal garden. Medicinal in 2 ways, one way Is to acctually grow medicinal plants, an other Is to build up different "rooms" in the garden. Soft places with soft soil and Moss. Sparky places, calm places, buissy places, waterplaces etc etc. To soothe and ease the mind. Working with that healthy Green colour for helth in the soul. I've been following the medicinal gardens at SLU in Sweden, where they treated, among other things, PTSD and overworked brains that has shut down. I like the idea of geting helthy in many ways. Who needs a gym when having a garden? Or, how to build and outdoor gym? Depending on what kind of person you are. Just thanks for this very inspiering film! Lot's of love from Sweden!
Perfect timing! I'm having talks today to lease a piece of land (buying's shelved for now unfortunately) and these questions and my answers to them also come in handy for that talk 👍. Wish me luck!
I am coming to this in Australia seeing the impact of climate change here with heatwaves, fires, flood and at times real food insecurity now with the global impact on the cost of food travelling around our country, the rising costs to farmers for water and as such the design of my garden will allow shade for those heat waves, and I am increasing my ability to harvest rainwater (so that when it does rain, I can catch all I can). The fruit trees will also create shade for the house, planted nearer the house to be that shade from the summer sun, then without leaves in winter to allow the sun to warm us. I am wanting healthier winter food, prettier than supermarket produce with edible flowers and purple/red leaves too. You are right - to ask ourselves why we are doing this because there is a cost on our time, our resources and our budgets, from my perspective we have reached the tipping point and to get to basics for me is a rewarding pursuit. Thanks for sharing your insights with us.
Thank you! I had sort of forgotten there was an order to things 🤣 I'm planting out the first plants on the first swale, really just trying for shade down here in Florida. Shade and mulch
Big mistake I made was when buying fruit trees that require others for pollination , ie, apple trees . I bought two different varieties thinking I could enjoy both . However they both flower at different times which now they don't pollinate . So my option are clone , plant , wait 2-3 years orrr buy more trees 😅
Building a food forest in Ecuador! The best weather in the world. Could use a bit more sunlight. Growing 365 is a tough gig. Keeping the soil going and strong is the main focus.
Yeah 365 day growing season, fertility cycling is the biggest focus. Lots of chop and drop can do wonders for replenishing nutrients and keeping to build soil.
Some great questions to ask here, I think I intuitively realised most of these when I began heading in this direction with my land, but to be honest I probably took way too long fully developing them, and rushed into some decisions without thinking them through, or didn't prioritise some things early on which would have benefited me now. I would say these are absolutely the bare bones, and you won't be overthinking things by at least giving them some thought, any more than this and you might start getting into analysis paralysis. I am still glad I did SOMETHING, even though it wasn't always the "right" thing.
Awesome content. I love the nerdy ones because it helps my thirsty brain. I wanted a food forest to do my part to heal the earth, and in turn heal me. I want that peaceful refuge and abundance that nature brings. And I did start. 11 fruit trees, 20 berry bushes, flowers, annual veggies, new compost pile every 2 weeks. even consulted the local watershed group to get help managing the stream and planting a bunch of Acadian forest trees for free! Highly recommend if you have a waterway on or near your property. I have a large blank slate so I am trying to work from the edges of existing structures out.
Love the micro swale/pond idea. The whole “on contour” thing has always been super confusing to me and I wondered also about trip hazards. We are only on 1 acre but there’s still a lot we can do here
Could you do a video (maybe you already have one in earlier years?) about how you looked for your land? What criteria you used to choose your land (I recall you saying it had to have a stream on it?)? How you saved up for it? Aside, it's so interesting to me that I think "alternatively" on various topics and chose a low income job to give me the freedom to think and live outside the mainstream. You on the other hand are living and thinking outside the mainstream and have a job in mainstream making good money. A video on how you straddle both worlds would be interesting. Love these questions and tips, thanks :)
Outstanding and inspiring video! My main goals are the same as yours, but our priorities are a bit different. Good healthy food is #1, but developing a healthy ecosystem and contributing to improving our environment are right up there. Thanks for your hard work and sharing! You are the man!
another question is how fast do you want to get things done? if one wants it completely planted out in 5 years, it'll take money to buy plants, materials, and heavy equipment use. if the building of a food forest is a lifestyle journey, starting from seed and putting in a lot of labor becomes an option. plus, there's no need for a strict design since you always have the time to change things that don't work.
It's worth becoming educated in permaculture so that you don't miss out on potential systems. Plants can be redone with heart ache, but reorienting your house to use the sun changing the roof design, relocating the driveway...can be outrageously expensive.... worse still if you haven't considered accessibility and you can't enter your house or use the bathroom after breaking your leg or you had the fortune to get old.
Thank you! Indeed, I've heard that many times from older folks, and I always try to listen when people with experience doing something speak. Always learn from everyone. Everyone can teach you something!
As always, awesome content. The answer to question #1....why am I here, what got me interested in permaculture. Easy answer, YOU. Your passion inspired me to get into permaculture and I thank you for it. Best to you & yours
Excellent summary Keith! This is a great, lightly technical primer to permaculture and site design. I'm sure I'll be referring people back to this one a bunch in the future.
This made me really think & ask the famous question why? 🤔💭 food, preserving, beauty, native plants to encourage & support nature…educating my boys, living healthy through choices…
speaking up for the folks moving in to a suburban or urban environment... (i just moved from urban to suburban and OMG so much space by comparison!!!) find out the local regulations. if you are unfortunate enough to have a HOA (im so sorry) make sure you know EXACTLY what the rules are. this applies to local rules also: my township, for example, doesnt allow chickens in areas marked 'residential' and requires permits before pretty much any construction. UNSPOKEN rules are critical also. you do not want to have a bad relationship with the neighborhood. you dont have to be buddy buddy, but you dont want your neighbor complaining about the property line, you dont want neighbors angry that your property "looks bad" even if you want a really wild looking food forest, you can make it fit... add a decorative fence, make a more 'tame' area up front, or plant view blocking but decorative plants to keep the "mess" out of sight. if you can tolerate a more constrained LOOK? many many berry bushes and fruit trees can look just like decorative landscaping! you can also make your water holds and water catchments look more like design choices (yes it will cost more) as to water... allow me to share my disaster we have two down spout s from the roof. one visibly goes into pipe that goes underground to the sewer... the other one went behind a landscape bush by the front door and we *assumed* also went straight into the sewer. I finally got fed up with the bush and cut it...and found out the water spout was just ... dumping... right there on the bushes roots... next to our foundation. its AMAZING how fast you can find a pond liner, and set up a fake stream bed to direct water at least a few feet away...
We went whole heartedly down the 'rapid approach' method. It's been an incredible amount of work for the last 4 years, but it's finally starting to really pay off (pluots, pluerries and figs this year, first good raspberry harvest, etc). We've got approximately half our our 1/3 acre plot landscaped so far and we're slowing down on our planting projects (more filling in spots with native plants and doing erosion control work). For cost, we've probably spent a couple thousand USD on plants (mostly bare root trees at $25 each, potted plants between $5 and $150), and maybe $300 on mulch (delivery is about $90-100 for a dump truck load). Good soil / compost to fill up raised beds is expensive too. Probably at least $1500 over the years. I'd say, in total, we've probably put in $4-5k in the food forest and garden stuff. FWIW, the hardscaping costs to dress up the rest of our yard are way more expensive than any of the plants/soil. If we were more financially constrained, I would have taken a very different approach and probably bought scionwood / seedling rootstocks to graft myself. You can get the variety of fruit trees you want for a couple dollars. Getting cuttings from neighbors and friends would also save quite a bit of cost, as would collecting native plant seed to propagate. It doesn't have to be expensive, but I wanted to landscape quickly. Our first year on the property, we planted out a small orchard of fruit trees by the side of our house (about 9 trees) and put a bunch of native plants in the back yard + 4 ribes. The following year we had one of our other fenced yards hardscaped (terraced garden beds) and started to plant that out (mostly natives and decorative plants, 1 apricot, 3 bush cherries). Year 3 we were really bored during the pandemic so we planted out one side of our front yard (probably 70' by 25'). Crazy amount of work that year (8 fruit trees, 5 evergreen trees, a garden bed, two rows of native shrubs for a windbreak). This year we finished off some spots to dress up the front yard (edged our driveway with native plants), put in espaliered fruit trees / grapes / herbs along one of our fencelines and did another part of the front yard in native plants. We're at the point where our fruit trees are just starting to get pretty big. The oldest are getting to be 10-12' tall. The 2nd year trees are 6-8' tall. I've had to remove 1 already that wasn't growing well and will remove another that is a bit diseased. In general, most of the trees are super healthy and growing nicely. We got a decent amount of precipitation this summer and everything erupted in growth. We luckily didn't put the trees / shrubs too close to each other, but we're now understanding how easy it would be to not leave yourselves walking paths. Some parts we did go a bit on the dense side for the wind break value. I'll have to trim those plants slightly if they exceed the typical sizes. I normally give them a light shaping over the winter so that they're a little more regular shaped (not as unruly). In general, we wouldn't plant extremely densely for fire reasons here. Gotta do the necessary risk reduction where it makes sense. I think a lot of folks can be intimidated by the "overgrown jungle" approach that some permaculturists take to 'efficiently' use the space. Since you mentioned planning, we 'engineered' the layout by walking the areas putting stakes out and eventually putting everything into a free sketching software (inkscape worked great for us) using mature plant sizes. In the case of our fruit trees, I spaced them a little more compactly as I'll prune them to 8-10' wide (instead of 12-15' that they'd reach on semi dwarf rootstocks). We made sure to get a feel for the amount of sun each of the areas get with the type of plants. I might move a few shrubs at some point to better spots (redcurrants getting too much sun), but all in all, I think it worked out pretty well. We did have to consider some trees that would get less sun in their early years due to shade from fencelines, and then get way more sun once they're above 6' tall. By that point, the trees roots are fairly well established and they'll take off with all the extra sun. One of our apricots is already starting to do this, a little slow the first 2 years and it's pushing 8' tall. Next year it'll be huge, which is great as I put it as a cornerstone shade tree.
Oh! I'm watching this video now and seems like I've got the answers to my questions which I've posted few minutes ago below another video :) So thanks again for sharing this precious knowledge!
My prime consideration is the environment, soils, and trying to understand how things like diversified planting can benefit the plants, wildlife and me. Living in Surrey BC has given me some serious frustrations with condo towers packed in close proximity, black exteriors, and removal of trees that were at least 50 years old. There are people literally paving their yards, making a frying pan out of the neighborhoods. So I chose to encourage people to share tree cuttings, donate to community gardens, and improve the minute amount of soils I have direct contact with. Geoff Lawton, Dr Elaine Ingham, and many others have given me reasons to do what I can. Unfortunately the amount of time left in my life won't allow me much room, but I prefer to leave behind the knowledge for the rest. Regenerative agriculture, hemp based building, trying to contact people who do have influence over land, water, forestry uses. Rammed earth buildings started one aspect, then moving into leaving behind as little damage as possible.
It's crazy how modern cities are done. Pavement everywhere. All we can do is make the most of the time we are given. It sounds like you are doing that in spades!
I think this behaviour began with New York City, the idea of "glitz and glam" after the Empire State building went up to world acclaim. Add in the mass use of cars,etc and pavement everywhere. Undoing behaviour must change, now. It's deadly to animals and plants, plus health hazards to people.
I just found you about three days ago and I am so happy the algorithm worked for me this time. Your scientific explanations are so needed in this space, where most content creators tell you to do something, because. Thanks for your time and effort and your family for allowing you. :) You and Edible Acres are two of my favorites!
This was SO HELPFUL! Great video for newbies like us just starting out. I loved the intro and outro, great flow and engagement, and just absolutely packed with useful and important info. Thanks so much.
Great information. The intro had me thinking about some of your old videos. One question came to mind in talking about design and buying trees… rootstock. Is this something you give a lot of thought to? I was also half concerned about the monoculture side of using the same rootstock through an otherwise diverse orchard/fruit forest. I guess that is where your plant seeds everywhere video comes in. Any seed anywhere (or not there, haha).
Absolutely. Rootstock will determine energy flow to the rest of the tree. This can impact not only size of the tree, but also when it breaks dormancy. As far as monoculture of rootstock, that is NOT a concern (well 99% isn't) because the genetics of the tree and fruit are based on the fruiting wood, not the rootstock wood. it would only be a concern if there is a root or soil pathogen that could wipe out all your trees and that certain rootstock is weak against.
I love Angela's work. It's funny, when her meme of her yard went viral, one of the places it did was on the landscaping subreddit, and a lot of people were bashing it. I was the person there who told people of her amazing youtube channel, and how incredible her yard is.
I have three acres that I cannot at the moment, live on. I am thinking about where to put things, & what I can plant now. This was very helpful! TY! I am also thinking of asking a University to get their students to look at my land & make suggestions for swales, mini ponds & where exactly to plant the big nut trees :)
I don't really have anything else to comment so I'll latch onto your redundancy bit to give a reminder that I've always remembered from my armchair engineering. Two is one, One is none!
Very good advice! I've got an addiction to free shrubs, trees and perennials on our local buy and sell 🤣 So many people trying to get rid of things! Some have just been placed randomly over the last few years, just because they needed to get in the ground. But I can always move them. I just took a PDC with Verge this winter and am revamping much of our property and getting a better plan in place. Thank-you for all your great info!
I made one mistake...well, one bigger mistake. I build my food forest thinking it would be that space and that's it. I have another part where we planted things but completely different. And last year we connected these two parts with blueberry bush rows. So now it's a huge food forest (for me anyway) but there's no continuum. There's no path. If I want something more gracious, more foresty, I have to remove shrubs and plants that are now established there. And I have to figure out where to put kiwi plants in there too. haha!
It took me five full years to realise what the "desire lines" through our land were, I am kind of glad I didn't plant TOO densely until now, but on the other hand, I would maybe rather have your problem where at least I have years of growth, and though removing established stuff isn't great, it's good to have established stuff! Plus a lot of things can be moved, even if it sets back their development somewhat.
@@thehillsidegardener3961 @The Hillside Gardener For sure, we can always move some bushes. The trees can stay where they are. Thanks for the reminder!
I planted 50 blueberries along the property line thinking that it would be a nice neighborly thing to do...then, I realized that my neighbors didn't want to take care of their side, so I ended up moving them...yes, all fifty! They all survived and thrived. I'm picturing some sort of trellis/pergola structure connecting your two areas...a place where you can sit and cool off and rest. Upon that, you can plant your kiwi. Maybe have your blueberries out from it (south side?) That's how mine is set up, and it works beautifully.
@@barbarasimoes9463 Yeah, that could be something. Since the other part is also a hop jungle that need some training... It would probably be a sitting site but you never know
@@barbarasimoes9463 It's good to know it's doable. Plants are more resilient than we give them credit for, I find it's a good idea to cut them back a bit more severely when moving them to help them compensate for the root damage, and they usually do fine. Still haven't got into blueberries, they seem a bit more fussy in terms of their needs and are expensive to buy, so don't want to mess them up!
i love this video. i for example like my esthetics and have much room to work with. i started by picking the trees and bushes i like the most and invested money that ii could afford. not everyone has the room i have or the money. im not rich i just wanted to start quickly. i have a greenhouse that is almost finished building and thats where ill do most of cloning and starting fruit and vegetables. i have one swale feeding the ponds but there is a plan to catch rain water and use it for irrigation(my last big investment for the food forest). plant a tree today and work around it great advise. cheers kieth again great video
So glad I found your channel while searching for people practicing permaculture in Canada. I just finished my PDC with Verge Permaculture and you are an inspiration to what is possible here in Canada. I am in Montreal. I was curious what software and specifically design icons you used when you were a design consultant?
I used a pretty cheap software called Garden Planner. It just has a bunch of icons that you can place, almost like stickers. All that matters is that you get a general point across. However, on a larger site design, (like Verge sometimes does) I would definitely recommend something more "professional", like autocad or something. I'm honestly not sure what they use. However for small projects, anything works, and Garden planner was cheap.
You're ether on a roll with the videos or I'm just been to busy previously... 😅 Amazing informative videos as always and got me thinking about our old family countryhouse and how I should maybe rethink the plans for more accessibility and less maintenance. I been the custodian of the land there but I think I need rethink somethings if my elderly parents will move out there and how they will become the primary custodians. I have planned everything for low maintenance except the landscape flower garden....and that's their baby that I keep for them.....😅 The calorie or nutritional point really hit home and got me thinking of storage and processing food vs eating harvest directly and what my parents will probably enjoy/use more if they move out permanently?
@@ediblelandscaping1504 In Sweden because of russia, we are in the cusp of an energy crisis and the gov had to hold an emergency pressconferance this weekend, so the electricity issue is an real issue. Im in the same boat as you regarding freezing and working on alternatives as well. Because I just don't like canned stuff so much, I really haven't learned to can properly. So not really safe regarding the storage issue. im toast if my freezer(s) dies on me. I make som jelly and jam for more traditional swedish dishes, and dry mushrooms and beans but can't do shit beyond that...😅 will have to empty one freezer to dry and maybe learn to can properly this fall, because our energy bills will continue to rise exponentially, because of the energy crisis here in Europe.
very good video, i have to add one thing wich in many cases is also a priority: what about your animals? ive been growing alot of my own food for a decade or so and more and more change towards making sure if i have an abundance of anything, i can feed it to my family's horses, chickens will also propably eat everything a human eats, but having different animals require different information!
I've only recently been given the "green light" to start getting some animals (family buy-in is really important to me), so I'm not in a great position to answer this one yet. I typically tend to only like commenting on things I know well enough to have a valid opinion on - animals is something I need more time with.
Great info. These are essential questions to consider Learning to grow your own plants from seed and cutting is a huge asset for expanding your food forest
Great video! Some of my goals are conflicting. I want wild life, but darn it, I'm sick of the bunnies chewing my grape vines down to the ground every winter! I will be doing a better job at protecting them this year! I want all the birds, but darn it, I hate it when they eat every last cherry on my trees! I have already maxed out how many I can have in my tiny space, but I hope that as the threes get bigger there will be enough for all of us. I am getting better at hiding some crops under others so that the bunnies don't eat them in the first few days after they have sprouted, but I'm still struggling a bit. Hiding plants AND making sure that they get enough sun is a tricky balance. I ended up planting a BUNCH of stiff in pots on my deck this year...including carrots!
I think the bigger everything gets, the more you can allow wildlife in. Plenty of fodder to distract them is the key. Also understanding that no matter how much you do, they will still do damage.
@@con_sci depends on what's going in your septic tank. The idea that it's dangerous is mostly the ick factor. Humanure is safe when composted. In a leach field it is composted and diluted.
I'll just echo what people have said here. Shallow rooted plants. I hear blueberries can do great over skeptics. I have my grapes over the septic. No concerns with growing food there, as long as it isn't root crops, and the septic is working properly. Myself, I figured I'd also avoid leafy greens, and only grow edibles that put on a fruit. This just puts the food an extra step further from any septic leech.
This is an awesome an encouraging video! I’ve been thinking about starting a food forest on our land but wasn’t sure where to start. There are so many possibilities! I do want to have a bit of structure for ease of harvest, but also wild areas. I’m going to start sketching. Thank you! 🙏🏼
I concur and get excited about everything you talk about (thank you!) until it comes to swales…that is where I get overwhelmed. 😂 I know that is your wheelhouse as an engineer. But maybe I don’t even need to think about it? I’m not sure how important it is where I live in Alaska. It is very dry in the spring, so takes a lot of watering to get things going in June - it felt like the desert - had to water sometimes twice a day, but then suddenly July, Aug, and Sept we are so wet with rain. I dont have problems with standing water, but man it is still so wet. I even have to pull mulch away from the base of plants to try to dry it out as the ground starts like molding and growing green moss. Out of our 4 months, I only wish I was capturing water the month of June. I haven’t had to water my garden since June! One other thing - Ive had more than one nursery owner tell me not to bark chip mulch around perennials as it locks in the cold in the winter and will thaw slower in the spring. I’m not really following them. Is there any truth to that? I can easily move chips away from the base of plants in the spring, but that it can do harm over the winter…?
It's true, but not because it locks cold in, it just acts like a thermal moderator. I.e. it takes extreme swings in temperature and flattens them out. There is no harm in this, it's actually better for the plants to not experience extreme swings in soil temp.
For the swale question, they can have the most value in the driest climates, because usually they get water, but only a few times and a LOT of it. So holding it is important. Swales will cause the water to stop, slow and be held, and then it will slowly sink into the subsoils and rebuild underground aquifers. Often the benefit of having a swale isn't seen for 4-7 years or longer, it depends on how deep your hardpan is beneath. For you, it would likely mean that on the summer, your plants will still have access to some of the spring snow melt, as it will be stored underground. In the wet fall, the swale may actually stay full for longer, but the trench depression itself will help pull water out of standing areas (similar to how a dry well works, or a French drain) and will likely also alleviate some of the standing water problems you have in the fall.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy Wow! Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge. That makes a lot of sense and considers things I’d never even think of. Good thing there are engineers like you who get this stuff. We don’t have any standing water problems. The excavators did a really good job, but there has been so much water some homes nearby have had septics failing. We all basically live on a riverbed that used to be a glacier. We do have an area that is just really wet. Even though there is no visible standing water it sounds like it could help prevent some issues and improve drainage. Thank you! You’ve given me a lot to think about! Future goals!😁
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy Thank you thank you!!! 🙏🏽 I kept thinking how you live in almost the same climate as I do and have never had a problem. I will put that out of my mind now and carry on mulching!😆😁👍 I am saving this response to pass it along in case it ever comes up again. 😁
Great video !!!!!! Love your videos! Glad I randomly came across this channel !! I want a food forest when I buy a place someday. I love this stuff so much!!
My big question is :-) I live where it only rains once a year anymore and we do freeze on top of all that chemical farming is destroying everything in sight. I have a few challenges
I also appreciate your videos. I am trying to source a few trees and shrubs for my VERY small permaculture inspired garden. I am located in southern Ontario in the GTHA. Would love some recommendations on nursery or two that I can get some plants, like hascaps, elderberry, currants, etc, from.
I really appreciate all your videos , I'm doing research in Permaculture for about a year now, im looking into a piece of vacant land basically a swampy area in a 4b region in Ontario Canada, im looking into a chinampas in a cold hardy climate, not sure if will work but im really excited about changing my life style from urban to rural. I want to have animals and try to make a living of it, in a sustainable and regenerative.
As long as you connect them to a decently deep pond area for the fish to survive the winter, they will do great. I was thinking of doing chinampas in my back 2 acres.
Great video as usual. All your videos are great. My main goal is to eliminate grass in my 30 x50 bee yard orchard. But part of it is because of where we live and how far we are from a store, we wanted more food and fruit on the property and enclosed in an electrified compound helps keep the bears away. But I do have a question. You are in zone four, right. We are zone 3/4 here and because of the 10” of river rock onto of nice soil, it was easier for us to make a raised bed for our blue berries. But now I worry about winter. The bed is maybe 8” high. Do you think if I mulch with a th I, bed of straw, they will be ok. All four plants were planted this spring. Thanks 🇨🇦🌷🐝
They will be more at risk for sure. Will they make it? I think so. I can't promise of course, but they should be okay. One thing you could do is to surround the beds with bales of straw, or bags of leaves.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy thanks, a friend has a bunch of straw she is giving me and my neighbour has offered me bags of leaves. So I will add both. Thank you for your support and advice
Is it worth it to put swales in sandy soil?Especially if you put big trees like walnut 6meters downstream,will the water really beneficiate to the walnut?I'm afraid water just go straight down with my sandy draining soil
Yeah it's fine, it's drains away anyways. It's going to hit hardpan at some point and recharge the underground aquifer. Geoff Lawton always says that the best place for a swale is in the desert.
Trying to create a permaculture is a noble task that should not be taken "lightly?" One major variable is time, time beyond a calendar year, time which is often neglected. Sure, have a daily, weekly, monthly plan but we must look 10, 15 or more years down the road. Sort of how you mentioned large shade trees. If people cannot see themselves on a property for the rest of their lives or their family continuing the legacy it maybe valuable time and energy lost. I am not saying that it should not be done, it is how these goals we set for ourselves are valued.
Couldn't agree more. So many of the problems we are dealing with today are because humanity can't look further than the next financial quarter to decide what we should be doing, or where our focus should be. We need to zoom out and think bigger (and further into the future). The home gardener should think at least a few years or decades into the future. Political choices/decisions/projects should be thinking 200-2000 years into the future. I.e. what happens to people 500 years from now if we empty the world's coal reserves, cut down all the trees, and poison the water with forever chemicals and plastic.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy When proper "steps" are taken we would not have the issues that you pointed out. We still want to make a quick buck and take short-cuts. Many of which are just dumping the waste products.
I have a tiny urban yard and an autoimmune problem. Is there somewhere to find a Permaculture designer? I love to putz around in the garden but don’t have it to do a lot of planting. With a design maybe I could hire somebody
How do you start when there is a monoculture of pine trees everywhere? I was thinking of leaving groupings of them randomly for the wildlife and plant the food forest around them, is this what you did with your cedar trees?
You will laugh. I started looking into Permaculture, because I don’t wanna mow grass. Is that a good enough reason to start? I haven’t started yet, I did order some fruit trees that should be delivered in the spring.
I really appreciate this video. I filmed a video on this topic last week and your fifth point never occurred to me, because for me, the reality is I had to work around existing structures and couldn’t move them, so I never even thought about making the really expensive error of putting your house in the wrong place. That is such an important point for folks who are moving on to a plot of land where they need to build their home.
Thanks Angela. FYI for anyone reading this, Angela's video on this exact same topic is fantastic, definitely go check it out. Her entire channel is incredible.
i moved into a house with what FOR ME was an enormous amount of lawn (tiiny by most standards) in a subdivision. so my budding baby food forest is constrained by existing structures, neighboring structures, small space, and a need to look at least reasonably attractive to the nieghbors
I have a question , I've never seen plans for big permaculture projects, say 1400 acres how could th work
Economics was the most important point for me. Just could never buy expensive nursery-quality, standard-grown apple and peach trees, so I started with buying one cheap little £2 fruit bush when out shopping for supermarket groceries.
Over my first winter living at my present property, I slowly collected one each of blackcurrant, redcurrant, whitecurrant, thornless blackberry, green gooseberry, red gooseberry, large-fruited red raspberry, autumn-fruiting raspberry and a yellow raspberry.
After carefully planting and tending, I didn't so much concentrate on what amount of fruit they would produce in their first year - but how to sensibly propagate them in the autumn so I could multiply harvests in future years.
From a few of my original berry bushes, I probably have a total of 100 currants, 400 raspberries, and 150 thornless blackberries.
Slightly later, at times when I could afford to, I added a few cheap supermarket bare root apple and cherry trees, blueberries and honeyberries.
I grew fruits from seeds, pips and stones, regardless of the knowledge that they commonly revert to parent types or not (because you can always turn smaller, sharper apples into apple cider vinegar, pickle certain others, and use them to add a 'bite' to otherwise fairly insipid dishes. Sharp-tasting cherries can be cooked or added to mixed fruit jams).
I looked into fruits that grow wild in my native country but don't normally find themselves grown in gardens as fruit any more - sloes (for jam, my neighbour turns them into gin), damsons, and Viburnum opulus (must be cooked thoroughly for 20 minutes to destroy the poison).
Lately, I have begun investing in unusual fruits, as I truly believe that the key to food security is to diversify my collection as far as my location will allow.
I now have a total of 53 different types and species of fruit plant, the latest additions being black, purple and peach-coloured raspberries (all having unique flavours), something called an Ugni Guava (looked interesting), 3 teeny-tiny Sumacs, and 3 plug-plant sized Cranberries.
But of all things, I think the most important skill for me has been an ability to successfully, efficiently and confidently propagate and prune plants.
By those 2 skills, I have totally bypassed the high cost of stocking a permaculture-style garden, and it's now a habit to propagate any pruning materials I have.
Amazing! This is such a great example of how a plan can be TOTALLY DIFFERENT for two different sets of people. One of my consultations was for a newly retired couple who bought land and wanted to transform it with permaculture. They had more money than they knew what to do with, but TIME was the thing they didn't have much of (the husband has a terminal illness). Their plan was the complete opposite of yours, and for obvious reasons.
Yours however more closely resembles mine. I have another 2 acres to plant out, but I'm going to chip away at that over a lifetime, using existing plants and TONS of propagation.
Amazing comment!
I have a small front and back yard and it's getting crowded with food I'm almost out of room but I've been propagating and slowly taking over my neighbors yards and my moms and my sisters house soon ill have my own nursery selling plants from my driveway to extend my permaculture impact to the rest of the town
Good Foods that grow wild in your area is quite a topic to explore
3rd skill: patience. 😊
I will be 60 in a few months. We have a small tractor, a little back hoe, and my husband is handy. I can usually convince him to help on the property even if he isn’t into permaculture or gardening. We are raising grandchildren (13 and 9). Luckily I’m in good health and I don’t have an aversion to child labor.
Made me spit out my drink HAHA 😄
Besides it's not really labour, it's more of a classroom lesson. A useful one 👌
😂
When we were children, every yard had a fruit tree in it. And as children we went and picked all the fruit from every yard. None of our parents had to go out and buy fruit. Many even grew their own gardens. So many didn't even have to buy vegetables.
Exactly, and think about entire communities done this way. All the trading between families, and community cohesion and resilience that this fosters.
I remember living in Texas. We would pick pomegranate on it way to school. Oh the memories!
I recall that being part of my childhood as well. Citrus, loquats, mulberries, guava, figs, papayas everywhere. I have no idea what happened to that ? Was that the older generation thing? I feel like it skipped the generation to garden with my mom. I was practically raised by my grandparents and I spent so much time in the garden with them I love it.
A few years ago we allowed some loggers to cut some pines. They failed to get the ones closest to the house which were the main ones we wanted gone. They left the biggest ruts. The area is where I wanted to plant a good forest. I thought for one second about getting my husband to use the tractor to push the dirty into the ruts and then thought better off that! I let them alone. They collect water. One even has cattails growing in it. Have no idea where that came from but I love it. The area is still over grown and may never get my food forest.
We have just moved into a cottage with a huge overgrown garden and are in the process of permaculturing it with a greenhouse, market garden and food forest areas. The woodland is mainly bluebells, brambles, nettles and pine trees but I am hoping to introduce berry bushes and edible mushrooms. It's a rental so we can't completely overhaul it but work with what already exists
One of the goals for me, I’ve discovered, is poly culture. Not because that’s a permaculture principle. But because polyculture is COOL in the summer, I have realized. Front yard still hot because a bunch of it is still grass. But same time of day, I go out back, and it’s already cool outside. ❤️❤️❤️
haha for sure 😅
I hope to start a food forest in my mother's backyard so she can have some food independence and avoid the high cost of groceries in the area. This video is immensely helpful, thank you.
Good luck!
Feel-good content makes me feel bad.
Educational content makes me feel good.
Videos that are both educational and feel-good make me feel very good.
You had asked me what brought me to this video and or Permaculture?
I watched a video called Back to Eden. Paul Gautschi changed my whole way of thinking about the way I was killing my soil and I was hooked from the moment the video ended. So I joined the permaculture cult as they call us who don't understand why and will never understand how or why. It has changed my life in such a way and made my garden grow me. No matter how we do it, If it's covered then it has us covered.
it really challenges me to work less to produce more abundance over the years. Some say oh that crap takes to long. We have nothing but time. So how's it taking to much time? Over the years I've seen a gradual increase in plant growth and abundance of life. The food is just a perk, watching it come to life and grow from it is awesome!
Two words
Sustainable Permaculture
If you want some more inspiration, check out David Holmgren, RetoSuburbia The Downshifters guide to a Resilient Future. It's got lots of nifty ideas particularly in the three zones around the house. If you have a larger block look into silvopasture and holistic management by Allan Savory
Love Paul and the back to Eden garden!
Found the perfect channel. Have a passion to restore biodiversity!!
We love you back Keith! Thanks for all the inspiration as always.
Thanks Holly as always! so kind.
I am so thankful that I found this video. I will be rewatching it while taking notes. I appreciate you sharing this valuable advice. I also appreciate your thoughtful responses to your viewers and many of their comments as well. Thank you for sharing your time, knowledge, and wisdom!
You are so welcome!
Good day-Caadian!really unusual picture~✋
This is what happens when I let my kids pick the thumbnail LOL 😆 😂 🤣
I've been told that the best way to harvest seabuckthone is to clip the whole branch of berries and put it in the freezer. once it's frozen, you can take the branch and gently whack it in a large bowl. The berries fall off and you can discard the branch - much safer than climbing into the bush for that last berry!
We do that sometimes. I find it doesn't work as well as people say. I think as my named cultivars set fruit, it may work better for those ones. They hold the fruit a little farther from the branch.
Yay for usable nerdy info! I love everything on your channel but I particularly appreciate the detailed, educational, how-to or theoretical systems-thinking videos. Thank you.
Thanks! I'm glad they are helpful. 😀
You are the man! Thanks for all of this information. I am looking forward to using your videos as my "school". It seems to me that we think alike. However, you have way more knowledge. This is why I appreciate what you have done and continue to do! Also, because you are genuinely sincere,.
So kind, thank you!
I really love your tip you gave at 8:30
I used lockdown time of covid to do that and my garden is doing so much better now that I’ve gotten to know my sunlight 🎉
Awesome. I've also made changes based on watching spring snow melts - where the water pools, where it overflows after pooling, etc. Such valuable information!
This is a great refresher on all the things to think about when working on a property. I'll definitely be rewatching this video in the future.
Really thank you for this video! This is what I acctually teach my students in school. Set your goal, then learn how to reach them.
When in permaculture surroundings, I very much talk in the same way as you do. What do you like to eat? Is this for buissness? Is it for helth? What are your goal?
I'm 5 years into my lifetime project. On about 5 acres I have my house, and a combined kitchengarden, foodforest, apiary, medicinal garden. Medicinal in 2 ways, one way Is to acctually grow medicinal plants, an other Is to build up different "rooms" in the garden. Soft places with soft soil and Moss. Sparky places, calm places, buissy places, waterplaces etc etc. To soothe and ease the mind. Working with that healthy Green colour for helth in the soul. I've been following the medicinal gardens at SLU in Sweden, where they treated, among other things, PTSD and overworked brains that has shut down. I like the idea of geting helthy in many ways.
Who needs a gym when having a garden? Or, how to build and outdoor gym? Depending on what kind of person you are.
Just thanks for this very inspiering film! Lot's of love from Sweden!
And you really have to live the life of the gardener to understand it also. I can't even explain how healing it is to be in a garden constantly.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy I so agree with you there! It is healing to be in a garden.
Perfect timing! I'm having talks today to lease a piece of land (buying's shelved for now unfortunately) and these questions and my answers to them also come in handy for that talk 👍. Wish me luck!
I'm truly excited for you as this is my dream, too! Lifting you up in prayer that all goes well!😃❤️🙏
Good luck!
I am coming to this in Australia seeing the impact of climate change here with heatwaves, fires, flood and at times real food insecurity now with the global impact on the cost of food travelling around our country, the rising costs to farmers for water and as such the design of my garden will allow shade for those heat waves, and I am increasing my ability to harvest rainwater (so that when it does rain, I can catch all I can). The fruit trees will also create shade for the house, planted nearer the house to be that shade from the summer sun, then without leaves in winter to allow the sun to warm us. I am wanting healthier winter food, prettier than supermarket produce with edible flowers and purple/red leaves too. You are right - to ask ourselves why we are doing this because there is a cost on our time, our resources and our budgets, from my perspective we have reached the tipping point and to get to basics for me is a rewarding pursuit. Thanks for sharing your insights with us.
Thank you for such a wonderful comment
Thank you! I had sort of forgotten there was an order to things 🤣 I'm planting out the first plants on the first swale, really just trying for shade down here in Florida. Shade and mulch
Shade and mulch, probably the 2 secret weapons to Florida gardening
Big mistake I made was when buying fruit trees that require others for pollination , ie, apple trees . I bought two different varieties thinking I could enjoy both . However they both flower at different times which now they don't pollinate . So my option are clone , plant , wait 2-3 years orrr buy more trees 😅
Building a food forest in Ecuador! The best weather in the world. Could use a bit more sunlight. Growing 365 is a tough gig. Keeping the soil going and strong is the main focus.
Yeah 365 day growing season, fertility cycling is the biggest focus. Lots of chop and drop can do wonders for replenishing nutrients and keeping to build soil.
Some great questions to ask here, I think I intuitively realised most of these when I began heading in this direction with my land, but to be honest I probably took way too long fully developing them, and rushed into some decisions without thinking them through, or didn't prioritise some things early on which would have benefited me now. I would say these are absolutely the bare bones, and you won't be overthinking things by at least giving them some thought, any more than this and you might start getting into analysis paralysis. I am still glad I did SOMETHING, even though it wasn't always the "right" thing.
Awesome content. I love the nerdy ones because it helps my thirsty brain. I wanted a food forest to do my part to heal the earth, and in turn heal me. I want that peaceful refuge and abundance that nature brings. And I did start. 11 fruit trees, 20 berry bushes, flowers, annual veggies, new compost pile every 2 weeks. even consulted the local watershed group to get help managing the stream and planting a bunch of Acadian forest trees for free! Highly recommend if you have a waterway on or near your property. I have a large blank slate so I am trying to work from the edges of existing structures out.
That's so cool!
Right on Julie! You are doing it- healing nature heals us, medicine.
I mostly want to grow fruit trees I love to eat and have maybe 2-3 chickens. That’s it!
Love the micro swale/pond idea. The whole “on contour” thing has always been super confusing to me and I wondered also about trip hazards. We are only on 1 acre but there’s still a lot we can do here
thank you sir
Could you do a video (maybe you already have one in earlier years?) about how you looked for your land? What criteria you used to choose your land (I recall you saying it had to have a stream on it?)? How you saved up for it?
Aside, it's so interesting to me that I think "alternatively" on various topics and chose a low income job to give me the freedom to think and live outside the mainstream. You on the other hand are living and thinking outside the mainstream and have a job in mainstream making good money. A video on how you straddle both worlds would be interesting.
Love these questions and tips, thanks :)
The closest to that is this video here: th-cam.com/video/C_HfycRUOFM/w-d-xo.html
Outstanding and inspiring video! My main goals are the same as yours, but our priorities are a bit different. Good healthy food is #1, but developing a healthy ecosystem and contributing to improving our environment are right up there. Thanks for your hard work and sharing! You are the man!
another question is how fast do you want to get things done?
if one wants it completely planted out in 5 years, it'll take money to buy plants, materials, and heavy equipment use.
if the building of a food forest is a lifestyle journey, starting from seed and putting in a lot of labor becomes an option. plus, there's no need for a strict design since you always have the time to change things that don't work.
Great one!
It's worth becoming educated in permaculture so that you don't miss out on potential systems. Plants can be redone with heart ache, but reorienting your house to use the sun changing the roof design, relocating the driveway...can be outrageously expensive.... worse still if you haven't considered accessibility and you can't enter your house or use the bathroom after breaking your leg or you had the fortune to get old.
4:58 Always great advice, gentlemen!
Thank you! Indeed, I've heard that many times from older folks, and I always try to listen when people with experience doing something speak. Always learn from everyone. Everyone can teach you something!
TREEmendous vid, thanks for the gift. I found a Hascap bush abandoned on the Farm & tried the berries.....wow!
No way! What an odd bush to find, many people don't even know about them.
Love your channel- it has changed my goals for ife, changing the direction for e better. You are all amazing!
❤️
As always, awesome content. The answer to question #1....why am I here, what got me interested in permaculture. Easy answer, YOU. Your passion inspired me to get into permaculture and I thank you for it. Best to you & yours
❤️
Excellent summary Keith! This is a great, lightly technical primer to permaculture and site design. I'm sure I'll be referring people back to this one a bunch in the future.
This made me really think & ask the famous question why? 🤔💭 food, preserving, beauty, native plants to encourage & support nature…educating my boys, living healthy through choices…
speaking up for the folks moving in to a suburban or urban environment... (i just moved from urban to suburban and OMG so much space by comparison!!!)
find out the local regulations. if you are unfortunate enough to have a HOA (im so sorry) make sure you know EXACTLY what the rules are. this applies to local rules also: my township, for example, doesnt allow chickens in areas marked 'residential' and requires permits before pretty much any construction.
UNSPOKEN rules are critical also.
you do not want to have a bad relationship with the neighborhood. you dont have to be buddy buddy, but you dont want your neighbor complaining about the property line, you dont want neighbors angry that your property "looks bad" even if you want a really wild looking food forest, you can make it fit... add a decorative fence, make a more 'tame' area up front, or plant view blocking but decorative plants to keep the "mess" out of sight.
if you can tolerate a more constrained LOOK? many many berry bushes and fruit trees can look just like decorative landscaping! you can also make your water holds and water catchments look more like design choices (yes it will cost more)
as to water... allow me to share my disaster
we have two down spout s from the roof. one visibly goes into pipe that goes underground to the sewer... the other one went behind a landscape bush by the front door and we *assumed* also went straight into the sewer.
I finally got fed up with the bush and cut it...and found out the water spout was just ... dumping... right there on the bushes roots... next to our foundation.
its AMAZING how fast you can find a pond liner, and set up a fake stream bed to direct water at least a few feet away...
Hey thanks dude, you rock!
liked and subscribed! you are loved from Portugal! thanks for sharing🙏
Welcome to the family! The best part of this channel is the community and the comment section!
A video on mini swales would be great for us urban gardeners.
That's a good idea. I may tinker my annual garden this fall, and if I do I will make a focus on this.
You should do a mini swale in your mother’s small garden and use it as an example.
That's a good idea
Just kidding. You have way too much on your hands.
Yes!!
We went whole heartedly down the 'rapid approach' method. It's been an incredible amount of work for the last 4 years, but it's finally starting to really pay off (pluots, pluerries and figs this year, first good raspberry harvest, etc). We've got approximately half our our 1/3 acre plot landscaped so far and we're slowing down on our planting projects (more filling in spots with native plants and doing erosion control work). For cost, we've probably spent a couple thousand USD on plants (mostly bare root trees at $25 each, potted plants between $5 and $150), and maybe $300 on mulch (delivery is about $90-100 for a dump truck load). Good soil / compost to fill up raised beds is expensive too. Probably at least $1500 over the years. I'd say, in total, we've probably put in $4-5k in the food forest and garden stuff. FWIW, the hardscaping costs to dress up the rest of our yard are way more expensive than any of the plants/soil. If we were more financially constrained, I would have taken a very different approach and probably bought scionwood / seedling rootstocks to graft myself. You can get the variety of fruit trees you want for a couple dollars. Getting cuttings from neighbors and friends would also save quite a bit of cost, as would collecting native plant seed to propagate. It doesn't have to be expensive, but I wanted to landscape quickly.
Our first year on the property, we planted out a small orchard of fruit trees by the side of our house (about 9 trees) and put a bunch of native plants in the back yard + 4 ribes. The following year we had one of our other fenced yards hardscaped (terraced garden beds) and started to plant that out (mostly natives and decorative plants, 1 apricot, 3 bush cherries). Year 3 we were really bored during the pandemic so we planted out one side of our front yard (probably 70' by 25'). Crazy amount of work that year (8 fruit trees, 5 evergreen trees, a garden bed, two rows of native shrubs for a windbreak). This year we finished off some spots to dress up the front yard (edged our driveway with native plants), put in espaliered fruit trees / grapes / herbs along one of our fencelines and did another part of the front yard in native plants.
We're at the point where our fruit trees are just starting to get pretty big. The oldest are getting to be 10-12' tall. The 2nd year trees are 6-8' tall. I've had to remove 1 already that wasn't growing well and will remove another that is a bit diseased. In general, most of the trees are super healthy and growing nicely. We got a decent amount of precipitation this summer and everything erupted in growth. We luckily didn't put the trees / shrubs too close to each other, but we're now understanding how easy it would be to not leave yourselves walking paths. Some parts we did go a bit on the dense side for the wind break value. I'll have to trim those plants slightly if they exceed the typical sizes. I normally give them a light shaping over the winter so that they're a little more regular shaped (not as unruly). In general, we wouldn't plant extremely densely for fire reasons here. Gotta do the necessary risk reduction where it makes sense. I think a lot of folks can be intimidated by the "overgrown jungle" approach that some permaculturists take to 'efficiently' use the space.
Since you mentioned planning, we 'engineered' the layout by walking the areas putting stakes out and eventually putting everything into a free sketching software (inkscape worked great for us) using mature plant sizes. In the case of our fruit trees, I spaced them a little more compactly as I'll prune them to 8-10' wide (instead of 12-15' that they'd reach on semi dwarf rootstocks). We made sure to get a feel for the amount of sun each of the areas get with the type of plants. I might move a few shrubs at some point to better spots (redcurrants getting too much sun), but all in all, I think it worked out pretty well. We did have to consider some trees that would get less sun in their early years due to shade from fencelines, and then get way more sun once they're above 6' tall. By that point, the trees roots are fairly well established and they'll take off with all the extra sun. One of our apricots is already starting to do this, a little slow the first 2 years and it's pushing 8' tall. Next year it'll be huge, which is great as I put it as a cornerstone shade tree.
Awesome comment! I think you are ready to be a consultant Nate!
We love your videos and share them all the time! Thanks so much for all you do.
I appreciate that!
Oh! I'm watching this video now and seems like I've got the answers to my questions which I've posted few minutes ago below another video :) So thanks again for sharing this precious knowledge!
Awesome!
My prime consideration is the environment, soils, and trying to understand how things like diversified planting can benefit the plants, wildlife and me.
Living in Surrey BC has given me some serious frustrations with condo towers packed in close proximity, black exteriors, and removal of trees that were at least 50 years old.
There are people literally paving their yards, making a frying pan out of the neighborhoods.
So I chose to encourage people to share tree cuttings, donate to community gardens, and improve the minute amount of soils I have direct contact with.
Geoff Lawton, Dr Elaine Ingham, and many others have given me reasons to do what I can. Unfortunately the amount of time left in my life won't allow me much room, but I prefer to leave behind the knowledge for the rest.
Regenerative agriculture, hemp based building, trying to contact people who do have influence over land, water, forestry uses.
Rammed earth buildings started one aspect, then moving into leaving behind as little damage as possible.
It's crazy how modern cities are done. Pavement everywhere.
All we can do is make the most of the time we are given. It sounds like you are doing that in spades!
I think this behaviour began with New York City, the idea of "glitz and glam" after the Empire State building went up to world acclaim. Add in the mass use of cars,etc and pavement everywhere.
Undoing behaviour must change, now. It's deadly to animals and plants, plus health hazards to people.
I just found you about three days ago and I am so happy the algorithm worked for me this time. Your scientific explanations are so needed in this space, where most content creators tell you to do something, because. Thanks for your time and effort and your family for allowing you. :) You and Edible Acres are two of my favorites!
Thanks! Being in the same sentence as Sean (who was my main inspiration 7 years ago) is so flattering!
This was SO HELPFUL! Great video for newbies like us just starting out. I loved the intro and outro, great flow and engagement, and just absolutely packed with useful and important info. Thanks so much.
I am so grateful for this video. Thank you.
Great information. The intro had me thinking about some of your old videos. One question came to mind in talking about design and buying trees… rootstock. Is this something you give a lot of thought to? I was also half concerned about the monoculture side of using the same rootstock through an otherwise diverse orchard/fruit forest. I guess that is where your plant seeds everywhere video comes in. Any seed anywhere (or not there, haha).
Absolutely. Rootstock will determine energy flow to the rest of the tree. This can impact not only size of the tree, but also when it breaks dormancy.
As far as monoculture of rootstock, that is NOT a concern (well 99% isn't) because the genetics of the tree and fruit are based on the fruiting wood, not the rootstock wood.
it would only be a concern if there is a root or soil pathogen that could wipe out all your trees and that certain rootstock is weak against.
Great video! Came here from Parkrose Permacultures channel! Love you both!
I love Angela's work. It's funny, when her meme of her yard went viral, one of the places it did was on the landscaping subreddit, and a lot of people were bashing it. I was the person there who told people of her amazing youtube channel, and how incredible her yard is.
I have three acres that I cannot at the moment, live on. I am thinking about where to put things, & what I can plant now. This was very helpful! TY! I am also thinking of asking a University to get their students to look at my land & make suggestions for swales, mini ponds & where exactly to plant the big nut trees :)
I don't really have anything else to comment so I'll latch onto your redundancy bit to give a reminder that I've always remembered from my armchair engineering.
Two is one, One is none!
very helpful video, thanks
I love your common sense!!
It's in too short supply these days LOL
Very good advice! I've got an addiction to free shrubs, trees and perennials on our local buy and sell 🤣 So many people trying to get rid of things! Some have just been placed randomly over the last few years, just because they needed to get in the ground. But I can always move them. I just took a PDC with Verge this winter and am revamping much of our property and getting a better plan in place. Thank-you for all your great info!
I made one mistake...well, one bigger mistake. I build my food forest thinking it would be that space and that's it. I have another part where we planted things but completely different. And last year we connected these two parts with blueberry bush rows. So now it's a huge food forest (for me anyway) but there's no continuum. There's no path. If I want something more gracious, more foresty, I have to remove shrubs and plants that are now established there. And I have to figure out where to put kiwi plants in there too. haha!
It took me five full years to realise what the "desire lines" through our land were, I am kind of glad I didn't plant TOO densely until now, but on the other hand, I would maybe rather have your problem where at least I have years of growth, and though removing established stuff isn't great, it's good to have established stuff! Plus a lot of things can be moved, even if it sets back their development somewhat.
@@thehillsidegardener3961 @The Hillside Gardener For sure, we can always move some bushes. The trees can stay where they are. Thanks for the reminder!
I planted 50 blueberries along the property line thinking that it would be a nice neighborly thing to do...then, I realized that my neighbors didn't want to take care of their side, so I ended up moving them...yes, all fifty! They all survived and thrived. I'm picturing some sort of trellis/pergola structure connecting your two areas...a place where you can sit and cool off and rest. Upon that, you can plant your kiwi. Maybe have your blueberries out from it (south side?) That's how mine is set up, and it works beautifully.
@@barbarasimoes9463 Yeah, that could be something. Since the other part is also a hop jungle that need some training...
It would probably be a sitting site but you never know
@@barbarasimoes9463 It's good to know it's doable. Plants are more resilient than we give them credit for, I find it's a good idea to cut them back a bit more severely when moving them to help them compensate for the root damage, and they usually do fine. Still haven't got into blueberries, they seem a bit more fussy in terms of their needs and are expensive to buy, so don't want to mess them up!
i love this video. i for example like my esthetics and have much room to work with. i started by picking the trees and bushes i like the most and invested money that ii could afford. not everyone has the room i have or the money. im not rich i just wanted to start quickly. i have a greenhouse that is almost finished building and thats where ill do most of cloning and starting fruit and vegetables. i have one swale feeding the ponds but there is a plan to catch rain water and use it for irrigation(my last big investment for the food forest). plant a tree today and work around it great advise. cheers kieth again great video
Fun video! Congrats on 50k subscribers.
Oh neat
So glad I found your channel while searching for people practicing permaculture in Canada. I just finished my PDC with Verge Permaculture and you are an inspiration to what is possible here in Canada. I am in Montreal. I was curious what software and specifically design icons you used when you were a design consultant?
I used a pretty cheap software called Garden Planner. It just has a bunch of icons that you can place, almost like stickers. All that matters is that you get a general point across. However, on a larger site design, (like Verge sometimes does) I would definitely recommend something more "professional", like autocad or something. I'm honestly not sure what they use. However for small projects, anything works, and Garden planner was cheap.
You're ether on a roll with the videos or I'm just been to busy previously... 😅 Amazing informative videos as always and got me thinking about our old family countryhouse and how I should maybe rethink the plans for more accessibility and less maintenance. I been the custodian of the land there but I think I need rethink somethings if my elderly parents will move out there and how they will become the primary custodians. I have planned everything for low maintenance except the landscape flower garden....and that's their baby that I keep for them.....😅 The calorie or nutritional point really hit home and got me thinking of storage and processing food vs eating harvest directly and what my parents will probably enjoy/use more if they move out permanently?
@@ediblelandscaping1504 In Sweden because of russia, we are in the cusp of an energy crisis and the gov had to hold an emergency pressconferance this weekend, so the electricity issue is an real issue. Im in the same boat as you regarding freezing and working on alternatives as well. Because I just don't like canned stuff so much, I really haven't learned to can properly. So not really safe regarding the storage issue. im toast if my freezer(s) dies on me. I make som jelly and jam for more traditional swedish dishes, and dry mushrooms and beans but can't do shit beyond that...😅 will have to empty one freezer to dry and maybe learn to can properly this fall, because our energy bills will continue to rise exponentially, because of the energy crisis here in Europe.
very good video, i have to add one thing wich in many cases is also a priority: what about your animals? ive been growing alot of my own food for a decade or so and more and more change towards making sure if i have an abundance of anything, i can feed it to my family's horses, chickens will also propably eat everything a human eats, but having different animals require different information!
I've only recently been given the "green light" to start getting some animals (family buy-in is really important to me), so I'm not in a great position to answer this one yet. I typically tend to only like commenting on things I know well enough to have a valid opinion on - animals is something I need more time with.
Unconscious problem solving. Loved that.
Fantastic guide, thank you so much. I can’t wait to start on my landlord’s property!!
Great info. These are essential questions to consider
Learning to grow your own plants from seed and cutting is a huge asset for expanding your food forest
Such a great video with helpful tips about food forest building. Thanks, Best.
Glad you enjoyed it!
I love this. ❤️
Great video! Some of my goals are conflicting. I want wild life, but darn it, I'm sick of the bunnies chewing my grape vines down to the ground every winter! I will be doing a better job at protecting them this year! I want all the birds, but darn it, I hate it when they eat every last cherry on my trees! I have already maxed out how many I can have in my tiny space, but I hope that as the threes get bigger there will be enough for all of us. I am getting better at hiding some crops under others so that the bunnies don't eat them in the first few days after they have sprouted, but I'm still struggling a bit. Hiding plants AND making sure that they get enough sun is a tricky balance. I ended up planting a BUNCH of stiff in pots on my deck this year...including carrots!
I think the bigger everything gets, the more you can allow wildlife in. Plenty of fodder to distract them is the key. Also understanding that no matter how much you do, they will still do damage.
Yes, this very much is the kind of video i like 😅
You mentioned you'd plant up to your house if you could.
Any ideas of what to plant around a septic tank, if at all?
shallow rooted plants. I'd put annual veggies over a septic tank. or a native meadow area.
@@ecocentrichomestead6783 is it not dangerous to eat something that was grown on top of a leach field? I remember reading this somewhere.
@@con_sci depends on what's going in your septic tank. The idea that it's dangerous is mostly the ick factor. Humanure is safe when composted. In a leach field it is composted and diluted.
I'll just echo what people have said here. Shallow rooted plants. I hear blueberries can do great over skeptics. I have my grapes over the septic.
No concerns with growing food there, as long as it isn't root crops, and the septic is working properly. Myself, I figured I'd also avoid leafy greens, and only grow edibles that put on a fruit. This just puts the food an extra step further from any septic leech.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy Awesome, thanks!
This is an awesome an encouraging video! I’ve been thinking about starting a food forest on our land but wasn’t sure where to start. There are so many possibilities! I do want to have a bit of structure for ease of harvest, but also wild areas. I’m going to start sketching. Thank you! 🙏🏼
Definitely check out my latest video released just hours ago. It sounds like it would be right up your alley.
I concur and get excited about everything you talk about (thank you!) until it comes to swales…that is where I get overwhelmed. 😂 I know that is your wheelhouse as an engineer. But maybe I don’t even need to think about it? I’m not sure how important it is where I live in Alaska. It is very dry in the spring, so takes a lot of watering to get things going in June - it felt like the desert - had to water sometimes twice a day, but then suddenly July, Aug, and Sept we are so wet with rain. I dont have problems with standing water, but man it is still so wet. I even have to pull mulch away from the base of plants to try to dry it out as the ground starts like molding and growing green moss. Out of our 4 months, I only wish I was capturing water the month of June. I haven’t had to water my garden since June!
One other thing - Ive had more than one nursery owner tell me not to bark chip mulch around perennials as it locks in the cold in the winter and will thaw slower in the spring. I’m not really following them. Is there any truth to that? I can easily move chips away from the base of plants in the spring, but that it can do harm over the winter…?
It's true, but not because it locks cold in, it just acts like a thermal moderator. I.e. it takes extreme swings in temperature and flattens them out. There is no harm in this, it's actually better for the plants to not experience extreme swings in soil temp.
For the swale question, they can have the most value in the driest climates, because usually they get water, but only a few times and a LOT of it. So holding it is important. Swales will cause the water to stop, slow and be held, and then it will slowly sink into the subsoils and rebuild underground aquifers. Often the benefit of having a swale isn't seen for 4-7 years or longer, it depends on how deep your hardpan is beneath.
For you, it would likely mean that on the summer, your plants will still have access to some of the spring snow melt, as it will be stored underground.
In the wet fall, the swale may actually stay full for longer, but the trench depression itself will help pull water out of standing areas (similar to how a dry well works, or a French drain) and will likely also alleviate some of the standing water problems you have in the fall.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy Wow! Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge. That makes a lot of sense and considers things I’d never even think of. Good thing there are engineers like you who get this stuff.
We don’t have any standing water problems. The excavators did a really good job, but there has been so much water some homes nearby have had septics failing. We all basically live on a riverbed that used to be a glacier. We do have an area that is just really wet. Even though there is no visible standing water it sounds like it could help prevent some issues and improve drainage. Thank you! You’ve given me a lot to think about! Future goals!😁
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy Thank you thank you!!! 🙏🏽 I kept thinking how you live in almost the same climate as I do and have never had a problem. I will put that out of my mind now and carry on mulching!😆😁👍 I am saving this response to pass it along in case it ever comes up again. 😁
Great video !!!!!!
Love your videos!
Glad I randomly came across this channel !!
I want a food forest when I buy a place someday. I love this stuff so much!!
Awesome! welcome to the family 👪
My big question is :-) I live where it only rains once a year anymore and we do freeze on top of all that chemical farming is destroying everything in sight. I have a few challenges
Great video
I also appreciate your videos. I am trying to source a few trees and shrubs for my VERY small permaculture inspired garden. I am located in southern Ontario in the GTHA. Would love some recommendations on nursery or two that I can get some plants, like hascaps, elderberry, currants, etc, from.
Richters herbs, whiffletree and Grimo nut nursery are all great options.
I really appreciate all your videos , I'm doing research in Permaculture for about a year now, im looking into a piece of vacant land basically a swampy area in a 4b region in Ontario Canada, im looking into a chinampas in a cold hardy climate, not sure if will work but im really excited about changing my life style from urban to rural. I want to have animals and try to make a living of it, in a sustainable and regenerative.
As long as you connect them to a decently deep pond area for the fish to survive the winter, they will do great. I was thinking of doing chinampas in my back 2 acres.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy great
Thank you #SaveSoil #Consciousplanet
Canada is too cold but you are great!
Great video as usual. All your videos are great. My main goal is to eliminate grass in my 30 x50 bee yard orchard. But part of it is because of where we live and how far we are from a store, we wanted more food and fruit on the property and enclosed in an electrified compound helps keep the bears away. But I do have a question. You are in zone four, right. We are zone 3/4 here and because of the 10” of river rock onto of nice soil, it was easier for us to make a raised bed for our blue berries. But now I worry about winter. The bed is maybe 8” high. Do you think if I mulch with a th I, bed of straw, they will be ok. All four plants were planted this spring. Thanks 🇨🇦🌷🐝
They will be more at risk for sure. Will they make it? I think so. I can't promise of course, but they should be okay. One thing you could do is to surround the beds with bales of straw, or bags of leaves.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy thanks, a friend has a bunch of straw she is giving me and my neighbour has offered me bags of leaves. So I will add both. Thank you for your support and advice
Awesome video!!!
Would using wild plants work for a food forest assuming that it's possible to figure out what wild plants are edible?
I do all the time! Absolutely 💯
Hi Keith, what is the name of the design program you use at 8:15?
Garden Planner
Is it worth it to put swales in sandy soil?Especially if you put big trees like walnut 6meters downstream,will the water really beneficiate to the walnut?I'm afraid water just go straight down with my sandy draining soil
Yeah it's fine, it's drains away anyways. It's going to hit hardpan at some point and recharge the underground aquifer. Geoff Lawton always says that the best place for a swale is in the desert.
Practical!
Hi, what software do you use for your designs? Thank you
It's called garden planner.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy Thank you
Trying to create a permaculture is a noble task that should not be taken "lightly?" One major variable is time, time beyond a calendar year, time which is often neglected. Sure, have a daily, weekly, monthly plan but we must look 10, 15 or more years down the road. Sort of how you mentioned large shade trees. If people cannot see themselves on a property for the rest of their lives or their family continuing the legacy it maybe valuable time and energy lost. I am not saying that it should not be done, it is how these goals we set for ourselves are valued.
Couldn't agree more. So many of the problems we are dealing with today are because humanity can't look further than the next financial quarter to decide what we should be doing, or where our focus should be. We need to zoom out and think bigger (and further into the future). The home gardener should think at least a few years or decades into the future. Political choices/decisions/projects should be thinking 200-2000 years into the future. I.e. what happens to people 500 years from now if we empty the world's coal reserves, cut down all the trees, and poison the water with forever chemicals and plastic.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy When proper "steps" are taken we would not have the issues that you pointed out. We still want to make a quick buck and take short-cuts. Many of which are just dumping the waste products.
This channel is styling!
❤️ 😆
I have a tiny urban yard and an autoimmune problem. Is there somewhere to find a Permaculture designer? I love to putz around in the garden but don’t have it to do a lot of planting. With a design maybe I could hire somebody
I'm not sure, other than googling your area and permaculture designers
Great Video what program did you use for that diagram on how you design your food forest?
It's called garden planner
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy would you have the link for it?
I have to have a path my 4 wheels can drive over. GOD BLESS
"wear protection" HAHAHA, made me lol - man who's been decimated from european buckthorn eradication without gloves
😆
Gracias
To skip the intro: 1:30
What program did you use to make that design?
It's called garden planner.
How do you start when there is a monoculture of pine trees everywhere? I was thinking of leaving groupings of them randomly for the wildlife and plant the food forest around them, is this what you did with your cedar trees?
Exactly like that. Have you seen edible acres content? His larger property is basically a giant pine forest that he's turning into a food forest.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy thx! I will check it out 👍
Be your own grocery store with an urban backyard food forest
You will laugh. I started looking into Permaculture, because I don’t wanna mow grass. Is that a good enough reason to start? I haven’t started yet, I did order some fruit trees that should be delivered in the spring.
Hey, any reason is good enough to start, as long as we start! I hope you enjoy the journey!
'welcome to earth, third rock from the son."