Let the leaves, branches and fruit that falls to the ground stay there and mulch the tree and it will be around indefinitely. Simple really. In the process of building one myself from a current non food forest. Chop and replace with edibles
@@4kturBe careful with that advice because some foreign plants might not even be able to grow at all depending on the grow zone or some will grow and outcompete other plants because they are in a new environment without any natural pests or herbivores that would eat the plant!
I read a book about Sudan and these boy's journey across it in an extended time of war. One of the reasons they survived was fruit trees. They not only fed each other but were able to trade the fruit they found for things they needed to survive. Every time they found fruit it was a miracle.
Most of Africa used to be that way. But things have changed a lot these days. I am in Kenya and my dream is to grow a fruits tree forest for posterity. 😅
@@Pdalim59The green belt project has been doing incredibly well from what I have heard. I remember Wangari Mathai doing this in Uganda before she died. It would be great if Africa generally rejected monoculture for food forest because it's very rich if you can secure moisture during dry season.
Great story. Growing up in the village(Botswana) we herded livestock. We spent the whole day during the rainy season picking fruits from various trees and digging up sweet tubers from the ground. We were well fed and learned a lot about plants. We would even collect some for grandma to make some delicious dishes for us in the evening. I love the food prepared at our family weddings - they include a lot of dishes grandma made for us and people enjoy the food since they are rare for many these days. Also, when I found I was really sick 10 years ago, I remembered that grandma used to collect plant materials for healing us. I therefore researched a lot about plants and found healing from plants that conventional medicine failed to provide. Plants are awesome. I want to start a food forest now that I have my strength back.
@@mandandi... I consider plants "conventional" medicine. Modern "healthcare" is really "sick care", which supplies pharmaceuticals to mask symptoms, then more pharmaceuticals to treat the negative effects of the previous batch of pharmaceuticals... ad nauseum.
I started a food forest in my small town on the coast of Maine at a public park. We now have 2 pear trees, 2 apple trees, 2 cherry trees, 3 elderberry bushes, and 5 hazelnut shrubs. All volunteer led and the trees were paid for by the town. We are planning on planting more chestnuts and understory plants that produce fruit like berries. Anyone can do this in their town/city ! update: as for how I did it, my town was looking for people to come up with interesting projects to use up covid relief money. I proposed public fruit trees for the community and got the grant. But, I could have still done it without the grant if I had gone to parks and rec and proposed it to them if I paid for the trees myself. They were the ones I had to convince so I hunted them down and dropped in at their meeting to talk to them in person about it. They were reluctant when I was trying to convince them via email but once we met face to face, they softened up. I changed my plan from wanting to plant fruit trees all over town to just one place which is easier to manage for us and for parks and rec. We call it the community orchard because it's basically a community garden but with trees instead. The important thing was to locate it near a water source so that we can water the trees in the summer! I got a local arborist to dump some woodchips for us in the parking lot so we can mulch the trees heavily. And that's it! Now a few of us orchard enthusiasts check on the trees a few times a year to see if their healthy, and we add more mulch twice a year. This late winter, we are planning to prune our trees :)
Would you mind sharing the town name? I live in the northern tip of Washington County where the growing zones start getting much different than the coast. I'm trying to get as much variety as possible that does well in my specific area. I have volunteer apple trees all over my property as well as blackberries. I'm trying to establish low bush blueberries from a local barren.
Please share how you did it! All the steps please - people out there could really use a kick in the butt to get out there, and having a blueprint can mobilize them fast!
Down in south Maine, there are wild strawberries and wintergreen plants that are both tasty and beautiful. Don’t know if they grow where you live. I currently live in drought stricken Utah, and a lot of the trees that do well in Pennsylvania don’t grow well here. Adapting to local climate conditions is key for widespread food forests!
I just realized why I like your informative videos so much: Everywhere in the world of print and TV news you always hear bad things. But you talk about hopeful things, that give someone a good example to do the same on their own. More of the same!
"Everywhere in the world of print and TV news you always hear bad things." And that's not coincidence, nor does it reflect true state of things. In fact, media purposely focuses on negative things to keep people in perpetual state of anxiety and fear. Do an experiment. Stop watching any news from any media source for a month.
This is the only video I've watched on this channel, and I loved that about it. Your comment has made me a subscriber because that's exactly the kind of content I want. Thanks!
My dad grafted nut and persimmon trees on two different farms in the 60s through the early 80s. Many trees continue bearing great fruit. My brother harvests from the one farm he lives near. The other farm has been converted to a trail area next to a large business complex. Many people walk by fallen persimmons and black walnuts not knowing their value. Of course the deer and squirrels are happy beneficiaries. I’ve propagated some persimmon trees and they’re now bearing fruit on all sides of our house, even the front yard. A great way to start a conversation. Thx for the inspirational video!
@@Acr6gAttt-mq2hr why wait on your government to do the right thing? Lead by example. Clearly that food forest expanded right through lots of peoples gardens and that’s exactly how people should plant their gardens, especially front gardens, lots of trees and native plants bearing fruit and nectar, instead of wide expanses of just ugly lawns. Also form gardening committees with your neighbourhood and when everyone is on the same page approach your local council and show them how it could be.
Lovely story again! I jus love so much all these hopefull stories you bring to us. This one kind of made me sad though. There were people 100 year ago who tried hard to show the way, and yet noone followed. His work was all cut up, developped over and even today the fruit is not used.😢
@@amillison keep at it though Andrew, we can still turn the tide. The biggest challenge these days is knowledge , I can’t purchase apricot trees from a nursery at $100 per but if I knew how to propagate rootstock I could take a stem from my Mom’s outstanding apricot tree and graft it in👍🏼
My grandparents lived on a homestead off of Hwy 20 in the Cascade Mountains of Oregon and half of their 2, or so, acres was dedicated to annuals and perennials, mostly edible. My grandmother designed the gardens and my grandfather grafted fruit trees as a hobby, so the 3 or 4 huge apple trees he planted there carried 3 or 4 varieties each. Sadly, it was sold off to pay for their care in late life, but I have a much better appreciation for what they were doing! This is such an awesome concept.
I have a food forest I started, this video gives me hope. I've planted almost an acre so far. I have abundant fruit and nuts, herbs and vegetables. My goal is to expand to cover at least 1.5 acres, and for my great grandkids to still have an abundance of healthy organic food to eat. Thanks for this video.
It's a nice find, and it looks great... in the actual food forest part. I wished you mentionned the biggest threat on the "park" section though : the lawns... A mowed lawn is a menace to trees. Here in Normandy, it's the norm to have a manucured lawn right up to the base of fruit trees, and it's really damaging to the trees. Pests and diseases get more and more pronounced each year. The reason is simple, a mowed lawn is degrading the soil. The soil gets poor and compacted, and trees grow weak as a result. It's gonna be the same here. Not right away, but after a decade or two, they're gonna start to show signs of diseases and reduced yields. That's why suburbia and food forests cannot coexist at the moment : you would have to explain to people that you can't have lawns in them. Or that at least you should leave a 2 m radius around the trees (5-10 m for tall trees) with either mulch, or other plants (whether it's tall grasses, shrubs or flowering perennials). You have no idea how many times people ask on gardening groups what's going on with their trees that won't produce and fall ill, and the reason is just the lawn...Kill your lawns guys. It's the best thing you can do.
I think these trees are so established with such extensive root systems that this luckily buffers some of the negative affects of the grass growing up to the trunks
@@amillison It just will slow down the decline of the tree, but won't stop it. If the lawn is mowed regularly, compacted, and people used fertilizers and stuff, it will impact the trees for sure. Don't forget that in a natural system, the roots that feed are close to the surface. The deep roots are not for nutrients, they're for water. So it doesn't really matter how deep the roots are, if the surface of the soil is degraded, it's bad. Besides, with just grass, mycorrhizae, the second way of feeding after roots+bacteria, is very impacted as well.
I agree. Plus any caterpillars feeding on these trees drop to their demise because there’s no place to go into their cocoon. They need leaves or plants to crawl to.
I've thought since I was a kid that we should have public fruit and nut trees. I've picked fruit in a few public parks but there should be a lot more. Rooftops should be veggie gardens and parks should be food forests.
How fantastic! Such a wonderful experiment Hershey created! I would love to be able to use some of these varieties here in South West France in my fledgling food forest!
❤🙏 Thank you so much for your great work, Andrew! You bring wisdom and hope to the world! More and more people, including myself, are inspired to do small and larger changes which improve both life and environment❤
I have 300 rare fruit trees on half an acre…family reasons mean I’ll soon be selling up and starting again. Holding out hope to sell to someone who gets it….and not some developer who will bulldoze the lot. In Victoria, Australia.
I have more like 20 fruit trees. But I feel the same way; I can see myself arguing with some future realtor to make sure my home is listed and described in such a way as to attract a buyer who will appreciate and build on my legacy! And I would happily sell to that person at a lower, but reasonable, price.
I'm dealing with the same problem with a Grove I designed. The owner just died, and the property is being sold to the bank. I'm just praying that the now fruitful Trees, the Shrubs, Vines, bulbs and groundcovers, are appreciated and not returned to the thirsty resource sucking lawn that got replaced. I'm considering Polinater Habitat signage, and possibly a design plan interpretive sign to educate those who wouldn't easily recognize the value long after I can't explain it anymore.
@@margaretmarshall3645 I know what you mean about individually labeling the plants. The best plant tags I've ever seen were dogtags on ballchain. They were attached to the plants near the central "trunk" on woody plants kinda like a necklace, and could be lengthened as the plant outgrew them. I'm having less success with labeling the herbaceous layer though...I tried little metal signboards that were atop landscape staples, but visitors to the garden kept stepping on them or kicking them over after straying from the path. Sometimes they got overgrown too. I'm going to try some different garden art for my next experiment.
Springdale, UT at the entrance to Zion canyon has sooooo many pecan trees. Most tourists didn't make the simple effort to bend down and try one. I rode my bike around and filled my backpack so many times. So much easier to process than walnut, better flavor too, such a great tree! I am saving to get land to make my own food forest. I want to leave a similar legacy as Hershey :)
@@amillison Nope, sounds really cool. I just saw a video by Andrew Millison about a 100 year old food forest. That'd be amazing to see. I've only seen fulky mature nut trees that had light their whole life in cemetaries and yards and fields
Think he may be assuming they're "best" when part of it is just that some varieties of trees just need different conditions than those of their present site. Think it's worth it for others to attempt different varieties elsewhere for this reason. This was certainly a gift (intentional or not) for us today.
Where I live every forest is a food forest. Every single native tree species that grows in my area is edible. Pine nuts, almonds, olives, Mediterranean holm oak bellotas , strawberry trees, Carob, Figs, Mulberry, Bay leaf laurel. You actually can find a decent amount of Pomegranates growing in the wild too. Also wild cherries but the birds usually get to them before you can
The self-regulating orchards of the Pacific Northwest First Nations people in Vancouver BC are still in good shape centuries after they were abandoned. Amazon basin orchard-keepers started breeding for productivity over 10,000 years ago: nobody knows how much over.
@@eugenetswong Just go visit the woods near ancient settlements. People used to think the mix of tree species was extra-lucky, but it turned out to be, instead, a very stable symbiotic selection.
@ I'm already signed up to do a lot of volunteer work in he region. A quick "What about me?" isn't selfish. I could be asking for donating to a food bank or for generating a walking tour, which would create a job. 'that’s your first question? “but what about me?”' That's your 1st response? Maybe somebody needs food in a horrible job market, and is willing to pay it forward in exchange for free food. Don't be so rude.
@ Right, but where? For those of us, who have never been there, we'll need pointers I'm under the impression that there should be about 4 or 5 places, but we aren't supposed to wander around in some forests.
I've actually been thinking about this kind of thing for a while now. Every year my city gives out free trees when requested. But they're usually shade trees, not food bearing. I've wondered what a city might look like if most of the street trees were food bearing. Now I know. Really cool.
Your thumbnail caught my attention with the persimmon and mulberry. My family did not have much money and definitely had years of struggling. But my Chinese immigrant parents had on their half acre property a variety of trees over the years: peach, plum, loquat, kumquat, pomegranate, persimmons, mulberry, lemon, orange, pomelo, tangerine, jujube, walnut and more. When a child was born, a tree was planted. Instead of a birthday gift, a tree might be planted. Plus they had an extensive garden of veggies. Land was there to provide for the family with a lot of hard work. Today property is outrageously out of the reach of most families no matter how hard they work.
Keep up the good work! Thanks for bringing us this story. John Hershey's farm and work was discussed prominently In Russel Smith's book "Tree Crops". Very happy to learn that much of his work survives.
Not all of those were native. He states that one variety was from Japan. Pecans are native to the Mississippi River Valley, not to PA. It works because he chose the right types and because he grafted a lot of his stock.
One of the barriers I've seen in my neighboorhood to food foresting is people not able to spend the effort to harvest what they plant. It's too easy to go to the grocery store. There are tart cherry and pear trees that no one bothers picking.
For some reason harvesting is also my least favorite part of gardening. I love planting, caring for the plants, and working on the soil, but harvesting… ah its so laborious!
@@tomatito3824 That’s the thing. This is a wonderful food forest for the birds and squirrels, but it’s so far above the ground! Still, it’s pretty cool. I’m curious how much of the nuts and pods and berries and persimmons fall to the ground in edible condition?
I'm getting some of those genetics! Thank you for highlighting this. I've been able to find examples of old Food Forest in other countries. Finally, there is an example of what can be done here in a temperate zone I can show to my local Land Trusts.
Really inspiring to see one mans life work being enjoyed by future generations. I myself have been puttering away in my spare time for the last 20 years creating a food forest for my family. I also have a little piece of John Hershey growing here in the form of 12 jumbo acorn bur oaks. All the way from the Hershey farm to the east coast of Canada! I hope I live long enough to see these little oak trees get big enough to produce acorns.. If I don't, then hopefully someone in the future can enjoy them😊
I do this all around my yard. All the other old farmyards in walkways, anywhere you can find food. There's I take seeds plants if people let me. There's food everywhere you're right? I have walnut trees. I can't process them yet but I'm, I collect enough Hickory nuts to probably eat off for a year. Bins of them every year. There's food everywhere. You're right, and there's also medicine everywhere
Great discovery. It will be great to see more videos on this subject from a range of presenters with specialist local expertise, guys like Sean Dembosky, and the agro-forestry history guy, please.
My partner and I bought an old house. It only had birch trees, so we´ve taken them down and turned into firewood. Instead we have now planted apple, cherry, peach and plum trees. It is really exciting to hear all the pollinators during spring!
thanks to all , wish the best for this precious forest left over piece and let people know that no fertilizer is necessary to grow fertil trees, this is very important for our future!
I just found this clip, I'm in West Virginia and I'm definitely going to make a point to visit so I can look at John Hershey's garden. This is such a fantastic idea obviously not a new idea but nonetheless absolute essential to our environment and survival of many animal species as well as our own. Thank you for putting this information out there. I feel in this day and age of technology, we forget the simple things around us. Those simple things are what sustain life. ❤
3:58 "We just have to find ways to harvest it" I notice quite often in permaculture, there's some detail missing that they assume is no big deal. But that final "detail" actually makes the difference between it being viable or not. In order to harvest fruit and nuts at those heights people would have to seriously risk their lives. Doesn't seem like a functional system.
Absolutely true. Gravity will bring the nuts down on their own, but fruit is typically damaged by a fall from even from low height. Trees for producing harvestable fruit should be kept much shorter. Most growers with commercial orchards these days plant on semi-dwarf root stock, because their insurance companies don't want to pay claims for workers who get injured falling from a ladder. Ladder falls result in 100,000+ emergency room visits in the U.S. annually.
Great point. This system is not currently functional because the harvest piece is missing. It is more of a demonstration of how long these systems can remain viable for
Reminder of why we plant food forests . . . the future, a legacy, a gift to our children.
Yet, now, people aren't having children.
@@earlysda I believe he was quoting Dear Alice :) 💚
@@earlysdayeah, cause there aren't enough food forests
@😢😢😢earlysda
@@earlysda Well its statistically impossible for everyone to have no children
I have planted over a 100 fruit and nut trees on my farm,
I hope when I'm dead and gone that they keep growing
certainly they will
put some foreign frruits
Let the leaves, branches and fruit that falls to the ground stay there and mulch the tree and it will be around indefinitely. Simple really. In the process of building one myself from a current non food forest. Chop and replace with edibles
theyll prob have offspring too at thaat many
@@4kturBe careful with that advice because some foreign plants might not even be able to grow at all depending on the grow zone or some will grow and outcompete other plants because they are in a new environment without any natural pests or herbivores that would eat the plant!
I read a book about Sudan and these boy's journey across it in an extended time of war. One of the reasons they survived was fruit trees. They not only fed each other but were able to trade the fruit they found for things they needed to survive. Every time they found fruit it was a miracle.
Most of Africa used to be that way. But things have changed a lot these days. I am in Kenya and my dream is to grow a fruits tree forest for posterity. 😅
@@Pdalim59The green belt project has been doing incredibly well from what I have heard. I remember Wangari Mathai doing this in Uganda before she died. It would be great if Africa generally rejected monoculture for food forest because it's very rich if you can secure moisture during dry season.
Great story. Growing up in the village(Botswana) we herded livestock. We spent the whole day during the rainy season picking fruits from various trees and digging up sweet tubers from the ground. We were well fed and learned a lot about plants. We would even collect some for grandma to make some delicious dishes for us in the evening.
I love the food prepared at our family weddings - they include a lot of dishes grandma made for us and people enjoy the food since they are rare for many these days.
Also, when I found I was really sick 10 years ago, I remembered that grandma used to collect plant materials for healing us. I therefore researched a lot about plants and found healing from plants that conventional medicine failed to provide. Plants are awesome.
I want to start a food forest now that I have my strength back.
@@Pdalim59there was a time when you could roam the earth and not worry about food
@@mandandi... I consider plants "conventional" medicine. Modern "healthcare" is really "sick care", which supplies pharmaceuticals to mask symptoms, then more pharmaceuticals to treat the negative effects of the previous batch of pharmaceuticals... ad nauseum.
I started a food forest in my small town on the coast of Maine at a public park. We now have 2 pear trees, 2 apple trees, 2 cherry trees, 3 elderberry bushes, and 5 hazelnut shrubs. All volunteer led and the trees were paid for by the town. We are planning on planting more chestnuts and understory plants that produce fruit like berries. Anyone can do this in their town/city !
update:
as for how I did it, my town was looking for people to come up with interesting projects to use up covid relief money. I proposed public fruit trees for the community and got the grant. But, I could have still done it without the grant if I had gone to parks and rec and proposed it to them if I paid for the trees myself. They were the ones I had to convince so I hunted them down and dropped in at their meeting to talk to them in person about it. They were reluctant when I was trying to convince them via email but once we met face to face, they softened up. I changed my plan from wanting to plant fruit trees all over town to just one place which is easier to manage for us and for parks and rec. We call it the community orchard because it's basically a community garden but with trees instead. The important thing was to locate it near a water source so that we can water the trees in the summer! I got a local arborist to dump some woodchips for us in the parking lot so we can mulch the trees heavily. And that's it! Now a few of us orchard enthusiasts check on the trees a few times a year to see if their healthy, and we add more mulch twice a year. This late winter, we are planning to prune our trees :)
Good for you!
Would you mind sharing the town name? I live in the northern tip of Washington County where the growing zones start getting much different than the coast. I'm trying to get as much variety as possible that does well in my specific area. I have volunteer apple trees all over my property as well as blackberries. I'm trying to establish low bush blueberries from a local barren.
Please share how you did it! All the steps please - people out there could really use a kick in the butt to get out there, and having a blueprint can mobilize them fast!
Down in south Maine, there are wild strawberries and wintergreen plants that are both tasty and beautiful. Don’t know if they grow where you live.
I currently live in drought stricken Utah, and a lot of the trees that do well in Pennsylvania don’t grow well here. Adapting to local climate conditions is key for widespread food forests!
@@SteveSherman-jp1dz in Rockland maine !
I just realized why I like your informative videos so much: Everywhere in the world of print and TV news you always hear bad things. But you talk about hopeful things, that give someone a good example to do the same on their own.
More of the same!
"Everywhere in the world of print and TV news you always hear bad things."
And that's not coincidence, nor does it reflect true state of things.
In fact, media purposely focuses on negative things to keep people in perpetual state of anxiety and fear.
Do an experiment. Stop watching any news from any media source for a month.
This is the only video I've watched on this channel, and I loved that about it. Your comment has made me a subscriber because that's exactly the kind of content I want. Thanks!
To see those 100 plus year old grafted trees is amazing ❤
For real. Never seen that before, myself.
My dad grafted nut and persimmon trees on two different farms in the 60s through the early 80s. Many trees continue bearing great fruit. My brother harvests from the one farm he lives near. The other farm has been converted to a trail area next to a large business complex. Many people walk by fallen persimmons and black walnuts not knowing their value. Of course the deer and squirrels are happy beneficiaries. I’ve propagated some persimmon trees and they’re now bearing fruit on all sides of our house, even the front yard. A great way to start a conversation. Thx for the inspirational video!
That is a hero.. what an amazing person. So sweet.
AWESOME ENDING PART, ANDREW! Thank you for honoring the people that got us these varieties!!!!!!
This should be the model for urban and suburban green spaces instead of invasive landscaping that ends up being torn up and replaced every 10 years
If only our tax dollars were spent how we wanted them to be
The topic of urbanism is getting popular. I hope that both movements can get together some day.
But you guys need to spread your FREEDOM and DEMOCRACY to get oil
If people have free and abundant food, then they are no longer blackmailable and exploitable by the elites
@@Acr6gAttt-mq2hr why wait on your government to do the right thing? Lead by example. Clearly that food forest expanded right through lots of peoples gardens and that’s exactly how people should plant their gardens, especially front gardens, lots of trees and native plants bearing fruit and nectar, instead of wide expanses of just ugly lawns. Also form gardening committees with your neighbourhood and when everyone is on the same page approach your local council and show them how it could be.
Lovely story again! I jus love so much all these hopefull stories you bring to us.
This one kind of made me sad though. There were people 100 year ago who tried hard to show the way, and yet noone followed. His work was all cut up, developped over and even today the fruit is not used.😢
Some followed. It's not a nightmare. 😞
I agree about how positive these stories are. 🙂
It's true that it was really an opportunity missed to embed the practice of diverse fruit cultivation into the American farmscape
@@amillison keep at it though Andrew, we can still turn the tide. The biggest challenge these days is knowledge , I can’t purchase apricot trees from a nursery at $100 per but if I knew how to propagate rootstock I could take a stem from my Mom’s outstanding apricot tree and graft it in👍🏼
Thank-you, Andrew, Dale and of course John, for this story, this legacy, this inspiration! I love this channel.
we love to see centuries old grafting! here's to hoping that there will be many such trees next century
I'd love to see a city/town focus on such a theme of food trees.
While it might not be the government of a town, a community certainly can work on that sort of thing!
My grandparents lived on a homestead off of Hwy 20 in the Cascade Mountains of Oregon and half of their 2, or so, acres was dedicated to annuals and perennials, mostly edible. My grandmother designed the gardens and my grandfather grafted fruit trees as a hobby, so the 3 or 4 huge apple trees he planted there carried 3 or 4 varieties each. Sadly, it was sold off to pay for their care in late life, but I have a much better appreciation for what they were doing! This is such an awesome concept.
I have a food forest I started, this video gives me hope. I've planted almost an acre so far. I have abundant fruit and nuts, herbs and vegetables. My goal is to expand to cover at least 1.5 acres, and for my great grandkids to still have an abundance of healthy organic food to eat. Thanks for this video.
Beautiful 🙏🏼💕🙏🏼
Amazing. Imagine every city like this. Food would be everywhere!
its great bad sadly we gonna get those people that vandalise anything for no reason.
@ yeah that is true. Or those that would take everything. Some people were caught dredging the pond at a lake in my area many years back 😂.
Fascinating. Looks like people trimmed the lower branches so that you now need a ladder to get to the fruit.
It's a nice find, and it looks great... in the actual food forest part. I wished you mentionned the biggest threat on the "park" section though : the lawns... A mowed lawn is a menace to trees. Here in Normandy, it's the norm to have a manucured lawn right up to the base of fruit trees, and it's really damaging to the trees. Pests and diseases get more and more pronounced each year. The reason is simple, a mowed lawn is degrading the soil. The soil gets poor and compacted, and trees grow weak as a result. It's gonna be the same here. Not right away, but after a decade or two, they're gonna start to show signs of diseases and reduced yields. That's why suburbia and food forests cannot coexist at the moment : you would have to explain to people that you can't have lawns in them. Or that at least you should leave a 2 m radius around the trees (5-10 m for tall trees) with either mulch, or other plants (whether it's tall grasses, shrubs or flowering perennials). You have no idea how many times people ask on gardening groups what's going on with their trees that won't produce and fall ill, and the reason is just the lawn...Kill your lawns guys. It's the best thing you can do.
Tl;Dr lawns kill trees, leave a natural section around your trees
I think these trees are so established with such extensive root systems that this luckily buffers some of the negative affects of the grass growing up to the trunks
@@amillison It just will slow down the decline of the tree, but won't stop it. If the lawn is mowed regularly, compacted, and people used fertilizers and stuff, it will impact the trees for sure. Don't forget that in a natural system, the roots that feed are close to the surface. The deep roots are not for nutrients, they're for water. So it doesn't really matter how deep the roots are, if the surface of the soil is degraded, it's bad. Besides, with just grass, mycorrhizae, the second way of feeding after roots+bacteria, is very impacted as well.
I agree. Plus any caterpillars feeding on these trees drop to their demise because there’s no place to go into their cocoon. They need leaves or plants to crawl to.
Are you talking about the new trees or the century-old ones?
I've thought since I was a kid that we should have public fruit and nut trees. I've picked fruit in a few public parks but there should be a lot more. Rooftops should be veggie gardens and parks should be food forests.
The lawyers are to blame, but maybe they’ll change their tune someday
People complain of rats coming in, so cities plan their planting to not have fruit.
@ that's an excuse, not a real reason. I'm sure the real reason has more to do with grocers making money selling produce...
@@lemonyskunkketts7781 Well then, USA should follow Turkey and allow cats to roam freely and be cared for - that'll solve ya rat problem.
A living roof helped Save a home in the LA wildfires. This could be the new way to rebuild 🌳❤️🩹
This is awesome, really have to thank John Hershey for playing and grafting all those trees 100 years ago
How fantastic! Such a wonderful experiment Hershey created! I would love to be able to use some of these varieties here in South West France in my fledgling food forest!
❤🙏 Thank you so much for your great work, Andrew! You bring wisdom and hope to the world! More and more people, including myself, are inspired to do small and larger changes which improve both life and environment❤
Every city should have some type of food forest free for all to gather for non-profit
It should be mandatory for all public buildings
To have this as their landscaping
I always thought fruit trees should be planted everywhere
Excellent... those varieties need to be distributed.
And "managing the abundance" needs to be this year's 'catchphrase'...
Manage the Abundance!
THE ULTIMATE VICTORY GARDEN!!!!
I have 300 rare fruit trees on half an acre…family reasons mean I’ll soon be selling up and starting again. Holding out hope to sell to someone who gets it….and not some developer who will bulldoze the lot. In Victoria, Australia.
Hope you're able to propagate as many of those trees as you can so you have a head start on your next place....
I have more like 20 fruit trees. But I feel the same way; I can see myself arguing with some future realtor to make sure my home is listed and described in such a way as to attract a buyer who will appreciate and build on my legacy! And I would happily sell to that person at a lower, but reasonable, price.
I'm dealing with the same problem with a Grove I designed. The owner just died, and the property is being sold to the bank. I'm just praying that the now fruitful Trees, the Shrubs, Vines, bulbs and groundcovers, are appreciated and not returned to the thirsty resource sucking lawn that got replaced. I'm considering Polinater Habitat signage, and possibly a design plan interpretive sign to educate those who wouldn't easily recognize the value long after I can't explain it anymore.
@ Great idea. That and labeling every plant that can be labeled might help. But it’s a bit of a crapshoot. 🤞🤞
@@margaretmarshall3645 I know what you mean about individually labeling the plants. The best plant tags I've ever seen were dogtags on ballchain. They were attached to the plants near the central "trunk" on woody plants kinda like a necklace, and could be lengthened as the plant outgrew them. I'm having less success with labeling the herbaceous layer though...I tried little metal signboards that were atop landscape staples, but visitors to the garden kept stepping on them or kicking them over after straying from the path. Sometimes they got overgrown too. I'm going to try some different garden art for my next experiment.
Fantastic job highlighting John Hershey’s work and legacy! Thank you, Andrew and Dale!
This should be common place everywhere.
Thats so good, what he envisioned and did are bearing fruits continiously. 🐞
Springdale, UT at the entrance to Zion canyon has sooooo many pecan trees. Most tourists didn't make the simple effort to bend down and try one. I rode my bike around and filled my backpack so many times. So much easier to process than walnut, better flavor too, such a great tree! I am saving to get land to make my own food forest. I want to leave a similar legacy as Hershey :)
Ever been to Capital Reef National Monument in Utah? The entire valley is filled with fruit (mostly apples)
@@amillison Nope, sounds really cool. I just saw a video by Andrew Millison about a 100 year old food forest. That'd be amazing to see. I've only seen fulky mature nut trees that had light their whole life in cemetaries and yards and fields
Another great find and share. Thanks Professor Millison.
This food forest is amazing beautiful and really a cultural heritage site! Thanks for bringing our attention to it
Think he may be assuming they're "best" when part of it is just that some varieties of trees just need different conditions than those of their present site. Think it's worth it for others to attempt different varieties elsewhere for this reason.
This was certainly a gift (intentional or not) for us today.
So amazing!! Thank you for spotlighting this amazing food forest
Where I live every forest is a food forest. Every single native tree species that grows in my area is edible. Pine nuts, almonds, olives, Mediterranean holm oak bellotas , strawberry trees, Carob, Figs, Mulberry, Bay leaf laurel. You actually can find a decent amount of Pomegranates growing in the wild too. Also wild cherries but the birds usually get to them before you can
Nice!
Strawberry..trees?
Where do you live?
@adam418gthey are stunningly beautiful trees with bright red fruit the color of strawberries and apparently the fruit is edible.
@@shannonreed1651 oh right thanks for the info, but they aren't actual strawberrys right, I have a strawberry patch that definitely isn't trees 😂
I'm getting some of those persimmons! Thank you for sharing!
This was so encouraging and beautiful! Thank you for the work you do and for getting Dale on to share his wisdom and passion with the rest of us!
This is one of the most exciting videos I've ever seen. Thank you
Thank-you for sharing this story.
3:50 the best part : opening the eye of people about the fact that they are surrounded by abundance
The self-regulating orchards of the Pacific Northwest First Nations people in Vancouver BC are still in good shape centuries after they were abandoned. Amazon basin orchard-keepers started breeding for productivity over 10,000 years ago: nobody knows how much over.
I live in Greater Vancouver. Are these orchards available for all of us?
@@eugenetswong Just go visit the woods near ancient settlements. People used to think the mix of tree species was extra-lucky, but it turned out to be, instead, a very stable symbiotic selection.
@@eugenetswongthat’s your first question? “but what about me?”
@ I'm already signed up to do a lot of volunteer work in he region. A quick "What about me?" isn't selfish. I could be asking for donating to a food bank or for generating a walking tour, which would create a job.
'that’s your first question? “but what about me?”'
That's your 1st response? Maybe somebody needs food in a horrible job market, and is willing to pay it forward in exchange for free food. Don't be so rude.
@ Right, but where? For those of us, who have never been there, we'll need pointers I'm under the impression that there should be about 4 or 5 places, but we aren't supposed to wander around in some forests.
I've actually been thinking about this kind of thing for a while now. Every year my city gives out free trees when requested. But they're usually shade trees, not food bearing. I've wondered what a city might look like if most of the street trees were food bearing. Now I know. Really cool.
Your thumbnail caught my attention with the persimmon and mulberry. My family did not have much money and definitely had years of struggling. But my Chinese immigrant parents had on their half acre property a variety of trees over the years: peach, plum, loquat, kumquat, pomegranate, persimmons, mulberry, lemon, orange, pomelo, tangerine, jujube, walnut and more. When a child was born, a tree was planted. Instead of a birthday gift, a tree might be planted. Plus they had an extensive garden of veggies. Land was there to provide for the family with a lot of hard work. Today property is outrageously out of the reach of most families no matter how hard they work.
Next level treasure hunting. Cool video, important to share with whoever.
Let’s find more of those!
Fabulous story for abundance of food. So should be the new world. Food equal no WAR!
Fascinating! Thank you for sharing this amazing food forest, Andrew.
Keep up the good work! Thanks for bringing us this story. John Hershey's farm and work was discussed prominently In Russel Smith's book "Tree Crops". Very happy to learn that much of his work survives.
Reaching some of that fruit might be a problem... for humans. But birds and animals must love it!
It's great to see so many, old, grafted trees.
Thank God for Mr. Hershey and his food forest.
Such an amazing story. Thank you so much.
Great video. They reason this works is because they are native plants to the region where the food forest is.
Good point! I think a lot of crops are better if they fit the environment.
Not all of those were native. He states that one variety was from Japan. Pecans are native to the Mississippi River Valley, not to PA. It works because he chose the right types and because he grafted a lot of his stock.
Wow that's a true treasure ❤
One of the barriers I've seen in my neighboorhood to food foresting is people not able to spend the effort to harvest what they plant. It's too easy to go to the grocery store. There are tart cherry and pear trees that no one bothers picking.
the best way to persuade is usually to set the example with actions, rather than language!
be the change you wish to see! 🌱
Can't wait to risk my life to get some walnuts
For some reason harvesting is also my least favorite part of gardening. I love planting, caring for the plants, and working on the soil, but harvesting… ah its so laborious!
@@tomatito3824 That’s the thing. This is a wonderful food forest for the birds and squirrels, but it’s so far above the ground! Still, it’s pretty cool. I’m curious how much of the nuts and pods and berries and persimmons fall to the ground in edible condition?
@@tomatito3824 your ancestors managed 🤷
I'm getting some of those genetics!
Thank you for highlighting this. I've been able to find examples of old Food Forest in other countries.
Finally, there is an example of what can be done here in a temperate zone I can show to my local Land Trusts.
Amazing! I had no idea something like this still existed. Blown away!
Thank you for sharing this amazing account of American ingenuity
Really inspiring to see one mans life work being enjoyed by future generations. I myself have been puttering away in my spare time for the last 20 years creating a food forest for my family. I also have a little piece of John Hershey growing here in the form of 12 jumbo acorn bur oaks. All the way from the Hershey farm to the east coast of Canada! I hope I live long enough to see these little oak trees get big enough to produce acorns.. If I don't, then hopefully someone in the future can enjoy them😊
i love Mr.Hershey....a GREAT human being!!
Starting my own little food forest in my own garden. With food prices going up all over it makes sense to grow as much of your own food as possible.
Your videos are always so beautiful and inspiring. On a day like this one I really needed some positivity.
you are sooooo rigth, this is the future of living..! please, spred it around the world over and over again!!!
I do this all around my yard. All the other old farmyards in walkways, anywhere you can find food. There's I take seeds plants if people let me. There's food everywhere you're right? I have walnut trees. I can't process them yet but I'm, I collect enough Hickory nuts to probably eat off for a year. Bins of them every year. There's food everywhere. You're right, and there's also medicine everywhere
Great discovery. It will be great to see more videos on this subject from a range of presenters with specialist local expertise, guys like Sean Dembosky, and the agro-forestry history guy, please.
Planting a food forest decade's ago is an amazing feeling. And seeing the longer term version is epic
Greetings from Redondo Beach 🇺🇸🇺🇸Great historic video of Hershey. 👍🏽👍🏽
Wow, this is amazing. Thank you!
wow that so cool!
we are moving to northern germany soon to plant our first food forrest and i hope it won t be our last
Thanks for sharing!
We in Himachal in India must learn from this.
Awed!
What a great idea! Wish we had more. Native though, to help out our native wildlife which is in decline.
Yep, hickories, blueberries, plums, paw paws, etc
Wow! Great story!
I love this im in Australia and I am starting a food forest. I just love this.
Thank you for what you do
This is so dope. This is some of what i plan to do in and around the 40 acres we just purchased. Abundance for generations way past my lifetime.
This is perhaps the coolest TH-cam video I've ever seen
Wow, glad to hear that!
That man and that food forest are national treasures. Protect them at all costs.
Very, very nice. Thank you.
I find food out in the forest all the time. You have to find what to look for
Being a former OSU sustainable horticulture student, I'm so glad to stumble across this!
What a great video. Thank you!
My partner and I bought an old house. It only had birch trees, so we´ve taken them down and turned into firewood. Instead we have now planted apple, cherry, peach and plum trees. It is really exciting to hear all the pollinators during spring!
This is amazing
Excellent job folks❤❤❤.Yep it is doable totally possible !!!!
Wow, amazing to see so many people doing this sort of thing. I’m about to start my own food forest here in SE VA. Let’s revolutionize food
Grafted Trees are beautiful. :) Great video!
thanks to all , wish the best for this precious forest left over piece and let people know that no fertilizer is necessary to grow fertil trees, this is very important for our future!
I absolutely love that you went here , I've been hoping and trying to get a food forest influencer to go here for years.
Wow! Still productive with jus lawns under the trees... imagine what could be achieved with sub canopy, shrub, herb, root and vine layers in place!
those oldass graft unions are nuts!
❤🎉 amazing life he must have had
I just found this clip, I'm in West Virginia and I'm definitely going to make a point to visit so I can look at John Hershey's garden. This is such a fantastic idea obviously not a new idea but nonetheless absolute essential to our environment and survival of many animal species as well as our own. Thank you for putting this information out there. I feel in this day and age of technology, we forget the simple things around us. Those simple things are what sustain life. ❤
This is awesome! My home state is Pennsylvania!
Fantastic video. I really enjoyed watching this. ❤
That 100+ grafted tree may be the coolest thing il see all year wow!
The remnants REALLY need to be preserved as a National Heritage
Love this so much.
incredible story awesome Thank You!!!
3:58 "We just have to find ways to harvest it"
I notice quite often in permaculture, there's some detail missing that they assume is no big deal. But that final "detail" actually makes the difference between it being viable or not.
In order to harvest fruit and nuts at those heights people would have to seriously risk their lives. Doesn't seem like a functional system.
Absolutely true. Gravity will bring the nuts down on their own, but fruit is typically damaged by a fall from even from low height.
Trees for producing harvestable fruit should be kept much shorter.
Most growers with commercial orchards these days plant on semi-dwarf root stock, because their insurance companies don't want to pay claims for workers who get injured falling from a ladder. Ladder falls result in 100,000+ emergency room visits in the U.S. annually.
Great point. This system is not currently functional because the harvest piece is missing. It is more of a demonstration of how long these systems can remain viable for
This is the only thing I consider perma culture, a forest that self exist for centuries and produces food for people and animals