Permaculture Planning - Part 1

I am trying hard to get the basics of the planting in atWithybeds this year. I want to, as faras is practicable, run the garden as an exercise in permaculture and forestfarming. Given that this means planting quite a lot of trees and shrubs, it isa long term project, and so the sooner they get growing, the better.

We actually have a bit of a flying start with what isalready growing. A copse to the south of the cottage/garden and a high hedge tothe west mean that we are beautifully sheltered from high winds. It frequheight –good for the mistletoe and destined to be a framework for a vine) and a variety of other dessert types.

There is also a plum tree (Victoria I think) giving a fabulous crop of fruit. Having glutted on plums last year, along with the chickens who also loved them, I got almost eighty pounds of jam from the tree. It is only about 12 feet high and nothing like mature.

There is also a greengage which did not seem happy at all last year and a peach which seemed healthy enough but showed no sign of fruiting. Another peach was so obviously stunted and diseased that I removed it.

The established hedges are a mix of hawthorn and blackthorn, so the wild birds (and chickens) have had a beano with the haws whilst I took a very nice crop of sloes and produced the Christmas sloe gin.

The hedges had however been taking over the end of the garden. The garden in this area is long and thin and comes to a point. The hedges, particularly the blackthorn, had moved in, taken over and the end of the garden was lost to view when I first saw it. With saw and secateurs and the help of a friend over a few days, we battled through and discovered some forty feet of garden previously lost to the world.

The protection given by the trees and hedges really make a diffeence. It oftencomes as a surprise to venture to the outside world and find that the weatheris chilly and breezy. Meanwhile at Withybeds, breakfast was outdoors on thegarden in full sunshine and warm balmy air.

So there is a wonderful Summer microclimate. Withybeds seems to get far more than its fair shareof good weather.

The flip side to the local climate comes in Winter. LastWinter we had some of the coldest temperatures in England. Not just that, butWithybeds was substantially colder than the local area. Driving back from Uptonone night, I noted the temperature as we left the pub – minus five(Centigrade). As we drove to Withybeds – which is only a ten minute walk as thecrow flies – I watched the temperature drop, degree by degree, as I drove. Bythe time I pulled in to the cottage the outside temperature was minus eleven.

So we are in a good position for a proper “hard snap” to putplants through their dormancy. On the other hand, anything that has borderlinehardiness needs to be treated with care.

So the garden produces wonderful apples. There is wellestablished a bramley, one very old apple of doubtful variety (which I stillenjoy having there as it is an old-fashioned tree growing to its full to man. Over the last year of so, this hasbecome the area where I house the chicken coops (inside Fort Knox), the wormeryand all the paraphernalia that you know you are going to need but don’t have animmediate use for.

Other areas of the garden edges were similar, having becomeneglected and overgrown. Whilst cutting back a willow discovered another plum tree.The poor stunted little thing was valiantly trying to reach the sunshine butwas being bullied out of sight by the willow. We soon changed that and the plumis now growing very healthily and produced a very decent crop of fruit lastyear.

Willows dominate the boundaries to the East and North sidesof the garden. They were fairly heavily treated last summer, cutting downenough to bring them under control whilst I decided just what to do with them.Given that Withybeds has wood-burning stoves, they will be pollarded andtreated as firewood. In addition their early catkins should be very good forthe bees and other useful insects.

Meanwhile, the spaces between the willows will be plantedout with a variety of shrubs and small trees chosen for edibility (either forhumans or the local wildlife) and nitrogen fixing.

The boundary area up by the chickens area of the garden isgoing to be partly experimental. I am planning to plant it out with trees andshrubs which should provide free chicken feed. Hardiness may be an issue forsome as I will be trying to grow, e.g. honey locust. Time will tell if thatworks. Hardiness will certainly not be an issue for other plants. E.g. Mulberryand Siberian pea shrub. And the chucksshould have a lovely time scratching through the leaf litter fro fruits, podsand seeds – a very “chickeny” lifestyle.

I have already planted out a number of the more obviousperennials around the garden. By the fences near the copse is fairly shady fromthe trees. These have been treated as woodland edge and planted withraspberries, blackberries, loganberries and the like. If they want to “run”they can do so as any that stray too far into the lawned areas will simply getmown under control.

Other fences with more sunshine have been planted withblackcurrants, redcurrants and dessert gooseberries. Also some sharper gooseberries.The plan is to plant soft fruit in a range of sunny and shady areas to extendthe season.

Set into the lawned areas have been planted damsons, pearsand a peach. As they grow, they will be underplanted with more soft fruits andother low shrubs.

Planting Fruit Bushes.

Fianlly got down to some serious planting today.... fruit bushes; gooseberries, blackcurrants, loganberries and blackberries. There's some raspberries as well to go in, but my back was packing up by then and I decided to leave those for another day.

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It was seriously hard work. The soil here is very heavy clay and although it's rained quite heavily a couple of times over the last week, the soil is still pretty dry... to the point that it is beginning to show drying cracks. And this isn't the degraded areas I'm talking about. This is the well worked area that the previous farmer used for growing dahlias on.

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So there's two choices; dig it dry - backbreaking, or hose it down for a couple of minutes and dig it wet - easier, but after five minutes, half the contents of the garden were stuck to my boots and I was walking like something out of the Addams Family.

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Having said all that, I got quite a bit done.

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It has become clear that trying to first mulch the whole area with cardboard etc, then plant through the cardboard is just not practical. The area is simply too big and what appear to be vast amounts of cardboard disappear into the plot with little progress made.

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So I'm taking the easier route.

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Where each plant is to grow, I'm clearing the area of weeds for a couple of feet around the spot - we're quite lucky in having very few perennial or invasive weeds in that area - and the weeds complete with topsoil attached I'm dumping twenty yards away in another area that is supposed to be lawn but is in fact simply bare subsoil (i.e. solid clay). I then plant the fruit bush and thickly mulch it with newspaper (Times Sunday Supplements - only the best at this establishment). The whole area I then drench with the hosepipe.

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Hopefully then end result of all this should be a weed free basis for my forest garden and an area which become established as lawn.

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The lawn itself is actually very useful as an endless source of mulch. i can only use so much in the compost heap of course, but there are plenty of areas where iI can just dump it as organic matter onto rock, clay, subsoil and all kinds of rubbish. Over time the worms can work their magic and we can reclaim some rather badly abused bits of land for something either useful or beautiful.

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There's really something very satisfying in finding a use for everything......

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On a change of note, it's been another glorious April day, and I am very encouraged by the number of ladybirds I am seeing. It bodes well for my local predator population. When the aphids arrive they should have a bad time of it.

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Also encouraging is the number of rooks and jackdaws I see patrolling the fields. I'm not sure what exactly they are after... worms? leatherjackets? but I don't think they would be bothering if there was nothing for them to eat. I suppose this is the up-side of taking over a run-down farm. The previous owner just hadn't been doing many of the things that modern agriculture normally requires. In consequence, erosion and lack of top soil aside, the place is, ecologiccally speaking, not in too bad a shape.

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I'm beginning to think of erecting a polytunnel. To buy all the plants I want will cost a fortune. but I'm perfectly happy to grow from seed and take a year or so longer. But we're talking a lot of seeds here. And a lot of seed trays/pots etc.