To add my two cents, I started asparagus rows years ago for profit. Following your advice a couple of years ago I added strawberries to the rows but they were still young so I added tomatoes (trellised and pruned) and peppers for personal use to the asparagus rows and cardboard and hay (available at no extra cost) in between the rows. Last fall, I harvested and canned enough tomatoes to last our family 4 years and more peppers then I had ever seen in one place before plus I had my spring asparagus harvest and a better asparagus crop this spring than ever before. But it all didn't start in one season.
Thank you for reviewing this. I follow the two golden rules. The garden is robust and full of activities. I use square foot gardening utilizing permaculture applications. My neighbors don't understand how I garden. I am calling mine edible landscaping 😅😅😅.
It's so nice to read about other friends working with mom-nature! Glad to read your note. Edible landscaping. Yes. I hunt and forage in my "garden" daily. IT's packed with flowers for pollinators, and in there are things I want to eat. I live on a small acre and have been food foresting for nearly 25 years. I didn't know what it was called then. I just knew it needed to be created.
Gotta say this is the first time a comment of mine prompted it's own video in response! :D Excellent point btw. I still intended to do it despite the "lower yield" because I'm putting more emphasis on longer term soil health AND because I also think it'll be less maintenance/more bang for the buck.
I like this. Going forward I will bifurcate my assessment of "yield" - "above ground yield" and "below ground yield". I want both to be as bountiful as possible and to leave my land (and the Earth) better than when I arrived on it!
"Only change one thing" Hahahahaha. I love that you are addressing this. You can only truly control variables in the lab (and even then, not completely). Anyone who does field science (as I do) know that there are gazillions of variables and you can't possibly control them all. The #1 thing I learned from my Ph.D. is, "No one can possibly understand all the connections between all of these things, there's just too much going on!" If you look at the discussion section a well-written, peer-reviewed scientific article on something related to ecology/ biogeochemistry/ other field science, you will see that the authors don't just lay out one conclusion--they lay out several possible conclusions, then try to explain why their favorite conclusion is the correct one. So yeah, people might disagree with their "official" conclusion, but at least the other possible ideas are put out into the scientific community.
100% Heck, we've only catalogue 1% of the orgabisms beneath the soil. We don't even know what we don't know. So when we make a change and make observations, we can only make educated theories to describe what we are seeing and what caused it, but there are billions of moving levers at play.
As a fairly new gardener, I enjoy growing just for the sake of growing. Yes, it's nice to get the broccoli or zucchini harvest, but I am also happy to let those plants go to flower for the pollinators. I love and agree with your approach, looking at the bigger picture. We are growing so much more than food for ourselves; we are feeding everyone: the microbes, the insects, the land, the heart!
All great points. Never rent your land. They will strip mine the soil, as you say. What is also left out is the value of the clover. It can be cut and used for fodder. Or let livestock graze on it after the potatoes are removed. Easy peasy. You could reverse the strips next year so that the potato area gets clover. Then the livestock again and that land should be very fertile
I think this was a great video. As a horticulturist, I love the engineer's sum-up of root exudates and mineralization of nutrients! One thing I would add for folks outside the food forest/guild concept: buy plants, particularly seeds, that were grown in organic production systems. Over the last few decades, plant genomes have gotten used to being totally coddled and yields simply will be lower when plants actually have to work for a living. If you buy from seed producers that are only growing for organic production, the genome x environment interactions result in seed stock capable of growing in organic environments. If you whack a conventional plant in a guild, it is almost invariably going to crash and burn right out of the gate. If you can grow enough plants to save seeds grown in guilds, you might get somewhere!
Thoughtful and well presented video. Your approach aligns with others such as John Kempf and Helen Attowe who similarly take a scientific and critical-thinking approach to what they do. Kempf has a video where he actually questions growers about what they are trying to achieve each season: the knee jerk responses being “we want yield and quality”. Then Kempf demonstrates (using cherry orchards as an example) that many cherry growers are failing to maximise their profitability because their high yield of low nutrient fruit, with lower shelf life does not command the prices that more enlightened growers are getting. So when you do the maths, you quickly see that yield in isolation is an insufficient determinant for deciding your growing strategy. Helen Attowe talks about how her fruit is noticeably darker/redder in colour than the competitors. When lab-tested, her fruit has a far higher nutrient density. And for home gardeners, a similar consideration applies: do we want to maximise yield, or grow the most nutrient-dense, great-tasting produce?
Kempf says repeatedly to feed the plants NOT the soil. The healthy plants will feed the soil. I've found this to be quite correct. Adding extra OM if able to on the soil to start certainly doesn't hurt though.
Just a comment about the butterfly. I was just in Ontario and was amazed at the biodiversity there vs where I live in Calgary. It is very rare to see coloured butterflies. Mostly only just the white cabbage moths fluttering around. Although, we don’t have deer flies which I am very happy about.
Another video that's worth its weight in gold, in my estimation! For people who need to earn a living off of the land, the important thing is how to balance the long term health of the soil with their need to support themselves in the short term. It seems from what I have observed and read that in some areas, such as holistic planned grazing, the results of improved soil (and perennial root structure) come very quickly in terms of increased capacity to support livestock and the farmer/rancher is ahead financially quite quickly (after investing more time and some $'s to set up the system). But in other areas, such as cereal crops on soils where the soil has been degraded by very heavy chemical use in the past, it might take more time for the soil to improve enough to create a strong yield without chemical supports. That is why, as I understand it, people like Gabe Brown sometimes recommend a somewhat gradual transition for such farmers (e.g. start practising no-till and polyculture cover crops but reduce, and not necessarily entirely eliminate, the use of chemical fertilizer, pesticides, herbicides etc). Over a few years, they often find that the soil has improved enough that they can eliminate all, or most, chemical inputs and still raise good crops. The purists don't like that approach but I think , if it helps farmers move towards a more sustainable method and still be able to afford to operate their farm, that it can be a very good way to go.
Indeed. I've heard it referred to as cutting a drug dependence. That cutting cold turkey can lead to withdrawals and struggle, but the proper way is to just slowly reduce inputs and focus on regenerative practices. Allow yourself and your land the time it needs to slowly ween off the chemical dependence of fertilizers and other inputs.
I am fortunate to be living on a piece of land that my grandparents owned. There is a field where my grandfather grew potatoes every year for decades. He died in 1988. This patch of ground is still largely bare three plus decades later, compared to neighbouring soil that has reforested. When we dig in that area, it is the worst soil on the property. My grandfather farmed all his life and generously gave surplus to others, but I am certain he had no idea what the long term effects would be on the soil.
Yes. Feeding the soil = healthy plants, and healthy everybody else too. Thanks for another great message. Love the guild concept! It's helped me so much. For me feeding the soil means nearly zero soil exposure to summer heat. Mulching, protecting, composting in place. I have a big compost heap but when harvesting compost (weeding 😄), if they aren't too large and woody they get laid down in place to protect the soil. 100% green plants solar panels above to shade all soil.
Re: paving paradise. 45 years ago while in ag college my professor told all of us that we were sitting on grade A farmland and that was what was getting built over. That was So-Cal in the early 70's. That grade A land was growing food for humans - asparagus to zucchini - not cattle feed commodities. The building over continues. Not all of it has been suffocated just yet. They're trying though.
11:49 such an amazing point. Not enough of us get angry enough to make change. You should do a joint episode with Strong Towns or Climate Town! Great video
One of the pieces that I and probably other people miss, is how much chop 'n dropping can/should/could be done sacrificing the biomass producing plants (comfrey, red bud, clover, buckwheat, senna, oats etc,) to the soil. I accidentally ran over my main comfrey bed with the truck, so I hauled it into the food forest and mulched everything. That was during the heat wave and the berries and currants etc. loved it. Better than watering, biomass contains all the nutrients and moisture! -- LOL! I just harvested my early red potatoes. It's like the joke: there weren't many...but they were small. 10 plants and I got as many potatoes. To me, the potatoes are not the only yield. For instantce, the soil having been covered with straw is recovering from being burned out from not being covered or having a cover crop on it last year, which was a huge mistake on my part to leave it in the sun. Digging the potatoes, I observed earthworms and cool, black, friable, moisture-holding soil just under the layer of straw, a complete 180 to what it was last year: hard, dry, cracked, sad. I value soil condition and constituents and this is a work in progress, so I am thrilled with my lil potatoes and soil life indicators. Never done. Always seeking. Thank you!
Hi, love your videos. I started my food forest journey this year and I've done my best to use the resources around me, but the obstacle I'm running into is the fact that I have a lot of woods around me and that there's places where their soil is good, but there isn't much sunlight and vice versa. I did my best to use what I have at my : digging compost from completely rotted trees as well as mulch from partially decomposed trees (works well as a sponge) and dead leaves. This seems to work great for trees and bushes as I have unlimited carbon to be give them. The problem is when it comes to annual and perenials, it has been hard to get them started and going. I'm not sure if its the fact I'm trying to grow them in compost that I dug up in the forest (fungal dominated soil rather than bacterial dominated soil) or if it is the pest pressure. I'm not at the property often enough to really get the hot compost going (I'm a medical student) but I was wondering what I could do to improve the soil for those plants...Just try to chop and drop weeds onto garden beds and places where I'd like to grow perenials ? How thick should I try to lay on the chop and drop? Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Beaucoup d'amour de Montréal!!
You have great soil... for trees. So when growing annuals, the soil has already transitioned past the grassland high bacterial soils that annuals like... and are now fungally dominant soils that trees like. You may really enjoy (and get benefits from) my soil microbiology guide where I go to that into detail. To grow annuals, you want bacterial dominated soils, and the best way to get that is with compost and manure. From your comment, it seems like you have a decent understanding of this, but taking soil from a forest and trying to use that to ammend an annual bed is backwards, for the reasons you mentioned... fungal dominated soil for annuals, who want bacterial dominated soils. The main thing this impacts is how the nitrogen is stored... in nitrates vs nitrites.
Love the video, great explaination what's going on now as i saw many industrial farms try to move in organic way but fail to do so because bad yield as they consider and too much pest without much learning about their soil health. Kinda like putting new packaging on the same old product.
This is a great video and a thorough explanation of how to look at yield through a new lens. I am part of a community garden where we strive to maximize the amount of photosynthesis to cover bare soil. This is easier in some areas than others. Between our fruit trees for example, we plant small fruit bushes, strawberries and native perennials. In our tomato rows, we plant basil between the plants. We have not found a solution in a community setting for a cover crop between our potato rows. Do you, or anyone have a suggestion for us? We would like to be able to hill the potatoes during the growing season. The other possibility would be to cover the soil with straw to avoid having bare soil but this will not increase photosynthesis nor attract other pollinators.
I would love to know if you have any recommendations for online retailers to source our cold hardy trees and shrubs? Thank you for your wealth of knowledge you have shared! The library of permaculture is incredible gift to humanity. I stumbled upon the channel a few weeks ago and have been feasting on them any spare second I can. Cheers from South Dakota
I ran the experiment a different way, and even then the “yield” argument supports growing the soil. I inherited terrible soil and started planting. Well, no surprise, low yield and the soil was still horrible. Used fertilizer, still low yields and bad soil. I started getting into permaculture and started composting, and i let the “weeds” go wild. Within 5 years everything was lush and yields were multiples of what they were before.
Then there are also other factors that needs to taken into account, such as skill and quality of the yeild. If the quality of the most nutriusiuos food appears to be low due to lack of skill, perhaps the yield wont be attractive enough to be eaten or even harvested. You might think that this is the best food you can eat, but your family might look at the same food and think it's full of worm or something else because of insect preassure, or perhaps the nuts are so small that it's more of a hassle to prepare them than it's worth.
I am working on a property with a very arid climate, and a soil that’s mainly sand. I’ve gathered some woodchips, but only a few loads which are not enough to do a thick layer on all of it. I started by sheet mulching around the trees, about 3ft (1m) around each tree, thick. Then, I’m spreading woodchips in the most depleted areas, but not thick at all (I don’t have enough material). Would you say that some woodchips are better than no woodchips, even if some bare ground is still exposed?
I would focus on a smaller area and do it properly. Find out what your most limiting thing is. Determine the size of area you can do properly. Do that area and do it right. In future years, expand from the edges and do each area properly, as you expand. See my sheet mulching guide for detailed info on what proper looks like. If you have already bought trees and planted them out, then do as you have done and do the small area around each tree properly, and just expand as much as you can, using the materials you have. But don't spread too thin, just do whatever area you can do in the right way.
Not to be a nitpicker 😅, but potatoes as they are grown by us don't depend on pollinators. Sadly, our agriculture often favors cloning (asexual reproduction) to safeguard a limited number of cultivars instead of promoting biodiversity. Great video and excellent points. Thanks for sharing.
True that potatoes when planted from tubers are clones and don't need pollination. But that doesn't mean that pollination isn't important for potatoes. We get new varieties through pollination done in research fields. If diseases ever pop up and kill current varieties, it will be very important that we have diversity and can select ones resistant to new diseases. Look at what has happened to bananas. The same thing could happen to any crop.
love your videos; currently looking for my place on this earth to put food foresting into practice! such a wonderful way to teach good stewardship. would love to recommend a book to all (most likely it has already been mentioned - still worthy of more shout outs! it's called dirt by david r. montgomery and an awesome read. food foresting is the antidote to the demise of our ability to grow what we need for sustainability, everyone can play a part and we all have hope
So true! Also when we look at how the zapatistas in Mexico or other indigenous communities manage their land as commons that show why capitalism and private property encourages this short sighted, selfish behaviour. A better world is possible!
So basically, don’t have a corporate capitalistic attitude that pursues short-term profit above all else. Unfortunately, our entire society is built upon this very principle. I’m up for tearing it down and starting over, but I highly doubt that’s the sentiment of the general populace.
People are in too much of a hurry to think deeply and systematically about pretty much everything it seems. So they end up complying with some arbitrary and destructive paradigm like maintaining a lawn in spite of the fact that simple input/output analysis clearly indicates the practice is entirely inappropriate and should be obsolete.
ah yes, i havent forgotten about the soil with dancing pixies visiting at night. your block will be bulldozed in 50 to 100 years, and the soil dancing pixies will leave. seriously, soil health needs to be balanced decisions that lead to improved yield, else you're wasting time and money for some dreams.
Absolutely loving your videos as I recently discovered your channel I think through the weedy garden! I would be really interested in how you grow your vegetables in your food forest. I learn so much in every single video, thank you for that
I usually try to find perennial versions (or self seeding annuals) of various plants. For example, asparagus as a table veggie. Good King Henry, Sorrel, Kale, Lamb's Quarters, Purslane, Watercress, Dandelion as greens/salad mixes, etc. Then I just plant those into the herbaceous layer. I do also run a few annual beds for plants that I cannot really replace with perennial substitutes, but I really want to still eat, such as tomatoes and peppers.
To add my two cents, I started asparagus rows years ago for profit. Following your advice a couple of years ago I added strawberries to the rows but they were still young so I added tomatoes (trellised and pruned) and peppers for personal use to the asparagus rows and cardboard and hay (available at no extra cost) in between the rows. Last fall, I harvested and canned enough tomatoes to last our family 4 years and more peppers then I had ever seen in one place before plus I had my spring asparagus harvest and a better asparagus crop this spring than ever before. But it all didn't start in one season.
This is true and a great point. Don't judge these system wide changes too soon. It can take a few years to start seeing the snowball growing.
Thank you for reviewing this. I follow the two golden rules. The garden is robust and full of activities. I use square foot gardening utilizing permaculture applications. My neighbors don't understand how I garden. I am calling mine edible landscaping 😅😅😅.
My neighbor keeps commenting that she "needs" to bring her weed Wacker next time she visits. I keep trying to explain everything is on purpose.
It's so nice to read about other friends working with mom-nature! Glad to read your note. Edible landscaping. Yes. I hunt and forage in my "garden" daily. IT's packed with flowers for pollinators, and in there are things I want to eat. I live on a small acre and have been food foresting for nearly 25 years. I didn't know what it was called then. I just knew it needed to be created.
Gotta say this is the first time a comment of mine prompted it's own video in response! :D
Excellent point btw. I still intended to do it despite the "lower yield" because I'm putting more emphasis on longer term soil health AND because I also think it'll be less maintenance/more bang for the buck.
I like this. Going forward I will bifurcate my assessment of "yield" - "above ground yield" and "below ground yield". I want both to be as bountiful as possible and to leave my land (and the Earth) better than when I arrived on it!
"Only change one thing" Hahahahaha. I love that you are addressing this.
You can only truly control variables in the lab (and even then, not completely). Anyone who does field science (as I do) know that there are gazillions of variables and you can't possibly control them all. The #1 thing I learned from my Ph.D. is, "No one can possibly understand all the connections between all of these things, there's just too much going on!"
If you look at the discussion section a well-written, peer-reviewed scientific article on something related to ecology/ biogeochemistry/ other field science, you will see that the authors don't just lay out one conclusion--they lay out several possible conclusions, then try to explain why their favorite conclusion is the correct one. So yeah, people might disagree with their "official" conclusion, but at least the other possible ideas are put out into the scientific community.
100%
Heck, we've only catalogue 1% of the orgabisms beneath the soil. We don't even know what we don't know.
So when we make a change and make observations, we can only make educated theories to describe what we are seeing and what caused it, but there are billions of moving levers at play.
What a beautiful design, symbiotic relationship
As a fairly new gardener, I enjoy growing just for the sake of growing. Yes, it's nice to get the broccoli or zucchini harvest, but I am also happy to let those plants go to flower for the pollinators. I love and agree with your approach, looking at the bigger picture. We are growing so much more than food for ourselves; we are feeding everyone: the microbes, the insects, the land, the heart!
All great points. Never rent your land. They will strip mine the soil, as you say. What is also left out is the value of the clover. It can be cut and used for fodder. Or let livestock graze on it after the potatoes are removed. Easy peasy. You could reverse the strips next year so that the potato area gets clover. Then the livestock again and that land should be very fertile
I think this was a great video. As a horticulturist, I love the engineer's sum-up of root exudates and mineralization of nutrients! One thing I would add for folks outside the food forest/guild concept: buy plants, particularly seeds, that were grown in organic production systems. Over the last few decades, plant genomes have gotten used to being totally coddled and yields simply will be lower when plants actually have to work for a living. If you buy from seed producers that are only growing for organic production, the genome x environment interactions result in seed stock capable of growing in organic environments. If you whack a conventional plant in a guild, it is almost invariably going to crash and burn right out of the gate. If you can grow enough plants to save seeds grown in guilds, you might get somewhere!
Great point!!
Thoughtful and well presented video. Your approach aligns with others such as John Kempf and Helen Attowe who similarly take a scientific and critical-thinking approach to what they do. Kempf has a video where he actually questions growers about what they are trying to achieve each season: the knee jerk responses being “we want yield and quality”. Then Kempf demonstrates (using cherry orchards as an example) that many cherry growers are failing to maximise their profitability because their high yield of low nutrient fruit, with lower shelf life does not command the prices that more enlightened growers are getting. So when you do the maths, you quickly see that yield in isolation is an insufficient determinant for deciding your growing strategy. Helen Attowe talks about how her fruit is noticeably darker/redder in colour than the competitors. When lab-tested, her fruit has a far higher nutrient density. And for home gardeners, a similar consideration applies: do we want to maximise yield, or grow the most nutrient-dense, great-tasting produce?
💯
Kempf says repeatedly to feed the plants NOT the soil. The healthy plants will feed the soil. I've found this to be quite correct. Adding extra OM if able to on the soil to start certainly doesn't hurt though.
Yes, yes, yes, the spirit of Masanobu Fukuoka lives in Keith!
💯
This is the best thing i have seen in a long time on this subject . Thank you very much for all that you do
Just a comment about the butterfly. I was just in Ontario and was amazed at the biodiversity there vs where I live in Calgary. It is very rare to see coloured butterflies. Mostly only just the white cabbage moths fluttering around. Although, we don’t have deer flies which I am very happy about.
I feel like Mark Shepard in Restoration Agriculture really have me this “Aha!” Moment with this concept.
Outstanding, Keith! Thanks
Another video that's worth its weight in gold, in my estimation!
For people who need to earn a living off of the land, the important thing is how to balance the long term health of the soil with their need to support themselves in the short term.
It seems from what I have observed and read that in some areas, such as holistic planned grazing, the results of improved soil (and perennial root structure) come very quickly in terms of increased capacity to support livestock and the farmer/rancher is ahead financially quite quickly (after investing more time and some $'s to set up the system).
But in other areas, such as cereal crops on soils where the soil has been degraded by very heavy chemical use in the past, it might take more time for the soil to improve enough to create a strong yield without chemical supports. That is why, as I understand it, people like Gabe Brown sometimes recommend a somewhat gradual transition for such farmers (e.g. start practising no-till and polyculture cover crops but reduce, and not necessarily entirely eliminate, the use of chemical fertilizer, pesticides, herbicides etc). Over a few years, they often find that the soil has improved enough that they can eliminate all, or most, chemical inputs and still raise good crops. The purists don't like that approach but I think , if it helps farmers move towards a more sustainable method and still be able to afford to operate their farm, that it can be a very good way to go.
Indeed. I've heard it referred to as cutting a drug dependence. That cutting cold turkey can lead to withdrawals and struggle, but the proper way is to just slowly reduce inputs and focus on regenerative practices. Allow yourself and your land the time it needs to slowly ween off the chemical dependence of fertilizers and other inputs.
I am fortunate to be living on a piece of land that my grandparents owned. There is a field where my grandfather grew potatoes every year for decades. He died in 1988. This patch of ground is still largely bare three plus decades later, compared to neighbouring soil that has reforested. When we dig in that area, it is the worst soil on the property. My grandfather farmed all his life and generously gave surplus to others, but I am certain he had no idea what the long term effects would be on the soil.
Yes. Feeding the soil = healthy plants, and healthy everybody else too. Thanks for another great message. Love the guild concept! It's helped me so much.
For me feeding the soil means nearly zero soil exposure to summer heat. Mulching, protecting, composting in place. I have a big compost heap but when harvesting compost (weeding 😄), if they aren't too large and woody they get laid down in place to protect the soil. 100% green plants solar panels above to shade all soil.
Re: paving paradise. 45 years ago while in ag college my professor told all of us that we were sitting on grade A farmland and that was what was getting built over. That was So-Cal in the early 70's. That grade A land was growing food for humans - asparagus to zucchini - not cattle feed commodities. The building over continues. Not all of it has been suffocated just yet. They're trying though.
11:49 such an amazing point. Not enough of us get angry enough to make change. You should do a joint episode with Strong Towns or Climate Town! Great video
I love both of those ❤️ I would be honored
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy same! Great content.
Your best yet. Great chat.
One of the pieces that I and probably other people miss, is how much chop 'n dropping can/should/could be done sacrificing the biomass producing plants (comfrey, red bud, clover, buckwheat, senna, oats etc,) to the soil. I accidentally ran over my main comfrey bed with the truck, so I hauled it into the food forest and mulched everything. That was during the heat wave and the berries and currants etc. loved it. Better than watering, biomass contains all the nutrients and moisture! -- LOL! I just harvested my early red potatoes. It's like the joke: there weren't many...but they were small. 10 plants and I got as many potatoes. To me, the potatoes are not the only yield. For instantce, the soil having been covered with straw is recovering from being burned out from not being covered or having a cover crop on it last year, which was a huge mistake on my part to leave it in the sun. Digging the potatoes, I observed earthworms and cool, black, friable, moisture-holding soil just under the layer of straw, a complete 180 to what it was last year: hard, dry, cracked, sad. I value soil condition and constituents and this is a work in progress, so I am thrilled with my lil potatoes and soil life indicators. Never done. Always seeking. Thank you!
The answer is as frequently as possible, without killing the plant. This will depend on the plant itself, ajd even the weather (sun and water).
Well put. Thank you.
This is just great, love your content. You actually inspired me to start my own channel on permaculture.
That's awesome!
I love this discussion!💛
Ya dude, clear explanation
Hi, love your videos. I started my food forest journey this year and I've done my best to use the resources around me, but the obstacle I'm running into is the fact that I have a lot of woods around me and that there's places where their soil is good, but there isn't much sunlight and vice versa.
I did my best to use what I have at my : digging compost from completely rotted trees as well as mulch from partially decomposed trees (works well as a sponge) and dead leaves. This seems to work great for trees and bushes as I have unlimited carbon to be give them.
The problem is when it comes to annual and perenials, it has been hard to get them started and going. I'm not sure if its the fact I'm trying to grow them in compost that I dug up in the forest (fungal dominated soil rather than bacterial dominated soil) or if it is the pest pressure. I'm not at the property often enough to really get the hot compost going (I'm a medical student) but I was wondering what I could do to improve the soil for those plants...Just try to chop and drop weeds onto garden beds and places where I'd like to grow perenials ? How thick should I try to lay on the chop and drop?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
Beaucoup d'amour de Montréal!!
You have great soil... for trees. So when growing annuals, the soil has already transitioned past the grassland high bacterial soils that annuals like... and are now fungally dominant soils that trees like. You may really enjoy (and get benefits from) my soil microbiology guide where I go to that into detail.
To grow annuals, you want bacterial dominated soils, and the best way to get that is with compost and manure.
From your comment, it seems like you have a decent understanding of this, but taking soil from a forest and trying to use that to ammend an annual bed is backwards, for the reasons you mentioned... fungal dominated soil for annuals, who want bacterial dominated soils. The main thing this impacts is how the nitrogen is stored... in nitrates vs nitrites.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy thank you!!
Love the video, great explaination what's going on now as i saw many industrial farms try to move in organic way but fail to do so because bad yield as they consider and too much pest without much learning about their soil health. Kinda like putting new packaging on the same old product.
Lipstick on a pig
absolutely, I want my 7th generation from me to benefit and have a beautiful bountiful life, not depleted and starving, dependent on someone else.
💯
This is a great video and a thorough explanation of how to look at yield through a new lens.
I am part of a community garden where we strive to maximize the amount of photosynthesis to cover bare soil. This is easier in some areas than others. Between our fruit trees for example, we plant small fruit bushes, strawberries and native perennials. In our tomato rows, we plant basil between the plants.
We have not found a solution in a community setting for a cover crop between our potato rows. Do you, or anyone have a suggestion for us? We would like to be able to hill the potatoes during the growing season. The other possibility would be to cover the soil with straw to avoid having bare soil but this will not increase photosynthesis nor attract other pollinators.
I'm a huge fan of clover in a situation like that. It brings in pollinators and fixes nitrogen.
I would love to know if you have any recommendations for online retailers to source our cold hardy trees and shrubs? Thank you for your wealth of knowledge you have shared! The library of permaculture is incredible gift to humanity. I stumbled upon the channel a few weeks ago and have been feasting on them any spare second I can. Cheers from South Dakota
Usually the best thing is to buy local. Local growers will have the best varieties for the area. I would always go as local as possible
I ran the experiment a different way, and even then the “yield” argument supports growing the soil. I inherited terrible soil and started planting. Well, no surprise, low yield and the soil was still horrible. Used fertilizer, still low yields and bad soil. I started getting into permaculture and started composting, and i let the “weeds” go wild. Within 5 years everything was lush and yields were multiples of what they were before.
Then there are also other factors that needs to taken into account, such as skill and quality of the yeild. If the quality of the most nutriusiuos food appears to be low due to lack of skill, perhaps the yield wont be attractive enough to be eaten or even harvested. You might think that this is the best food you can eat, but your family might look at the same food and think it's full of worm or something else because of insect preassure, or perhaps the nuts are so small that it's more of a hassle to prepare them than it's worth.
Great points, especially for a commercial grower. So they may have to tweak the system and make small compromises
I am working on a property with a very arid climate, and a soil that’s mainly sand.
I’ve gathered some woodchips, but only a few loads which are not enough to do a thick layer on all of it. I started by sheet mulching around the trees, about 3ft (1m) around each tree, thick.
Then, I’m spreading woodchips in the most depleted areas, but not thick at all (I don’t have enough material). Would you say that some woodchips are better than no woodchips, even if some bare ground is still exposed?
I would focus on a smaller area and do it properly. Find out what your most limiting thing is. Determine the size of area you can do properly. Do that area and do it right. In future years, expand from the edges and do each area properly, as you expand. See my sheet mulching guide for detailed info on what proper looks like.
If you have already bought trees and planted them out, then do as you have done and do the small area around each tree properly, and just expand as much as you can, using the materials you have. But don't spread too thin, just do whatever area you can do in the right way.
great video
I'm curious how you handle fruit pests such as codling moth
I have a video called "how I solved pest problems", it discusses this in detail
Would there also be a difference in the nutrient density of the yielded crop?
Sorry, just watched the initial video and that’s a main point in there 😊
@stherky Yes but it takes time to develop soil. At least 3-5 years. Then it just snowballs from there.
Not to be a nitpicker 😅, but potatoes as they are grown by us don't depend on pollinators. Sadly, our agriculture often favors cloning (asexual reproduction) to safeguard a limited number of cultivars instead of promoting biodiversity. Great video and excellent points. Thanks for sharing.
True that potatoes when planted from tubers are clones and don't need pollination. But that doesn't mean that pollination isn't important for potatoes. We get new varieties through pollination done in research fields. If diseases ever pop up and kill current varieties, it will be very important that we have diversity and can select ones resistant to new diseases. Look at what has happened to bananas. The same thing could happen to any crop.
love your videos; currently looking for my place on this earth to put food foresting into practice! such a wonderful way to teach good stewardship. would love to recommend a book to all (most likely it has already been mentioned - still worthy of more shout outs! it's called dirt by david r. montgomery and an awesome read. food foresting is the antidote to the demise of our ability to grow what we need for sustainability, everyone can play a part and we all have hope
So true! Also when we look at how the zapatistas in Mexico or other indigenous communities manage their land as commons that show why capitalism and private property encourages this short sighted, selfish behaviour. A better world is possible!
What's the weather there?
Brutal heat wave at the moment. All neighbours lawns are dead and brown.
So basically, don’t have a corporate capitalistic attitude that pursues short-term profit above all else. Unfortunately, our entire society is built upon this very principle. I’m up for tearing it down and starting over, but I highly doubt that’s the sentiment of the general populace.
Why not just plant better...
Biology is like no other science. Normal maths does not apply.
"Play on words"...?, are you sure...? Is not the Soul, the "soil" in which the body grows?
People are in too much of a hurry to think deeply and systematically about pretty much everything it seems. So they end up complying with some arbitrary and destructive paradigm like maintaining a lawn in spite of the fact that simple input/output analysis clearly indicates the practice is entirely inappropriate and should be obsolete.
ah yes, i havent forgotten about the soil with dancing pixies visiting at night.
your block will be bulldozed in 50 to 100 years, and the soil dancing pixies will leave.
seriously, soil health needs to be balanced decisions that lead to improved yield, else you're wasting time and money for some dreams.
Absolutely loving your videos as I recently discovered your channel I think through the weedy garden!
I would be really interested in how you grow your vegetables in your food forest.
I learn so much in every single video, thank you for that
I usually try to find perennial versions (or self seeding annuals) of various plants. For example, asparagus as a table veggie. Good King Henry, Sorrel, Kale, Lamb's Quarters, Purslane, Watercress, Dandelion as greens/salad mixes, etc. Then I just plant those into the herbaceous layer.
I do also run a few annual beds for plants that I cannot really replace with perennial substitutes, but I really want to still eat, such as tomatoes and peppers.