The Forest Garden Future

This documentary details how Western plow-based, oil-dependent farming will be over soon and forest gardens will be the future:

video.google.com...#

It's by Rebecca Hosking.

But who controls the farms? Big business or small independent farmers, who are on the decline?

I wish I had 50 minutes to actually watch this, but I dont. Could anyone sum this up or post text of it should it exist?

Staying away from purchased foods is very important to me.

What is a forest garden? Planting peas in the woods?

While I like the concept of plow based farming turning into something more eco-friendly, when you have companies like Monsanto out there doing everything they can to control the worlds food production, changing the plow and field method is going to be near impossible to do on a grand scale.

O.K. basically the concept is based on permaculture but you just have chestnut trees as the forest canopy, then berry shrubs or hedges as the next level and then you have beans or climbing plants as the third level and then squash and other ground crops like raspberries as the bottom level.

So it's 4 levels -- more productive than a farm -- 7 acres can feed 10 people -- and since you have diversity you get insects which predate on insects that eat plants, etc.

And the birds provide the phosate, the ferns provide the potash and the berries and other plants provide the nitrogen -- those are the three main fertilizers.

With the ground crops you don't need weeds.

So there's very little maintenance and about 1 day a week of work -- the system takes care of itself.

For the permaculture addition you have ponds to collect rain water for irrigation and then ducks and chickens to eat the food pests and then you can harvest the eggs and meat for food if you want.

Sounds great but it takes many years for a chestnut tree to mature and I'm not sure about the success rate they have had with blight-resistant trees.
Chestnuts were the dominant forest tree in eastern NA before the 20th century. People raised hogs in the woods on chestnuts, the indians made meal from them. The wood is rot and insect resistant and old dead snags in the smokies can be found over 100 years old but not rotted away.
It would be fantastic if we could restore the chestnut to it's rightful place in American woodlands.
I don't have the time to watch the video right now either but I can see the logic in the 4 tier system. Very promising.

reply to post by Asktheanimals


A new chestnut hybrid is now successful, developed by a Ph.D. who worked on chestnuts --

www.badgersett.com...

The chestnut is a very fast growing tree and will be the main food source beyond even acorns -- and a 2 acre chestnut grove can feed a family.

$5 a sapling. Have fun. I plan on ordering some this spring.