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  • From: "Michael Miller & Ute Bohnsack" <burrenag@iol.ie>
  • To: <permaculture@listserv.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: Fw: Help design this orchard
  • Date: Thu, 25 Dec 1997 21:53:03 -0000



----------
> From: FranksFarm <FranksFarm@aol.com>
> To: permaculture@listserv.oit.unc.edu
> Subject: Re: Fw: Help design this orchard
> Date: 24 December 1997 19:30
>
> Hi,
> In a message dated 12/23/97 7:35:03 AM, rvraders@tpgi.com.au? wrote:
> <<Neat rows are convenient for harvest and maintenance, but aren't very
> aesthetic, nor earth friendly. [snip]
------
> My question to Rene and Lorriane and all is this. First I tend to agree
with
> the above comments, but just what are the patterns, and the spacings
involved?
[snip]
------
Seasons Greetings to you all.

Maybe this is of interest.
We had an oddly shaped field surrounded by stone walls which we decided was
to be our goat patch. To make fencing easier we divided it into one large
(2000m2) and one small (200m2) patch. The big one for the goats, the small
one - well, it seemed to lend itself to being used as a little fruit
garden. Inspired by Hart's forest garden I made a design for the patch
involving 3 black + 5 red currants, 3 gooseberries, 3 Worcesterberries, 5
damsons, 2 filberts, a plum, a row of tummelberries + raspberries, rhubarb,
loads of comfrey for mulch + liquid manure, a couple fuchsias and a
rambling rose for colour, some perennial herbs, and flowers. We have a very
small chicken tractor for 3 birds (one of which turned out to be a cock.
God rest him, we just had him for dinner) which keep the grass down, eat
left-overs and provide eggs+manure. Most of the bushes were only planted
this spring, some had been relocated from our previous place.
The site has dry-stone walls on the northern, eastern + western side, the
south is open to the goat field (seperated of course by a five-strand,
twelve-gage, couple-thousand-volt fence - very unpleasant to touch...).
The patterns underlying the plantings are:
* Species in clusters (for pollination) or against the south wall for
support, shelter and heat stored and reflected from the wall (we had
raspberries 'Autumn Bliss" into early December, despite some frost - the
December frost killed the last flowers!).
* Bigger plants and shade-tolerant plants at the back and east (full sun
for those which need it).
* Flowers and comfrey to attract pollinators and for colour.
* Spacings as indicated in relevant books for our climate + soil (Ireland
- moderate Atlantic, mean July +15C, mean January +5C, little frost,
virtually no snow, 1000mm precipitation, brown earth on this plot). When I
drew up the plan I used a compass set to the respective spacing for each
species, i.e. if a spacing was two metres between plants of one species I
used a circle of a two centimetres (at scale 1:100) diameter for each plant
with the circles touching within a cluster of plants. Between clusters of
different species I used the largest required spacing=diameter. Obviously
height, shadows from plants and walls as well as the neighbours animals
grazing on the other side of the stonewall were also considered.
Soiled chicken bedding from the tractor goes right onto the comfrey beds
during the winter, onto the compost in the summer (because you can't get in
between the comfrey plants in the summer).
The fruit bushes are mulched once or twice a year with comfrey leaves
topped by a cardboard "collar", topped by leftover compost material from
sieving (for potting compost). This is done to keep weed competition at bay
during the growing season; you can't let the chickens scratch too close to
the plants as they scratch bare the roots. I'm toying with the idea (not
mine) to plant comfrey and horseradish around the bushes once they have
reached their maximum width.

The result so far (as I said most plants are only in their first year) is
grassland with bushes *seemingly* randomly scattered about the place. But
I'm fairly sure each plant will have enough space, light and nutrients as
it grows and hopefully give us back some food for the effort. Growth this
year has indeed be very good and promising. There's still space for more.
We are planning to plant some Rosa rugosa for rosehips (and as a treat for
the goats), some more herbs along the wall (have propagated sage and
rosemary this summer) and more raspberries along the wall, too. If all goes
well we'll have plenty organic fruit throughout the season, maybe a few
nuts, lots of herbs, some flowers, lots of comfrey and some eggs.


This is a design for a home garden and for home consumption, not for a
commercial site. But it involves very little work.

For many years I used to cycle past a lovely mature standard apple orchard
(in northern Germany) with grassland which was grazed alternately by sheep
and geese. This was an old-style orchard and seemed to work very well.
There were loads of apples each autumn. The trees were pruned every winter.
The spacing was, I'd say, about 7 or 8 metres. Despite the rigid pattern it
was actually a beautiful sigth during flowering time and in the autumn. I
don't see why this (standards plus grazing animals) shouldn't work with
other fruit species.

Hope this is of some use.
UteB













compost.





















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