Bumblebee on a 'Bocking 14' Comfrey plant
A trip to see a client emphasised the need for a whistlestop primer on wildlife and forest gardening
I went to a mid Victorian stone farmhouse today, to discuss designing a forest garden. Really interesting people and an awful lot to talk about, and I came away with a sense of needing a Forest Garden Primer.
This will be a 1 hour class which is an outline of what I believe wildlife & forest gardening is about in a time of Nature & Climate Emergency. There are many threads to the story and I want to convey a sense of the narrative arc.
These are the four key areas I recommended they consider:
- Zoning & stacking - concentrate near house first, work outward, think of multiple stacking functions
- Windbreaks & dead hedges - protect young trees
- Tree spacing - ½ to ¼ of average canopy diameter
- Nutrients - nitrogen from eg alder, pea family; potassium from eg comfrey
I’m thinking the class along these lines.
Also:
- Native plants where possible
- Wildlife habitat in infrastructure