Weekly Food Forest Tours! Fruits, Veggies, and More! :)

General Fruit Growing
#41

This video is part 5 of the weekly food forest tour for 2/23/20.

One reason I’m waiting until the weather warms up a little to pull over the little apple tree with two main shoots, is that it could probably be pulled over now, but it would most likely pull the main trunk over with it. By waiting until the weather’s a little warmer, it will be easier to pull the side shoot down and keep the main shoot vertical.

One of the blueberries from my other video about getting free blueberries from existing bushes is about 4 feet tall and has a few flower buds. It looks really happy in it’s new home where it was recently transplanted to a few months ago. I’ll post those videos below.

One of the European plums looks like it has a few flower buds. If they are flowers I’ll pick them off since the tree is so young.

I show how far some of the blueberries were originally planted from the fruit trees. With the fruit trees being so small, having the blueberries pretty close to the young fruit trees will help shade the ground and minimize undesirable plants coming up, and will also make the most use of the existing growing space. As the tree grows and its canopy expands, the blueberry will also expand and will send out suckers to increase its size.

The apple tree with the big red leaves is still keeping its leaves. It must think it’s a perennial! :slight_smile:

#42

if you have sandy soil you’re all set. anything on that scale here needs heavy equipment to move the rocky clay soil.

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#43

This video is Part 6 of the weekly food forest tour for 2/23/20.

A few of the blueberries and other fruit trees have some deer damage, so I pruned off the damaged wood back to a healthy bud.

Sometimes damaged blueberries will have hollow wood. I like to remove this back to healthy solid wood. The hollow wood can allow water to pool inside of the blueberry stems and may cause issues later.

#44

This video is Part 7 of the weekly food forest tour for 2/23/20.

Unlike fruit trees, I leave young blueberries that are a few feet tall to produce some berries. Especially if there are smaller blueberries nearby, the larger blueberries can be allowed to produce a crop which will slightly slow down their growth so the younger bushes can catch up.

The blooming plum tree smells so good, I wish I could share the smell with y’all! :slight_smile:

One of my larger apple trees had some small branches growing from near the base of the trunk. I’m pretty sure that two of them are definitely part of the named variety, and the other two may be the variety or possibly the rootstock. I wounded the branches and piled the dirt up around them, so hopefully they will root during this growing season and I can root them and have a few own root apple trees!

I may turn a fallen over plum tree into a plum bush! :slight_smile:

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#45

This video is Part 1 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/1/20.

I’m going to start trying to give an estimate of how long I’ve spent working in the food forest each week to give an idea of about how long it takes to do what I’ve done since last week. I spent about 2 hours between week 1 and week 2, 4 hours between week 2 and 3, and about 10 hours this week between week 3 and 4. A lot of the time I’ve spent so far has been preparing the basic minor earth shaping of the ground of the food forest. This should mostly be a one time investment of time, which will greatly help create well draining soil and also water retention, and will help reduce the work in the future!

I probably won’t use large quantities of just finely cut grass and other plants as a mulch in the future. It seems to mat together too much and doesn’t create an ideal growing area. I will probably use small amounts of it mixed with other types of mulches, but mostly I’ll be using large pieces of cut green growth and preferably mostly whole and shredded leaves. The leaves help create a carbon rich soil preferred by most perennial plants, fruit trees, other trees and bushes, and even a lot of vegetables and other annual plants that can be beneficial in the food forest.

I made two large raised beds near the front of the current natural garden area. One is about 4 feet by 10 and the other is about 4 by 12. I’d like to have these areas as potential nursery beds for young plants. The soil in this area is like digging clouds and was so much easier to dig compared to the wetter back section of the food forest.

I have a few mulberry rootstock that I plan to graft named varieties onto soon! This will be my first year grafting, so we’ll see how it goes! :slight_smile:

I used some of the nearby dead goldenrod stems and broke them up to put onto some of the raised beds to help add carbon and build healthy soil in them.

#46

This video is part 2 of the weekly food forest tour on 3/1/20.

Some honeybee friends are out and about and having fun!

The biggest of the older peach trees has less blossoms than it did last year, but it had a lot of blooms and peaches last year, so I’m guessing it is just taking it a little easier after producing a lot last year, which is fine with me.

The younger peach tree that we pruned off the branches from the rootstock is looking really healthy and in its second year of being planted has almost 100 flower blossoms on it, which I removed so that it it will put its energy into growing this year and be ready to produce some tasty peaches next year hopefully! :slight_smile:

The seedling peach tree looks like it may be the earliest bloomer and grower of all of my peach trees.

Hopefully the cherry trees will have a few blossoms this year and maybe even produce a few cherries.

In the next video we’ll look at the current system of pools and rainwater catchment systems that I’ve been working on recently.

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#47

This video is part 3 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/1/20.

I’ve been doing some minor earthworks by hand to build some pools and ditches throughout the food forest.

I currently have the ditches leading out from the pools dug down about six inches. As a result, the highest the pools will fill up with water currently will be about six inches from the top before overflowing into lower sections of the food forest. The ditch level can be raised or lowered as needed, to either hold more water in the pools or letting it flow down to lower sections if needed.

We’re forecasted to get a good amount of rain this week, so I hope to dig the outline of a few more pools after the rainfall reveals where the wettest areas are.

I hope to create a lot more of these small pools, feeding into bigger pools all throughout the food forest!

#48

This video is part 4 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/1/20.

I piled up the soil from digging out the pools to put around the fruit trees. I wounded the trunks of the fruit trees before putting the soil on them so they will hopefully root this growing season and become own root fruit trees.

On one of the apple trees, it has a side branch coming out near the soil level, that I also wounded and may remove to create an additional own root apple tree. I may just leave it to create an apple bush. :slight_smile:

Lots of pear buds are swelling!

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#49

This video is part 5 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/1/20.

The plum tree is in full bloom! It smells soooooo good!

There is some powdery mildew on the older apple trees. I’ll probably cut off the infected branches and burn them.

One of my mulberries appears to be very sensitive to cold. It has some bark peeling back near the base and the branches above ground appear to be dead, but will probably grow back from the roots like it did last year.

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#50

This video is part 1 of 3 for the weekly food forest tour for 3/8/20.

I spent a lot of time working in the food forest this week, about 25 hours, definitely the most so far, and probably the most all year long. Most of that time was spent grafting, and it probably took me a little longer than is normal, since this was my first year grafting.

I put them near the front of my enclosed existing natural garden area so they are closer and easier to check on.

I use a simple and easy gate for this area that is mainly used to keep deer and rabbits out. It’s just a piece of fencing set beside the gate posts. It can be connected with a large zip tie to one of the posts to act as a kind of hinge, but it’s really not necessary. It doesn’t look the greatest, but it was made with what I had on hand and does the job! :slight_smile:

I grafted mostly pears and apples, but also did a few mulberries. I try to pick varieties that will do well in my area and are disease resistant and vigorous growers for the most part. I also choose based on taste, but only if I think it meets the other two prerequisites. A tasty apple variety that won’t produce any fruit here because of our climate or humidity doesn’t do any good. :slight_smile:

I’m burying the graft union on some of the trees with longer scions and have it right at the soil level on the ones with shorter scions. I’ve done this because I would like for all of these trees to become own root fruit trees hopefully by this Fall. I plan to add soil around the trees after about a month or so and may slightly wound them to hopefully encourage them to send out roots from the main variety and become own root fruit trees.

The mulberries had longer scions, so I buried mostly all of them with a few buds under the soil, so they may develop roots quicker than some of the other grafted trees. I hit one of them with the shovel when I was burying it, so I don’t have very high hopes that one will make it, but it would be a nice surprise if it did. :slight_smile:

The two cherry trees that I grafted about a month ago, which were my first grafts ever, are about to start budding out and look healthy. They were buried pretty deep also if I’m remembering correctly, so hopefully they’ll send out some good roots soon also.

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#51

This video is part 2 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/8/20.

It looks like a good amount of the peach blossoms have survived the cold weather. There aren’t a lot of flowers on the first larger peach tree, but it’s interesting that its rootstock has a pretty large amount for its size. The second larger peach tree has a lot more flowers than the first.

Some of the peach trees have been starting to put on a little green growth. The seedling peach tree has put on the most so far. It’ll be interesting to see of it is the first to put on green growth next year when it starts hopefully flowering at that time. The larger first peach tree was right behind it. It makes me think that the seedling may be from that tree.

I’m planning to mound up around the plum tree located under the seedling peach tree, so that it will hopefully put down some of its own roots and I can remove a few of the rooted branches that will become own root plum trees.

During this time of year, when the weather is cooler and wetter, I plan to try to leave the mini dams of the food forest pools lower, so that more water can freely flow through the pools and other areas of the food forest. In the Summer and Fall, when the weather is very hot and seems to be a little drier if not more infrequent between rains, I will most likely raise the dam height so that it will mostly fill up all the pools to their fullest before they overflow into the lower portions of the food forest. This will help trap and hold more moisture during the hottest and driest portions of the year when water escapes more quickly from the landscape.

I almost went for a swim! :slight_smile:

I’ve added small mounds of soil around most of the fruit trees. I think gotten past the half way point, and hope to finish the rest soon. I don’t have any mulch on hand right now, so I’m trying to spread some seed on them to get something growing on the new mounds as soon as possible.

The orange/rusty colored flower buds are really swelling on the pear trees, and will probably produce some flowers really soon.

The rootstock/seedling? part of the pear tree is producing its first flower buds this year, so it should be really interesting to see what those pears are like. It has grown really fast, in about 3 or 4 years it has grown to be about 15 feet tall or higher.

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#52

This video is part 3 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/8/20.

I’ve grafted a lot of different varieties of plums on the large plum tree whose flowers smell really good. This was my first year grafting overall, and these were the first large scale grafting I had done this year. It is much harder and uncomfortable grafting onto an existing tree, than bench grafting onto individual rootstocks sitting in a chair. :slight_smile: I grafted them during the blooming phase, we’ll see how they do!

One of the larger apple trees has a very upright growth habit, with some new shoots near the bottom growing almost straight up. I’ll probably let them do their thing as they’ll most likely send out some new growth from the sides and branch out more.

In the back propagation bed with the grape vine cuttings they’re starting to bud out, and I’ve rubbed off all of the buds except for the one closest to the bottom on each cutting. This bed gets afternoon and evening shade whereas the other propagation bed gets full sun almost all day, except maybe in the very early morning and in the very late evening.

A lot of the willow cuttings are starting to put on some new growth for the year.

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#53

This video is part 1 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/15/20.

The pollen is here! Maybe my facemask will help keep some of it out! :slight_smile:

I finished up my grafting and the front beds are full of small grafted trees! I tried to space them out so that they both have room to grow, but also so that their canopies will block out and shade out other undesirable plants from growing here. I put about 6 inches in between them from left to right and 4 inches from front to back.

I describe how I plant the trees in the nursery bed. One row of digging, plants two rows of trees. This helps minimize the work and maximize your time! I’ll definitely be using this technique in the future!

The blueberries are starting to put out some green growth. It has a nice red color at the tips of the new growth.

Lots of green growth this year usually means lot of blueberries for next year! The new green shoots usually have tons of flower buds at the tips of them next year and will produce tons of blueberries!

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#54

This video is part 2 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/15/20.

The grafted mulberries have some swelling buds.

One of the grafted cherries is budding out and looks like it will have some new leaves very soon!

I’m doing an experiment with my grape vine hardwood cuttings. One bed is in full sun for almost the whole day. I am leaving them alone after sticking them in the soil.

The other bed with grape vine cuttings is in more shade for most of the middle and later part of the day. I also removed all of the buds except for the one closest to the ground. It should be interesting to see if one bed does better than the other.

The peach seeds I planted last summer are sprouting! You can check out more about them in this video.

They are looking really healthy so far, hopefully they will keep it up! :slight_smile:

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#55

This video is part 3 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/15/20.

On the first larger peach tree, a lot of the blooms didn’t make it. There are a lot more on the rootstock branches, so it looks like it will still produce a few peaches this year.

Some of the flowers on each individual peach tree bloom at different times. I think this is a really valuable trait to have. It helps avoid late frosts and can help overlap with other variety’s bloom times to increase pollination. I also like it when trees produce fruit spread out over a period of time, which lengthens the harvest window and can provide fruit for fresh eating over a longer period of time. A lot of varieties are bred to flower and be ready to harvest at the same time because the commercial fruit industry wants it to be that way, so that it’s easier to pollinate and harvest. However the for the home grower, and in my opinion even for commercial growers too, it is nice to have the flowering and harvest window spread out over a larger period of time.

One of the cherry trees is starting to bud out!

The paw paw flowers (aka alien flowers) are starting to get bigger.

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#56

This video is the part 4 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/15/20.

I’ve seeded out some of the newly built mounds around some of the fruit trees.

One of the young Japanese plums is blooming (I’ll remove the flowers since it is so young though), and it has lots of healthy new green growth.

The large pear tree has some flower clusters that are popping out and will probably be blooming very soon. I counted eight flowers in one cluster. It looks like the whole tree is full of flower buds and hopefully will have a lot of flowers, and as a result lots of pears this year.

The younger large pear that may be the rootstock of the large pear tree, both flowered and leafed out pretty far before the larger pear tree, so I’m pretty sure they are two different varieties. It is really healthy and has had no disease issues, and it also has a great shape and look to it also. It also got rubbed really bad by a deer buck, and even after that it is still thriving and healing over nicely.

I’ve also cast some seed on the larger mulched fruit tree mounds for some different types of ground covers, and I plan to plant some vegetable seeds very soon on them!

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#57

This video is part 5 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/15/20.

Rabbits don’t just eat what I try to grow, they actually eat other things too! :slight_smile: Good to know, lol.

The second older Japanese plum that fell over isn’t doing great and has some yellowish leaves. It’s never really done great, so I plan to probably remove it very soon.

A lot of fruit trees near the back of the food forest are still dormant. :slight_smile:

The willow hardwood cuttings in the back propagation bed are really putting on some growth! They are even flowering! I’ll need to pull the flowers off so they can focus their energy into building their roots. It’s really interesting that these willow cuttings were put in after the other ones, and these are ahead of the other ones.

The buds are starting to really open up on the hardwood grape cuttings, and they’ll probably be starting to have some leaves very soon.

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#58

I dunno, I still have my doubts! I think the rabbit ate that stick because it thought it was something good that you forgot to fence in. :laughing:

Bunnies have definitely snipped my elderberry down to the ground before, hope they don’t get yours!

Thanks for sharing your food forest.

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#59

Yeah that rabbit probably did think it was something I was trying to grow. :smiley:

#60

This video is part 1 of the weekly food forest tour for 3/22/20.

My grafted pear and apple trees are starting to leaf out!

The grape vines are starting to put on some green growth! I even saw a small baby cluster of grapes forming!

The blueberries are starting to put on a lot of new green growth! I think I found a beneficial insect near one of the flower clusters.

In previous years I’ve cut the grass in between the fruit trees. I think I’m going to let it grow out this year and see how it goes. It’ll be a lot less work, and it should also create lots of food for pollinators, create healthy soil, and can also be cut back with a scythe if needed to harvest large sized mulch.