Our forests are magical places. Whether in the tropical lushness of the mighty Amazon, in the majestic evergreens of the Pacific Northwest, or in the bio-diverse hardwoods of the Appalachians, every forest system carries out an amazing array of chemical and biological functions as well as provides homes for a multitude of plants, animals and fungi. The great forests of the world are the lungs of Mother Earth, absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing precious live-giving oxygen. The essence of all life, water, springs to life in the deepest recesses of the forests. The human soul is nourished by their beauty and stillness. Many cultures depend upon the health of the forests for their very survival.
Forest gardening or agroforestry is an agriculture and life-style system that takes the blueprint from our forests and applies it to a man-made system that is diverse, highly productive and stable. The laws of plant symbiosis govern the forest garden where all plants are compatible and nourishing to each other in some way. Forest gardens have proven to be the most productive of all land uses achieving the utmost in space and labor.
From India to Nairobi, and from Indonesia to Nigeria these complete and self-sustaining systems have been replicated as diverse, high yield agricultural systems, providing food, timber, fuel, oils, medicines and crafts. The forest gardens in Kerala, India and Nairobi have allowed families to become self-sufficient and have renewed and restored healthy ecological structures.
No fewer than three and half million-forest gardens provide food, fuel and cash crops for the residents of the Indian state of Kerala. This area of the world is perhaps the most advanced in terms of agroforestry. Kerala, the most densely populated state in India is a long, narrow strip of land between the Western Ghat mountains and the Arabian Sea. The land is mostly infertile, acidic and badly drained and much of the coastline is marshy with Mangrove swamps. Despite the unfavorable conditions, the creative people of Kerala have managed to become self-sufficient and productive through the use of the forest garden.
Industries in this forest garden area include the making of furniture and baskets, the processing of cocoa, rubber-tapping, cashew-nut processing, the building of bullock-carts and catamarans, pineapple canning, match-making, the manufacture of pandanus mats, oil distillation and the processing of coir fibers from coconuts. Many families have also become energy self-sufficient by running their own biogas plants using human, animal, vegetable and household wastes. The slurry from these biogas plants along with the crop residues and nitrifying leguminous plants eliminates the need for chemical fertilizers.
On a small plot of land consisting of only 0.3 acres, one study group found an extraordinary intensity of cultivation, including twenty-three young coconut palms, twelve cloves, fifty-six bananas, forty-nine pineapples, and thirty pepper vines trained up the trees. The family also grew fodder for a house-cow, along with medicinal herbs, spices and vegetables in the under story. These marvelous gardens provide an average family of six to eight people with food, occupations and trade goods.
These systems have been prevalent throughout the rain forest regions of the world for hundreds of years. In the last twenty years Western science has begun to take a closer look at the forest garden and its precise multi-storied structure that provides so much for so many. Once considered a chaotic haphazard system, the forest garden is now looked upon with respect bordering on reverence. These well-planned gardens are mini-ecological preserves.
A forest garden consists of seven “stories” of trees and plants just as in a natural forest. Fruit, nut and forage trees, such as honey locust or carob constitute the canopy layer with dwarf fruit trees the low-tree layer. The third story is the shrub layer with currants, berries, and roses. The fourth layer is the herbaceous layer with perennial herbs and vegetables. Number five is the vertical layer with climbing berries, nasturtiums, runner beans, grapes or yams trained up trees or over fences. Layer six is the ground cover layer with creeping plants. The seventh layer is the rhizosphere with the root vegetables and shade tolerant plants. Most gardens have many of these layers grown separately. The forest garden puts them all together, which allows for plant symbiosis and maximum efficiency of space.
Symbiosis or living together for mutual aid is a basic law of life. As Robert Hart states in his book Forest Gardening, “Evolution is a holistic process, the development of ever more complex, integrated organisms, involving a spiritual element which ensures that the whole is more than the sum of the parts. The living cell is a miracle of coordinated, cooperative activity.”
This basic law can be seen throughout nature. In all eco-systems there lies intense diversity, which allows for all organisms to reach their maximum potential while nurturing their fellow plants and animals. An example of this symbiosis is the roots of leguminous plants and their association with soil bacteria to extract nitrogen from the air and make it available to other plants. Other examples include certain flowers that carry out their pollination process using insects as the carrier from male to female flowers. The process is carried out in ingenious ways using nectars, colors and shapes to attract various insects and bees.
The endless multitude of symbiotic relationships amongst nature’s flora and fauna provide the stable foundation from which evolution takes place. When we replace this diversity with a monoculture, we unravel the very tapestry of life and we find that our own existence becomes more tenuous. Evolution takes a downward spiral instead of the upward spiral of ever more diverse and ever more complex and evolved life forms.
The established forest garden has certain common traits. It is self-perpetuating because almost all the plants grown are perennials or self-seeders. It is self-fertilizing because the deep-rooted trees and bushes that draw upon minerals in the sub-soil make them available to their neighbors as well as the nitrogen fixing legumes. It is self-watering because those same deep-roots tap into the spring veins and pump up water for the whole system. It is self-mulching and self-weeding due to the creeping plants that create a kind of a living mulch. It is self-pollinating because trees are selected to compatible and the various flowering plants attract insects. It is resistant to pests and disease because of the plants that attract beneficial insects and deter pests, and the diversity disallows for any disease to take hold.[i]
Forest gardens are somewhat new to North America and are being experimented with in various parts of the country. Rob Danford has one such garden on one-acre high above the town of Boone in the northwest mountains of North Carolina. On a recent visit during a farm tour one could walk through the diverse herb, vegetable and flower garden as well as the “forest”. Rob bubbles with enthusiasm when showing off his latest plantings and harvests. The world of farming using nature’s blueprint is a magical world to Rob, his eyes sparkling with childlike wonder at the miracle of it.
His forest garden is a work in progress, as many such gardens tend to be. He has planted Black Locust for their nitrogen-fixing properties, quick growth and excellent timber. The Black Locusts are joined by chestnut, apple, pear and plum trees. Many varieties of blueberry bushes dot the under story with medicinal herbs and sun chokes hovering along the ground while a hardy kiwi vine snakes up a locust tree. Rob continues to experiment every year in his forest garden adding new plants to the mix.
With farmland becoming scarcer and industrial agriculture taking over much of our food production, the forest garden offers an alternative to many communities and families who wish to have healthy, organic food locally grown. Even on very small acreage, a family can grown much of their food needs using this unique system.
Robert Hart in England has written the definitive book on forest gardening. A pioneer of permaculture and agroforestry, his insights and hard work have created the standard for the temperate forest garden. With universities on both sides of the ocean taking up the research in agroforestry, we will soon see this viable agricultural system sprouting up in commercial applications as well as home gardens everywhere spelling the end to the destructive monoculture practices and the renewal of our essential ecological biodiversity.
For more information the best book on the subject is, Forest Gardening, by Robert Hart, Chelsea Green Publishing Co. Also a hands-on guide and great reference, How to Make a Forest Garden, Patrick Whitefield, also put out by Chelsea Green Publishing.
[i] Hart, Robert, Forest Gardening, Chelsea Green Publishing, 1991, pg. 52