Cover image source: Wikipedia
PERENNIAL PLANTS
A perennial plant or simply perennial (from Latin per, meaning "through", and annus, meaning "year") is a plant that lives for more than two years. The term is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. The term is also widely used to distinguish plants with little or no woody growth from trees and shrubs, which are also technically perennials.
Source: Wikipedia
We follow along with the permaculture approach by incorporating as many perennial plants into our garden design as possible. We do this in accordance with the 'evolution and succession' principle. This entails working towards mature, self-reliant systems, which require little energy input and are more resilient. A perfect example of this kind of system is what we call a forest garden or food forest. More specifically it includes a majority of edible perennials in addition to plants that contribute beneficial qualities to the growing area such as legumes which are nitrogen fixers that will help provide this nutrient to the surrounding plants.
To determine the ideal place for our forest garden we look again to the design steps on the bottom of the Permaculture page. As it is a growing project that needs some attention (especially in the beginning) but as time goes on it will require less and less maintenance, we intend to place it close enough to our home but not necessarily right outside our front door, in other words, an area we refer to as Zone 2.
PERENNIAL PLANTS
A perennial plant or simply perennial (from Latin per, meaning "through", and annus, meaning "year") is a plant that lives for more than two years. The term is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. The term is also widely used to distinguish plants with little or no woody growth from trees and shrubs, which are also technically perennials.
Source: Wikipedia
We follow along with the permaculture approach by incorporating as many perennial plants into our garden design as possible. We do this in accordance with the 'evolution and succession' principle. This entails working towards mature, self-reliant systems, which require little energy input and are more resilient. A perfect example of this kind of system is what we call a forest garden or food forest. More specifically it includes a majority of edible perennials in addition to plants that contribute beneficial qualities to the growing area such as legumes which are nitrogen fixers that will help provide this nutrient to the surrounding plants.
To determine the ideal place for our forest garden we look again to the design steps on the bottom of the Permaculture page. As it is a growing project that needs some attention (especially in the beginning) but as time goes on it will require less and less maintenance, we intend to place it close enough to our home but not necessarily right outside our front door, in other words, an area we refer to as Zone 2.
As it takes essentially years to build up such food production system, we obviously don't have many photos to show yet for this part of the project. All I can share for now is our intended strategy to establish our food forest.
- Carry on observing our intended location for the food forest to determine specifically where the most ideal growing spots will be for specific plants. For instance, some plants such as a cherry tree is a bit more delicate then the hardy blueberry bushes.
- Collect perennials in the mean time - which we already have done. Luckily we have some very kind and generous friends and neighbours that share the bounty of these truly abundant plants. I am planting these close to our temporary dwelling for now, to keep an eye on them and keep them watered well to make sure they establish and then we can transplant them when we have a permanent place for them. Some edible perennials we received last year (fingers crossed they come up this spring!): hops, horseradish, and aronia (chokeberry). We also received gorgeous irises and the blazing star. We look forward to paying this generosity forward once we get established and are able to!
- We are eager to experiment with propagating and establishing a variety of nut trees. I say experiment because our hardiness zone limits the quantity of varieties that would be suitable to grow in the area. Some varieties we are likely certain will survive are the Black Walnut, Butternut and Beech.
- Start sculpting the landscape with earthworks such as swales, dams, and ponds in order to harvest and retain as much water as possible for the whole growing system.