The Food Forest

Two years ago we planted Stage Two of our orchard. Stage One being a year older and around 20 fruit trees near the chook run. We've removed half of Stage One by transplanting the stunted trees to other areas. For some reason they many not thrive in that location...

Stage Two was planted in a disused paddock area
previously filled with long grass and bracken fern like this one

Stage Two began as over 50 food-producing trees planted on a west-facing slope with deep, rich soil and good drainage. It was planted in typical grid formation to allow for the tractor to go between the trees and slash the grass which grows lush and tall through most of the year. The trees have thrived - with many well over head height already, and our first samples of the fruit to come ripening with the changing seasons. They have had less care and attention than most of our other tree plantings - a little feeding, some mulch (removed by helpful free-range chickens), removal of shoots below the graft point as required and grass and weeds pushed back, hoed or cut only around three times each year. In the beginning I had to spray with eco pest oil for what may have been red mite, but as the trees grew larger, signs of disease vanished. I do hope that they stay away!

After recently watching a fabulous Food Forest DVD we lamented not planning and planting this way from the start, but vowed to alter the orchard to mimic a forest over the coming wet seasons.

This week, we have planted out around one third of the trees required to fill the space between the rows. Varieties added included mulberries, pigeon pea, malabar chestnut, mandarin, wampu, loquat, miracle fruit, sweet leaf, a few different tropical stonefruit, cumquat, albizia, ice-cream bean and more.


We grow some of our trees from cuttings and seeds, are gifted or buy some through our local community groups like Seed Savers and LETS, buy some at the markets and a few at local nurseries.


We have only a few macadamia seedlings remaining in our tree box, so it's time to plant seeds and source more trees for the food forest project. If you have a favourite type of tree, please leave a comment and let me know about it.

Here are the trees on the hillside. A lot of them are 2m tall now and the bamboo on the edge is several metres tall and 1.5 metres diameter.

Four months old

Honey is now over four months old and has grown so big! She is coping well with being gently weaned and loves to graze alongside Lucy and chew her cud in the shade. She still has the back quarters (and strips out the front) each afternoon, but in the coming couple of weeks will be completely weaned from Lucy's milk. Lucy is due to calf on March 22nd and needs time to rest.

I've been using diatomaceous earth to deter flies and other parasites - it is mixed with their other supplements into their daily feed, used as a dusting powder and sprinkled onto their bedding area. So far, I think it really is making a difference!

After much deliberation, Honey hasn't been de-horned. Yet. Apparently I don't need to decide immediately, though this is the optimum time to remove her horn buds. Because she will always be in a small herd, and has been handled from when she came here, I'm leaning toward letting her keep her horns.


I'm about to start reading The Family Cow by Dirk van Loon. I picked it up from Fishpond for under $25 and it looks to be a fairly comprehensive addition to the farm bookshelf.

This isn't the greatest photo, but it does show how huge Lucy's belly is (with still 3 months to go) and how tall Honey has become compared to Lucy.

We're still getting between 4-5L of milk each day from the front quarters, and leaving the back quarters to Honey. I have loads of milk in the fridge and freezer and numerous yoghurt and cheese experiments going on! It will be such a shock to have no homegrown milk for 2+ months.

We're always reflecting how far the girls have come in 3.5 months. They're easy to catch now, and Lucy is easy to lead. Honey isn't as well-trained to the halter as she could be. They're affectionate and curious farm-pets who have really fit into our family and routine nicely.