Horticultural Strategies and Liberation Technologies
Cultivating Abundance in a limited world
• The primary bond: learning to consciously rely on living systems again • Restoring, cultivating and utilizing the fecundity of nature to meet our needs • Horticultural strategies- how we cultivate the plants and land in our care with informed intent.
Liberation Technology
• The technologies that aid in our liberation from global corporate dominance, a system that seeks to insert itself for a profit as an intermediary between us, all our human needs, and our relationships with others and the world. Czech fermentation pot Lid and airlock Ceramic weights Horticultural Strategy
• The locally adapted systematic methodology we use to cultivate the plants in our care to meet our needs over time. • Every useful plant benefits from an associated horticultural strategy and maintenance plan for a long, healthy, and productive life. • Bring gardens to wherever people live. • Conserves water, minimizes effort once established. • Very simple, world saving, growing system. – Water reservoir – Membrane/wick – Soil containment – Soil with high OM or capillarity
Wicking Bucket Garden Upper bucket Before filling with soil
Wicking Garden Beds Hugelkultur
• Burying woody carbon in hills and beds. • Works for annual and perennial gardens. • On contour or off contour? • May need extra water at establishment
Sepp Holzer’s Hugelkultur Diagram Crop comparison Excavate Trench Add logs Add coarse and woody materials Add non-woody layers Add fine material last Cover with excavated soil Mulching the sides Finished Hugelkultur Bed Hugelswale
Tall Beds Framed Hugelkultur Palisade style Micro Hugelkultur Deep Bed Soil Building
• Double Digging scaled and speeded up • The method: one time deep tilthing and remineralizing with big tools • Deep cultivation: incorporating OM and minerals. • Renews, aerates, drains
Deep Bed Method
• Builds and restores soil fast. • Plants love it! • Improves soil tilth and aeration • Captures and stores water in soil. • Deep roots drought proof plants.
• Strategic pruning for fruit and nut trees • Continuous seasonally appropriate pruning to modify size and form. • Prune in early summer to control growth. • Prune in winter to encourage growth. • Pinch prune active growth to direct and encourage branching.
Pollard and Pinch Prune Classic pollard in pasture Coppice: keeping woody plants forever young
• Maintaining Juvenility • Perennial harvest of food and materials • Shrub Coppice Method • Pruning through the season.
Classic multi-stem shrub The Shrub Coppice Method
prune for continual renewal Shrub Coppice
Works for plants grown on their own roots
English Chestnut Coppice Orchard Coppice Harvest and Renewal Open Crown Pruning Open crown pruning from above Developing an open crown SC Peach Orchard
Living and Woven Fences Woven Fences Plants for Bio-Fences
• Hazel • Willow • Hawthorn • Osage orange • Maple • Alder • Pawpaw • Hornbeam • Birch • Dogwood • Hickory • Beech • Chestnut • Persimmon • Hardy citrus An ancient weave……… Woven Hazel
Wattle Privacy Fence Farm & Orchard Fence Hazel Hurdle Woven Screens The art of screening Woven edging Bed Edging Bed Retaining
Live Willow Lattice Fencing
Living Willow Palisade Fence Palisade Fencing in Ghana Osage Orange Pasture Fence Layed Animal Fences Layed Fence Building Hawthorn Layed Fence Fancy Layed Fence Before laying After laying Live Post Fences Celebrate Fecundity!
Chuck Marsh