The Food Forest

Updates from the food forest in October 2021 –

We made and scattered bicochar seed balls to give opportunity for support plants In our seed balls there was..
Fenogreek to fix Nitrogen
Altramuz to fix Nitrogen
Kale to bring up nutrients
Caléndula to attract insects
Nabo (raddish) to decompact soil

Chop and drop, we cut alfalfa to leave the N+ in the soil and organic matter decomposing to create more soil

Creation of compost, a pile of organic matter made of various layers alternating consecutively coal and nitrogen.

The charcoal is provided by the dry part (branches) and nitrogen different layers between green branches, organic matter and fertilizer in different proportions. To maintain it you have to water it with plenty of water, wait two days and turn around completely like this every other day, always controlling the temperature for 18 days, and the compost is ready !

Comments from 29 March: the compost didn’t work as

“Compost needs a very specific mix of c/n and lots of water to start. Maybe a lack of manure or fresh greens? I don’t know what went into it. Fast compost is good for bacterial things like annuals but trees do much better with slow composting as it is much more fungal. We do both hot and cold here for different uses” – Nick

“It was a try to use up material but definitely there wasn’t enough water in it..and probably not enough nitrogen neither” – Chris (compost creator!)

“I’ll bring some raw biochar which we can soak and put in it and alfalfa. Hopefully that gives it enough moisture and nitrogen to wake it up” – Nick

We will try and wake up the compost and do another intervention in the next few weeks! At least we managed to post the information from October 2021 before the Spring 2022 intervention – even if it’s 5 months late! – Anna