These practices focus on the integration of trees and crops to create a balanced and sustainable farming system. By blending forestry with agricultural practices, we enhance biodiversity, improve soil health, and boost crop yields, all while supporting the health of the ecosystem. This approach not only boosts productivity but also fosters resilience against climate challenges, making it an ideal choice for cultivating harmony between agriculture and the environment.
Agroforestry: Integrates trees and shrubs into farming systems to improve biodiversity, soil health, and crop yields while providing habitats for pollinators and wildlife. This is the basis of harmonizing forestry and horticulture.
Based on this is also Forest Gardening, a perennial polyculture system inspired by natural woodland ecosystems, integrating various layers of plants to produce food in harmony with nature. This approach involves designing multi-layered gardens with perennial plants, where each layer—from canopy trees to shrubs, herbs, ground covers, and root crops—serves a specific role. Fruit and nut trees, berries, herbs, and vegetables coexist in a harmonious system that promotes biodiversity, improves soil health, and supports pollinators.
Syntropic Farming (Developed by Ernst Götsch), an approach emphasizes soil regeneration and biodiversity by mimicking natural forest growth is used on the edges of our orchard. Closely related to forest gardening, this method also focuses on dynamic succession and continuous biomass generation. On the perimeter of our orchard we have almost perfected this method which serves dual purposes – of having a fence all around and acting as a windbreak for our orchard.
Alley Cropping: Growing crops in alleys between rows of trees or shrubs, which helps manage soil erosion, retain moisture, and improve biodiversity.
Various fruit trees also require minimum cumulative chilling hours every year. With climate crisis here, rising temperatures are taking a toll on fruit production in our region. A variation of alley cropping where fruit trees are planted between evergreens like oaks helps in extending the chilling hours needed by the fruit trees, providing a microclimate control.
Our clay-rich soil benefits greatly from alley cropping. The shallow roots of the trees help absorb excess subsurface water during heavy rains, while their canopies provide shade that reduces moisture loss in the summer. This system also effectively prevents soil erosion — a common challenge in hilly terrain — as the tree roots anchor the soil firmly in place.
The trees also yield valuable resources like wood, fruits, nuts, and even fodder — further enhancing land productivity and making optimal use of available space.
