We love trees!
This is a blog dedicated to everyone who live with a lot of trees, but who also want to grow fresh food where they live.
Our Story
We thought we were buying the perfect house in March about 10 years ago. It was a little bigger than we thought we'd need, and a little more run down than we cared to admit, but the lot! We had nearly an acre, an absolute luxury within commuting distance to Boston. There was a front yard, a back yard, and a little horse barn with its own yard. Desperate to get out of our stuffed condo and give our 6-month-old some space to crawl around, we signed the papers in May.
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By June, the trees had leafed out, and the yard was dark, and damp. Someone had installed an irrigation system, which we have never needed to use. As we watched the yard, mushrooms popped up everywhere, and moss battled the lawn, and usually won.
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We tried putting in a garden in one of the few areas where we sometimes saw sun. Turned out that most of it did not get sun. The tomatoes hated it. The okra didn't grow. Beans didn't even bother.
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But some plants thrived. Growing scallions was easy, and greens bolted slower. We grew a bunch of tiny potatoes using potato "seed" by saving some tubers from our CSA. We started to research things like permaculture, which led to the idea of forest farming, where you actually create shade to protect some plants.
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We hired a consultant to come out for a couple of hours and look at our plot. He had a list of plants we could grow, noting that a lot of our plot gets zero sunlight at the height of our growing season. We visited a garden center, talked to the very knowledgable seller there, and found a few more varieties.
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Look in the woods. In the deepest shade, nothing grows, but you're probably not in those conditions. You might see wintergreen, dandelions, blueberries, and mushrooms. There are animals feasting on acorns and hazelnuts. Raspberries pop up randomly. There are options. This blog documents those options, our research, and our experience.
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No garden has perfect conditions, and there isn't enough written for folks who can't bear to chop down trees but also want fresh garden produce.