Post by taihaku on Jan 15, 2016 6:22:08 GMT -5
Thought I'd pop a post up in this forum to get people's thoughts on an idea I've been cooking up for my orchard. The orchard itself is somewhere slightly bigger than an acre, sits on a hill and is pretty exposed to wind. I'd love to keep bees in the orchard but bitter experience of locating hives in this area tells me the wind is an issue for them. Obviously as the trees and shrubs in the orchard growth this will disrupt the direct wind to an extent but I want to provide them with even more shelter. The plan therefore is to create a hexagon (just cos I thought the hexagon shape'd be cool for a bee yard not for any more clever reason) of fencing posts with wires on one side and windbreak material on the other. On the outside of the hexagon I will plant a perimeter of bocking 14 comfrey and the goal will be to kill off all the invasive grass within the hexagon (with the comfrey then providing a barrier to recolonisation by creeping rhizomes). I'm then planning to attempt to naturalise various bee friendly annual plants within it/resow every year from saved seed with just a masuoka-style random planting. Growing along the wires will be a "fedge" of edible food vines and trained shrubs.
The goals are:
1. Give the bees a structure that provides solid wind protection for up to 10 hives.
2. Create a space in which I can easily walk to work the bees with minimal maintenance and no need to mow.
3. Get a bit of extra food out of the space
4. Provide a bit of extra forage for the bees
5. Get a bit of extra food out of the fedge
6. Look awesome
7. Get a bit of compost material from the comfrey edging.
8. Create a comfrey bocking 14 mother planting for future projects
My proposed planting scheme is:
Edge with bocking 14 comfrey
On the Fedge:
- A load of ribes cuttings from existing plants/whatever else I can lay my hands on cuttings of.
- Hardy kiwis Actinidia arguata varieties
- Suitable grape varieties
- various hardy passifloras
On the inside in the meadowy bit
- a mix of tomatillos/ground cherry type things from my tomatillo landrace project
- breadseeds
- borage
- tagetes
- perennial alliums
- fennel?
- squash vines.
I'm curious as to people's thoughts and any additional planting suggestions people may have.