Polyculture Beds

First Forest Garden

We started the project in an area of the garden where there were already mature trees and fruit trees. We cleared a mature ornamental shrubbery leaving two large beech trees, a Mountain Ash, a cherry and a mahonia. We filled the space with lots of herbs that we had been keeping in pots: bay, rosemary, two types of sage, marjoram, mint and chives. We added a hedge of raspberry canes at the back of the border to mark the edge of the bed. We added asparagus and some perennial kale, spinach and sorrel to the bed. Between the two beech trees where it was very shaded, we added woodland plants like violets, wood sorrel and wild garlic.