I am off to attend a Forest Gardening course with Martin Crawford at the Agroforestry Research Trust in Totnes, Devon, next weekend, so I thought it would be appropriate to tell you how some of my own fruit and nut trees are doing, seven years after moving to Derryduff.
Of greatest excitement, I have a walnut!
A single, solitary specimen, but a walnut nevertheless- on a grafted tree of the cultivar “Broadview”. It is only planted here two years and just 3ft high, but the fact that it has a nut at all so early in its life is hugely encouraging and shows that it is possible in this climate.
As a timber tree, walnuts and related varieties grow like the clappers in the moist warm Irish climate, and should be considered for that reason alone.
In fact, the most spectacular tree i have on the property is a Heartnut (Japanese Walnut) given me about 10 years ago as a nut by my sister. I need another heartnut of a different cultivar to get nuts, which I will plant this year.
Of more tested viability, I have a few varieties of cobnuts, which are related to the native hazel but grown for their larger nuts. Some of mine are beginning to produce a handful of nuts each this year. For more information on cobs, check out the Kentish Cobnut Association and download their pruning booklet.
More as a curiosity than as a serious crop, I planted a couple of Bladdernuts- Staphylea pinnata-
soon after I moved here and they started producing their odd-shaped nuts after the second year. The nuts are tiny- only about 1/2 cm across (the ART claim up to 1cm) and enclosed in odd sacs that are unavoidably reminiscent of a scrotum!
I also have a few cultivars of sweet chestnut, purchased from Woodkerne Nurseries
of Skibbereen, still young, but with tremendous potential as a staple tree crop for Ireland. I also planted a small stand of the common sweet chestnut for coppice- the timber is as durable as oak heartwood and grows faster here, ideal for outside furniture, fencing stakes etc, these will be coppiced in another few years. This year for the first time they flowered and may have set some small nuts, but you need the larger cultivars for good nut production. For nuts, they also need a lot of space- 8-10 meters is recommended by Martin Crawford, so not for the small garden.
As far as fruit is concerned, I have a few apples and pears, but I cannot neglect to mention the ever-reliable blackcurrant crop which has yielded 17 ibs already from 10 bushes- the birds have probably had as many- and have i guess another 10 lbs still ripening. Many special thanks to Ciara for making jam! I also have Japanese Wineberries just coming ripe now, one of my favourites, not massively productive but easy to grow and very sweet.
That’s it for now, Im off to the Irish Green Gathering and then to the UK so reports from these will come when I have time.
One Comment
Graham, This is my first communication with you since you stayed in Clones some years back! Well done on your work since and in particular on the zone5 website. I attended the course with Martin Crawford in the Agroforestry Research Trust (ART) last year and enjoyed it and would highly recomend it. It is located on the grounds of Dartington Estate and not far from Schumacher College and Totnes – well known as the main centre of the Transition movement. There is a lovely walk along the River Dart between Dartington Hall and Totnes. Martin’s forest garden there is magnificent. It is much larger than Robert Hart’s. I well remember picking and eating the rubus tricolour fruit which surrounds the entrance to the garden. Two of the key features that struck me were (1) the emphasis he put on good quality windbreaks and their positive effect on the range of edible plants in the forest garden and (2) instead of a straw mulch which Robert Hart used Martin uses a wide range of useful ground cover plants such as mints.
I just got a copy of the 08/09 catalogue from Martin. It is also available on the ART website which has useful info on forest gardening and agofforestry. The ART website is http://www.agroforestry.co.uk
I have been through the experience of the seperation of ornamentals, veg path, orchard and lawn. Now having been to ART and having read the forest gardening books by Robert Hart and one by Patrick Whitefield I am convinced that forest gardening approach is the way we should use much of our garden spaces. (There is a clip of the late Robert Hart on YouTube)
Re my own patch in Co Monaghan – the trees (oak, ash hazel for coppicing) which you planted for us , have done very well despite an early setback from a number of wandering goats. The fruit trees I neglected a bit because of a focus for quite a number of years on house restoration. I notice quite a crop of cobnuts on one of the nut trees this year. I am now planning to work getting the ground ready for the shrub and perennial layer (long overdue). In the coming months I am going to start work on cutting back much of the bramble and blackthorn and putting down some clearance mulch and begin to apply some of what I learned from Martin Crawford.
Liam
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