Blitz 141 West Brunswick Food Forest
The morning frost melted as the sun poured over the West Brunswick Food Forest, resulting in a spectacularly sunny winter’s day. Volunteers from both the Permablitz network and friends of the Food Forest joined forces in what was a productive and fun day.
Designer Karen said…
The current under-planting design was developed to complement the remaining trees planted. The Food Forest had only trees and vines, so we added all the other elements of a rich and complex Food Forest:
- Some more deciduous fruit trees to complement the existing ones, such as some more Hazelnuts to ensure pollination
- More evergreen trees such as a self-pollinating Carob Tree – the variety is ‘Clifford’
- More vines, such as Black Seedling Passion-fruit – no more pesky root stock needing to be removed!
- Smaller fruit trees such as Strawberry Guava – Psidium cattleyanum
- Shrubs such as Pepino, which can fruit all year round in Melbourne
- Ground covers such as Aptenia cordifola – Baby Sun Rose – an edible succulent
- Herbaceous perennials such as Yarrow, a useful herb for humans and gardens
- Perennial vegetables such as Globe Artichokes
- Root vegetables such as Jerusalem Artichokes
- Self-seeding annuals such as Borage – a bee attracting flower, essential for good pollination of the fruit trees
- And we added in some edible indigenous plants such as Warrigal Greens
With the hottest, driest summer on record coming after our first planting this time last year, we adjusted some of the plantings for the Permablitz day to concentrate on more drought tolerant, hardier plants, such as Rosemary, native Saltbushes, etc, with the idea that we can add other plants more in keeping with the design as the soil and microclimates in the garden improve.
Host Mark said…
A massive thanks must go to the dozens of lovely people who found time to come along to what was a big, BIG day for the food forest!
We were very excited about welcoming lots of new friends to help us finish this bit of the food forest rejuvenation project with a bang and we had an amazing day. Despite the chilly start, we literally got MONTHS of work done in one day with lots of us learning about composting, pruning fruit trees, mulching, planting and weeding (as well as getting in plenty of practice), chatting with each other and eating the yummy food. A special mention for the diligent diggers who toiled for hours to completely remove a pesky rose that’s been coming back despite all out efforts to date.
By the close of the day, the food forest looked loved and refreshed and there were many smiles from tired faces as we packed up and made our way home. In the days since, we’ve seen quite a few “what an awesome day!” messages too. The community garden and food forest at Dunstan Reserve provide a great place to connect and hang out as well as to learn about and participate in growing food together and it’s being run by and for people from the local community. Days like this are what this place is really all about.
If you’re looking for something more than a quick fling in the food forest, we’d love to see you again soon, perhaps we might get to know each other better. All are welcome. You can get involved with the community garden in a variety of ways and in July we’re forming a “friends of” crew to act as custodians for the food forest, more details about this and other stuff on our website www.morelandcommunitygardening.org
