Veggie Swales

The swales are blooming and teeming with plant life. I walk through after a big rain and can hear frogs and see the trees as they green and blossom.

We’ve started our journey to an edible food forest with perennials.

We have cherry trees, apple trees, pear trees, walnut, chestnut and almond trees along with a variety of non-productive support trees like oak and willow.

Now, it’s time to add a few annuals and perennial berry shrubs to the mix.

Some annuals, we can turn into perennials.

Dill is the perfect example. Last year, we had dill shooting up all over the place because we didn’t harvest it. We let it go to seed.

Black-seeded  Simpson lettuce also popped up everywhere. Both plants were stronger and more vigorous than when we planted them from seed the previous year.

The plan is to make a mix of seeds and soil to throw down in the swales. By mixing the seeds with dry and crumbly dirt, we will be able to spread across a wider area and ensure that we don’t end up with clumps of annuals.

We’ll scatter cabbage, broccoli, lettuce and spinach seeds.

The boys will fling amaranth, sunflower and marigold seed bombs all over the place…and probably at each other.

And we’ll spread dill, chives, ground cherry, cilantro, parsley, and borage seeds.

We’ll create and edible food forest with berries and veggies everywhere.

Of course, we’ll have to keep the chickens out.

Seed bombers are back
Spreading flowers through the swales
Watch out you chickens