During the last 12 months we kept planting new trees and shrubs on our finca. We did not only add plants to terraces we already maintained, but we also recovered other terraces. In total we planted 1750 m2 with young trees and shrubs this year.
Not all of them may be visible yet because they are hidden behind (and protected by) indigenous plants. We deliberately kept most of those indigenous plants on the land, because they do not only protect the plants against the sun, but they also protect the soil from deterioration and they support birds and insects.
Once the trees and shrubs start growing they will partly replace the indigenous plants, but we always plant new ones and keeps open spaces in which they are able to keep thriving on our lands.rt writing here...
Outgrown by pino
Speaking about growing, our trees and shrubs do really well. Maybe you remember the small pine trees we planted during our first winter… some of them have already outgrown us! The avocado trees grow at an equally steady rate. The fruit trees, like apricots, apples and citruses, are healthy and growing slowly. Some giving great fruits already.
Unfortunately, the avocado and olives trees won’t be giving much fruit because of a big change of weather during their flowering season. We hear that from more farmers, so avocados might be getting expensive this year.
Fruit tree strategy adjustment
That’s also why we shifted our focus to different kinds of fruit trees. Most of the common fruit trees like apples and pears need a certain amount of chilling hours before they will flower and produce fruit. We are, and will be, getting a lot less of those chilling hours, even at 1.000m altitude so we planted more fruit trees that don’t require much chilling hours. Plums, peaches, citruses and other tropical fruits are examples of trees that might require less cold. But you have to search for the right varieties. Like our new Italian pears (Pyrus communis) of the variety Ercolini which have no issue whatsoever with the heat and drought and require about 200-300 chilling hours, instead of the 500 to 1000 chilling hours for regular European pear varieties.
Overall we are very satisfied with the development of our food forest. And in the coming months we will plants at least 150 trees and shrubs more. Achieving a young food forest of about 5000 m2 with a great diversity of fruit trees, nut trees, berries, herbs, indigenous plants etc.