During the Covid-19 lockdowns, Jo discovered a Facebook page called Grow Food Not Lawns, and enthusiastically set about absorbing information about permaculture - growing agricultural ecosystems sustainably and self-sufficiently, without the use of pesticides.
Jo's garden features in Secret Gardens of Aotearoa by Jane Mahoney and Sophie Bannan.
“I have always strived to be as self-sustaining as possible, and wanted to create a food forest but just didn’t know how to start.
“Even when we owned a small lifestyle block, it seemed too daunting and I never got there. Now I am on the smallest section I have ever owned, and have an amazing food forest growing! If only I had had this knowledge many years ago.”
A circular patch of bare soil was considered the perfect spot to try building the hugelkultur (mound bed) patches paramount to the principles of the seven layers of a food forest.
The seven layers of the food forest, built on the mounds, are canopy trees; a lower tree layer; a shrub layer; a herb layer; the soil surface; roots; and a vertical layer.
Jo’s hugelkultur experiments multiplied and she began planting fruit trees. All the while, she was learning everything she could about growing a food forest.
“I have just about every fruit tree imaginable including bananas and pineapples growing. Also the normal veges and a huge variety of berries!”
She has never had a garden plan, rather a guiding set of principles — organic gardening, sustainability, feeding themselves, and feeding the birds and insects.
The three pillars of permaculture have been enthusiastically adopted by many around the world. When asked why she thought growing and eating your own produce is so popular now, Jo believes “people are so aware of nutrient-dense, unsprayed, healthy and unprocessed food.
“That we are actually what we eat. Also, I think with the price of fresh fruit and veges - it is a no-brainer to me to grow what you can yourself.”
Like other horticulture and agriculture on the peninsula, Jo’s forest did not escape the ravages of last summer’s cyclones.
“Cyclone Gabrielle has had a huge impact on the garden, and the other cyclones to a lesser extent. The continual rain has killed my avocado tree, which has really upset me! The wind has blown over many young trees which have since died.
“We are going to have to learn to garden differently as these are the weather patterns to come in the future.”
