(uplifting music) - [Narrator 1] "The Home-Scale Forest Garden" is brought to you by: (uplifting music) Brookfield Renewable.

(uplifting music) A provider of renewable power supports public television, reminding the public to make safety a priority.

Know the risks, use caution in and around water.

Information available at safewaters.com.

- [Narrator 2] Since 1979, (birds chirping) Adirondack Fragrance (uplifting music) has offered artisan made place-based fragrance products made from our region's unique botanicals, providing aromas, inspired by the mountains, forests, and fields.

adirondackfragrance.com.

- [Narrator 1] And by Richard (uplifting music) and Deborah Macsherry, the Northern New York Community Foundation, and by these additional sponsors.

Closed captioning sponsored by Reed's Incorporated.

- Welcome to "The Home-Scale Forest Garden!"

I'm Lorraine O'Donnell (uplifting music) with Dani Baker, creator of "The Enchanted Edible Forest Garden," and author of the book, "The Home-Scale Forest Garden" on which this series is based.

In these eight episodes, we are visiting Dani's Garden in Northern New York at different times of the year.

We're also taking a peak at a subtropical garden in Florida.

Well, it's the beginning of fall and there's a lot to harvest this time of year.

- Well actually there's a lot to harvest in this kind of garden from April to November.

But yes, fall is a very abundant time in the garden.

So much is ready to be picked.

It's hard to decide where to begin!

- Our special correspondent, Yatile Patterson, had an opportunity to visit Dani and to assist with the harvest.

(playful music) - So this is a hops bine.

It's a herbaceous perennial, which means that it grows 20 feet tall in one season and then it dies back to the ground.

So hops have many virtues.

Of course you can use them to make beer, but they're also a lovely sedative.

You can make a great tea that puts you right to sleep.

The active ingredient is this little yellow pollen that's inside the flowers.

Can you see it?

- [Yatile] Yeah.

- Do you wanna sniff it?

It's a powerful odor, isn't it?

- It is.

- So back in the day when they used to run, now they, they run hops on strings and they lower them to harvest.

But back in the day, people would have to climb up on ladders to harvest and imagine a big field of hops and people on ladders.

What would happen is they would get overcome by the odor and they'd fall off the ladders.

So now, so they had to rope them to the ladder (laughs) so they wouldn't fall off!

But it's pretty powerful.

Okay, we're gonna harvest a few.

- Okay.

- Do you wanna help me?

- Yeah.

- Okay.

We can use that one.

So you take that one, I'll take this.

- Okay.

- They're very easy to harvest, but they're very light in weight.

So it's not a very profitable kind of venture, because it's very time consuming to harvest them and then they weigh nothing.

So to get a pound of hops, you'd have to harvest quite a quantity.

- So will I or will I not get drunk harvesting?

- No, you won't.

- Okay.

- This is not enough.

I think about people who are spending hours doing it, you know, and with a whole, you know, like a row of like rows and rows of these in a field.

So the air would be completely saturated with the odor.

- I'm sure they had a great time.

- No, you don't have to worry.

And you can pull a bunch off at a time.

You don't have to just take one at a time.

You can get a handful.

- So like, I could grab this here and- - Just pull, yep.

And just pull 'em up.

I just got a whole branch.

Look at that!

It doesn't matter.

It'll grow back next year.

And we're just gonna fill this and then we can make a nice tea.

There are also culinary applications.

People can flavor various dishes with them.

(uplifting music) Okay, we're good.

(graphic swooshes) (insects chirp) This is a good time to harvest some herbs and dry them for future use.

So this is oregano and I'm gonna cut a few of these stalks.

I'm gonna cut the flower off.

And if you wanna use it fresh, it's very easy.

You just do this and you have fresh leaves, taking off the stem.

But for drying, we wanna use the stem intact.

So I'm gonna just pick a few, cut the flowers off.

Here's some nice ones here.

(scissors clicking) Okay.

And when we get to the house, we're gonna tie these up with a rubber band and hang them upside down inside a paper bag.

That way if some of the leaves fall as they dry, they'll be captured by the paper bag and no dust or anything else is gonna get in there.

And then when they're good and dry, we can strip them off of the stems and put them in a plastic bag and just store them in the cupboard till we're ready to use them.

(graphic swooshes) So this is a beach plumb bush.

They're native to the northeast coast.

And surprisingly they're growing in my heavy clay.

I have several bushes here and they're all loaded with fruit.

This is the last one to ripen.

So we're gonna harvest a few.

Now they're little baby plums and they have a pit inside, just like a plum.

So do you wanna taste one?

- Yeah, I'm gonna try this one right here.

- Okay, I'm gonna have one too.

- See how that... - So these aren't quite as ripe as some of the others that we've picked already, but let's pick some anyway, 'cause they'll ripen a little bit in the house.

So let's pick some.

They're easy.

You can just pull off a bunch with your hand.

These make a great jam.

They form a very viscous, thick jam, 'cause they have a lot of pectin.

- I'll grab some over here too.

- Oh yeah.

Good job.

- Yeah.

The moment you bite into it, like juice just like burst out.

- Oh good.

Yeah!

- And like it's so flavorful.

- Yeah.

Thank you.

Yep, they're very tasty.

They're tiny, but they're very tasty.

All right, I think we're good.

(uplifting music) - I'm gonna try this one.

- All right!

(graphic swooshes) So Tile, (insects chirping) now we're gonna harvest some pears.

So this is a variety called luscious.

They really taste good.

And we're gonna see if they're ripe.

Now the way you know if pears are ripe is you gently pick them up.

Ah!

And if they come off like that, they're ready to pick.

So let's pick a bunch.

The other thing I wanna say about pears is you wanna pick them when they're not yellow on the outside, 'cause they, they ripen from the inside out.

And if they're yellow and soft on the outside, they may well be rotten on the inside.

So you wanna get them sort of a little greenish.

So you wanna help me?

- Let's see.

- Just lift them up and if they come off and even if, there, perfect!

All right.

So, can you grab another one?

I'm gonna do this one.

- Oh yeah, let's try this up top.

- All right.

And then if they're not quite ready- - Eh, probably not.

- Here, try one of these.

If they're not quite ready to eat, perfect, just leave them out on on the counter for a couple of days and they'll soften up.

Or if you wanna keep them for another time, put 'em in the fridge.

And when you're ready to eat them, take them out for a couple of days.

(graphic swooshes) So this is an Asian pear tree.

It's not the easiest thing to grow in our region.

It's been winter killed more than once by a really cold winter.

But the beauty of it is it has fruit on the second year growth.

So if we have two mild winters, I get fruit.

And look at these gorgeous Asian pears.

Aren't they beautiful?

- They really are.

- Asian pears are a little different from the other kinds of pears.

You have to let them ripen completely on the tree.

If you pick them when they're not quite ripe, they'll never ripen on the shelf like the others.

But you can tell if they're ripe the same way as the others.

So we're gonna them and see if they come off.

Yes!

Okay!

It's a ripe one!

All right, do you wanna try one?

- Yeah, let's just get this up here.

- There, that sounds like it's gonna be ready.

Good!

All right!

By the way, have you ever tasted an Asian pear?

- No!

- Would you like to?

- Oh, let's try this, okay.

(pear squelches) It tastes different from a regular pear, like slightly different.

- Mm-hmm.

- Maybe the texture is different.

- I think they're crunchy, juicy, and sweet.

Does that sound about right?

- Yeah!

- I think you like it.

(graphic swooshes) This is an Aronia bush.

It's also known as chokeberry because the berries when they're eaten fresh are very tannic.

They make your mouth pucker, but once you cook them, that goes away.

And judging by the color, you can tell that they're very, very high in nutritional value.

So I like to mix them with currants or another fruit that has some pectin and make a really luscious jam.

So do you wanna try one or do you wanna just help me pick?

(laughs) - I'm going to actually try one.

- Okay.

- To see- - [Dani] All right.

- [Yatile] What that experience is like.

Is this a good one?

- Yes.

These are all good.

You can see how loaded these branches are.

This bush requires no care whatsoever.

The only thing you might have to do is stake up a branch 'cause it's so loaden with, laden with berries that it might be touching the ground.

Now these are also very easy to harvest.

You just take a handful.

- [Yatile] But they're juicy.

- Yeah, they're juicy and tasty.

So there we go!

- Now what are some of the things you say you can make with these?

- I like to make jams by mixing them with a fruit that has a lot of pectin, like red currants.

But you can make a juice.

Actually, commercially, they use this as a coloring agent for juices and also for yogurts.

(graphic swooshes) This is sage, and again, this is a good time of year to harvest it to dry.

So I'm gonna take a couple of the stems.

I don't wanna take all the stems, 'cause you have to leave some of the green leaves to go back into the roots.

So the plant will survive the winter and be ready to grow again next year.

I'm just gonna take a couple, like that.

And then just like the oregano, we're gonna hang them upside down inside a paper bag until they dry.

And then we'll take them off the stems and put them in a plastic bag to store.

(playful music) In early autumn, (uplifting music) there were many more crops to gather than we had time to show, including grapes, crab apples, and even cornelian cherries.

- Cornelian cherries?

What are those?

- That's a great question.

A cornelian cherry is a small tree or a large bush related to dogwood, but it has edible cherries, which ripen in fall rather than summer.

And they're tart like pie cherries.

They make a great jam.

- Well, this explains why I am always hungry when I see you, Dani, talking all this fresh, delicious food.

I wonder if harvests are as plentiful during this season in other climates.

We visited Florida at the same time.

Let's see what Pike Food Forest harvests in early fall.

(playful music) - I'm here in Jupiter, Florida with Amanda Pike in her patio, surrounded by her magnificent forest garden.

And this is September and it looks like it's an abundant time of year.

What have you harvested?

- In South Florida, we do have abundance year round, but it does peak around now.

So we have a lot of different fruits and vegetables, many different tropical spinaches.

So Aibika, it's very tender.

It tastes a lot like butter spinach or butter lettuce.

We have longevity spinach, it has a nice crunch to it.

Suriname spinach, which I think tastes a lot more similar to commercial spinach.

Chaya, which is a protein, calcium, and iron powerhouse, but you do need to boil it.

Katuk, which is nicknamed multivitamin plant, because it's so nutrient dense and it tastes like sweet pea.

- Oh!

- We have turmeric and a achira.

These wide leaves we like to use as parchment paper or muffin liners.

Curry leaf is a nice flavoring for salsas and chutneys and different spices.

We have a variety of edible flowers that are considered vegetables, Turks cap, blue butterfly pea, and many other flowers, including maringa flowers.

This is maringa leaf and it is a powerhouse in calcium and iron and protein as well.

All very delicious.

It has a peppery flavor, like arugula.

In terms of fruits, we've got star fruit and this fruit's on and off all year.

Bananas do produce for us all year, but it does peak in the rainy season.

Knippas, that's solely this time of year, along with sugar apple, which is just now.

Coconut, we tend to have all year long.

But you can see how rich and fat it is now, which is delicious.

And then our jackfruit.

I like to harvest it about this size when I'm using it as a vegetable.

- Wonderful.

- So it's a lot of abundance, a lot of deliciousness, just floods the kitchen with nutrients.

- And this is all perennial.

So you plant it once and then it keeps coming back year after year.

- Exactly.

So, when you have a food forest in Florida, having no-mow zones means that you're just going to do much less work.

So for example, Suriname spinach is a perennial, but it also sets seed.

So you can see these little bitty seeds here and it'll just create a little colony for you.

You do nothing.

- It plants itself!

- It plants itself.

And it's delicious and nutrient dense.

(playful music) - The abundance of nutritious food you can harvest in a forest garden is amazing!

It seems whatever climate you're in, you'll find ingredients for a tasty salad!

But getting back into the business end of gardening, I understand there's a task that you can perform this time of year that creates new garden space.

- Yes.

A lot of gardeners these days are building raised beds, which require purchasing materials like lumber and topsoil and then hauling them in.

But another way to create a raised growing space is using materials at hand.

It's called a Hugelkultur mound.

Let's see how it's done!

(playful music) Fall or close to fall is also a good time of year to build a Hugelkultur mound.

So a Hugelkultur mound is a way to create more growing space, to get above poor soil, to get above a high water table.

It has many, many features, but I'm just gonna show you how to do it today.

So first you wanna do a base, a foot of cardboard.

So you're gonna kill all of the sod under and around it.

Then I've already done this.

I went into my woods and I gathered a bunch of semi rotted wood and I just piled it up in the form that the mound is going to take.

So I wanna make sure when I do this that I pack it really close together.

You don't wanna have any little gaps because that'll invite mice to come in and make little houses and make their homes there.

And then they're going to eat your plants that you put on top of the mound when it's finished from underneath.

So you wanna make sure this structure is pretty tight.

And to make it even tighter, I'm gonna take some wood chips and just sprinkle them in some of the little gaps that I'm seeing.

(chips clatter) So let some of these chips go into some of the gaps so that we won't have a nice home for mice or voles.

All right, so that's pretty good.

The next step is to pile on all kinds of organic matter.

So I have some grass clippings that were laying around that I collected.

I've got some vines from my winter squash harvest.

We have some Sudan grass stalks that were a cover crop in my vegetable garden that I clipped for this and some comfrey.

Tile, thanks for being here today.

I want you to help me finish this project, is that okay?

- Absolutely!

That is wonderful!

- Great.

Okay, so I know you haven't done this before.

- No.

- So I'm gonna teach you how.

Okay, the first thing we're gonna start with are these grass clippings.

Why?

Because they have seeds in them.

We don't want any seeds on the top, 'cause we don't want weeds to be growing.

So we're gonna put the stuff that has seeds on the bottom.

So let me demonstrate.

We're just gonna take some of this and spread it out.

Do you wanna get some and spread it out over the top?

- Nice little handful here.

- Yep, we'll get it over the entire mound.

(grass rustling) Now we made these, I gotta fix that.

We made these cardboard footings wide enough so that they'll be extend beyond the finished mound.

So we're gonna put that there.

Good.

Very nice.

All right, and a little more.

And then we're gonna put a layer of something else on top.

So let's see what's next.

Let's try some of these.

So these are the stalks I mentioned, (stalks crunching) and I haven't used these before, so it's gonna be interesting to see how they work.

You can help me with these as well.

- Yeah, It's kind of like pile 'em on top, just like that.

- Yep, yep.

We're just gonna pile.

So all of this organic matter is going to decay very rapidly.

It's surprising how quickly it'll start decaying.

And by next spring we'll be able to plant in this.

- Now why is this mound so important?

- Well, it's a way to create all kinds of microclimates.

So you notice it's the morning, so the sun's in the east.

This is an east-facing side.

So you have an east-facing side, a south-facing side, a west and a north.

You also have height, which will be really well drained and also low down.

Like take the north side down low.

That's gonna be quite moist, 'cause it's gonna be shaded a good part of the day.

So you get all these different microclimates so you can match your plants with the microclimates that you've created.

Another really important function is that wood that we had as the base, that is gonna slowly rot and it's gonna provide organic matter for the entire mound.

Not only that, but it's also gonna be a water sink.

So when it rains or snows and water seeps into the mound, those rotting logs are gonna hold a lot of water.

So in a drought time, the plant's roots can reach water in that wood.

- And what kind of plants could someone maybe grow on a mound like this?

- Good question.

So my plan for this mound is I'm gonna plant perennial vegetables.

So these are vegetables that you plant once and they come up year after year and you get to harvest them without doing any work after the initial planting.

You can also, I've made mounds where I have bushes and even trees.

So any kind if you, and by the way, you can make them any size you want.

You can make them this size or much larger.

I have two 50 foot long mounds in this garden and I have trees growing on them and bushes and ground covers and even vines.

(stalks rustling) Okay, now let's try some of these vines.

(vines rustling) - Oh, these are hefty.

- Yep.

So, if you see a squash, take it out, because I don't want squash seeds.

I don't want squash growing from the mound.

But yep.

So these were just taken, you know, anything you have at hand, you can use any organic matter you have.

If you have grass clippings, if you have compost, I've cut weeds and other things that are growing wild and use them.

Now you can see- - We have two baby squashes.

- Okay.

You can see that we need to put a lot of organic matter on, 'cause this is going to, as this decays, it's going to sink down.

So you wanna make sure you have at least six inches of soil that's going to be forming between the the wood and the, and the surface.

Okay, that looks pretty good, it's coming along.

Now one thing that's important and those, the stalks had some green matter, but it's important to include some green matter, because the green matter (plants rustling) helps the brown matter decay faster.

So we're gonna throw, these are some comfrey that I cut yesterday.

Now this is gonna sink down quite a bit as it decays.

And we may well need to add some material before we plant just to bring it up to speed.

But this looks pretty good so far.

All right, we're not gonna use any more of this, 'cause we're getting close to the top, but let's put some more of these on.

- Okay!

(plants rustling) Teamwork makes the dream work.

- All right, let's- - Or makes the mound work.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

I'm sorry.

- Now it's important too to make your mound convex, not concave, 'cause if you, so it's rounded like this.

If you make a concave edge like this, it's going to erode and it's not gonna work for you.

So you wanna make it like this.

All right, we're gonna use the rest of these and let's put 'em vertically so they kind of stand on the sides.

- [Yatile] Right.

- The final step after you put all this organic matter on, including green stuff, is wood chips.

So wood chips, not only do they hold down the organic matter, but it's a weed-free topping.

So let's see if we can do this.

(chips clatter) All right, that's one.

I've never used these stalks before, so I'm not sure how they're gonna work out.

Well, we're finding out.

Yep.

All right.

- Do you need me to grab a bucket?

- Sure.

That'd be great.

(uplifting music) And try to throw it on the side.

(playful music) Mounds are so much fun to build.

For your next get together, consider inviting friends over for a mound building party.

It's a good way to get outside, get fresh air, stay active, and accomplish a useful task.

- That's a great idea!

And I'm looking forward to getting my invitation.

(Dani and Loraine laugh) In the next episode, we'll discover what there is to harvest and what chores need to be done in late fall to prepare the garden for a cold, snowy winter.

I'm Loraine O'Donnell with Dani Baker.

Join us next time on "The Home-Scale Forest Garden."

Thanks for watching!

- [Narrator 1] "The Home-Scale Forest Garden" is brought to you by: (uplifting music) Brookfield Renewable.

(uplifting music) A provider of renewable power supports public television, reminding the public to make safety a priority.

Know the risks, use caution in and around water.

Information available at safewaters.com.

- [Narrator 2] Since 1979, (birds chirping) Adirondack Fragrance (uplifting music) has offered artisan made place-based fragrance products made from our region's unique botanicals, providing aromas, inspired by the mountains, forests, and fields.

adirondackfragrance.com.

- [Narrator 1] And by Richard (uplifting music) and Deborah Macsherry, the Northern New York Community Foundation, and by these additional sponsors.

Closed captioning sponsored by Reed's Incorporated.

- [Announcer] Dani Baker's award-winning book, The Home-Scale Forest Garden How to Plan, Plant, and Tend a Resilient Edible Landscape" is available from Chelsea Green Publishing at chelseagreen.com and wherever books are sold.

(uplifting music) (uplifting music)