Building a Diverse Food Forest System 

 

Agroforestry is a way of growing trees, shrubs, plants, and sometimes animals together (known as Silvopasture when livestock are included) in a single system that mimics natural ecosystems while producing food and other resources, rather than relying on monoculture systems that are degrading biodiversity and soil over time.

 

My interest in this started quite early on. At around 16, I often watched videos of food forest tours in places like Costa Rica and Florida, including growers like Paul Zink featured on Pete Kanaris’s GreenDreamsTV, seeing all the unusual and interesting fruits I had never even heard of before. 

A year or so later, while in the rural town of Torremanzanas in Alicante, Spain, I came across a strawberry tree (Arbutus unedo) growing on the side of a dry roadside. Trying the fruit of this unusual, almost tropical-looking tree for the first time was something completely new, especially after seeing the surrounding fields full of farmed olives, pomegranates, and almonds. 

When I got back to the UK and found out they could actually be grown here, I ordered one that same day, along with a 'Brown Turkey' fig. 

That moment sent me down a rabbit hole, and ever since then I’ve been researching, and more recently over the last three years, sourcing lost, forgotten, and rare fruits, herbs, and medicinal plants from around the world, many of which are now sold as ornamental plants in UK nurseries as their original uses have been largely lost to history, alongside top-producing plants and old cultivars, effectively creating a living gene bank. 

As I learnt more, I came across the Agroforestry Trust and the work of Martin Crawford, particularly his well-established food forest at Dartington in Devon. (Which we had the chance to visit this year!) Learning about what was possible in a temperate climate helped turn an interest into a long-term goal. 

In many tropical regions, agroforestry systems are already well established, with dense, highly productive food forests that can produce large amounts of food with relatively low inputs. In temperate climates like the UK, these types of systems are far less common, especially at a diverse, small-scale level. 

Our aim is to explore what is possible in a temperate setting by building a highly diverse, multi-layered system from the ground up. 

Every order you place helps fund the creation of this long-term permaculture food forest. 

 

 

Current Stage: Nursery Phase

Right now, we are focusing on building strong nursery stock before planting out. 

Rather than rushing plants into the ground, we are taking the time to grow and establish them properly while increasing numbers through propagation and selecting the strongest performers. This approach allows us to build a far more resilient and adaptable system from the start, giving everything the best possible foundation for long-term success. 

 

 

What We’ve Built So Far

We currently have hundreds of individual plants, covering well over 300+ different species and varieties, all growing as potted nursery stock as we prepare for large-scale planting of the system. This allows us to grow strong, well-established plants and trees, and monitor them closely before planting them out. 

These plants already represent all major layers of a food forest. 

The vining and climbing layer includes hardy kiwis, silver vine, akebia, maypop, schisandra, hops, and a wide range of Rubus species. These will eventually form productive vertical structure and help maximise space. 

The canopy layer is made up of larger trees such as evolutionary anachronisms like ginkgo, honey locust, and Kentucky coffee tree, species thought to have evolved alongside now-extinct megafauna and which no longer have their natural seed dispersers in modern ecosystems. Despite this, they remain highly valuable, offering food, resilience, and unique ecological functions within the system. Alongside these are cherries, pears, rowan, sassafras, magnolia, bamboo, and pine, which will form the long-term backbone of the system, creating shade, structure, and stability.

Below this sits the orchard / sub canopy layer, with species such as pawpaw, quince, persimmon, apples, pears, plums, cherries, apricots, mulberries, medlars, sea buckthorn, and jujube. This will become one of the main food-producing layers, where both high-performing modern varieties and older cultivars can be grown side by side. 

The shrub layer is already highly diverse, including currants, gooseberries, jostaberries, honeyberries, blueberries, barberries, Elaeagnus, viburnum, elderberries, figs, pomegranate, and spice-producing plants. This layer plays a key role in productivity, resilience, and biodiversity. 

Closer to the ground, we are developing groundcover species such as strawberries, cranberries, lingonberries, wintergreen, and other low-growing plants that help protect soil and retain moisture. 

Alongside this, a wide mix of perennials and herbs such as comfrey, mint, chamomile, fennel, sage, thyme, and ginseng help support pollinators, nutrient cycling, and overall system health. 

We are also experimenting with annual crops and beginning to introduce aquatic elements such as wild rice to expand into wetter areas. 

 

 

Preserving Fruit Genetics & Forgotten Breeding Projects

One of our particular interests is unusual fruit hybrids, especially crosses between different species and even different genera. Examples include Shipova (a pear and whitebeam hybrid), alongside lesser-known fruits such as ‘Burka’, ‘Granatnaja’, and ‘Dessertnaja’, which demonstrate just how much potential exists beyond conventional orchard fruits.

I'm especially interested in the work of Ivan Michurin and the generations of breeders who followed him across Europe, including the extensive Soviet fruit breeding programmes that continued throughout the Cold War. These projects explored combinations of different fruit species to develop new varieties with improved cold hardiness, flavour, productivity, and resilience.

The influence of this work can still be seen today, with breeding material developed from these historic programmes continuing to be grown, selected, and improved upon. One example is Michurin Chokeberry ‘Viking’ (× Sorbaronia fallax ‘Viking’), which was previously classified and sold as Purple Chokeberry (Aronia × prunifolia ‘Viking’). It is a cultivated selection associated with the hybrid chokeberry lines that originated from Michurin's breeding work. It demonstrates how the genetic foundations established by breeders generations ago can continue to contribute to modern fruit cultivation and provide opportunities for further improvement.

Many of these cultivars are now relatively obscure, despite representing decades of research, selection, and experimentation. Some are difficult to find outside specialist nurseries and collections, while others risk disappearing from cultivation altogether.

This is where diverse collections and food forests can act as living gene banks, preserving valuable plant genetics by keeping them alive, growing, and available for future propagation.

Unlike seeds, which don't necessarily grow true to type, many named fruit cultivars must be preserved through grafting, cuttings, or other forms of vegetative propagation. If the last remaining plants of a cultivar are lost without being propagated, that particular genetic combination can disappear forever.

In some cases, these varieties represent the result of centuries of cultivation and selective breeding, building upon thousands of years of human involvement in domesticating fruit crops. All it can take is one generation of growers choosing not to preserve a variety for that accumulated work to be lost.

Our aim is not simply to collect unusual plants, but to help keep these genetics in cultivation, explore their potential in the UK climate, and support their continued improvement through future breeding and selection.

By growing historic cultivars alongside modern varieties and unusual hybrids, we hope to contribute, even on a small scale, to preserving the diversity that future generations of growers and plant breeders may depend upon.

 

 

The Next Apple

One of the most exciting possibilities of plant breeding is that the next widely grown fruit might already exist somewhere in the world, just not in a form that most people would currently want to eat.

Many wild apples, cherries, pears, and other fruits are technically edible, but compared with their cultivated relatives, they can be small, bitter, sour, astringent, or simply not particularly enjoyable to eat. The same is true of lesser-known fruits such as rowan berries, chokeberries, and Himalayan pheasant berries.

Yet many of the fruits we enjoy today started from wild ancestors that looked and tasted very different. Through generations of selective breeding, growers have gradually developed varieties with larger fruit, improved sweetness, better textures, higher yields, and more reliable production.

One of the most remarkable examples of this process isn't actually a fruit tree, but maize, or sweetcorn.

Modern maize was domesticated from a wild grass called teosinte, which looked far more like a branching grass than the corn we recognise today. Its small ears contained only a handful of kernels, often around 5–12, enclosed in hard protective cases that made them very different from the soft, exposed kernels of modern corn.

Over approximately 9,000 years of domestication and selective breeding, Indigenous peoples of the Americas transformed this wild grass into a crop capable of producing large cobs containing hundreds of kernels.

Different Indigenous communities developed and maintained an extraordinary diversity of maize varieties, selecting for different colours, growing conditions, flavours, storage qualities, and uses. This eventually produced everything from sweetcorn and flour corn to striking blue, red, purple, pink, and multicoloured varieties.

All of this diversity developed from the same wild ancestor, through generations of people recognising useful characteristics and selecting plants that expressed them.

So why couldn't something similar happen with the fruits we currently overlook?

Rowan berries are generally small, tart, and often astringent, but there are already sweeter, less bitter selections originating from Russia, such as European Rowan ‘Nevezhinskaya’ (Sorbus aucuparia ‘Nevezhinskaya’), which we are currently growing.

Unlike typical wild rowan berries, these selections have a much more pleasant flavour and demonstrate how valuable naturally occurring variations can be identified, preserved, and developed further through breeding.

‘Nevezhinskaya’ itself originated as a naturally occurring sweet-fruited selection, rather than through deliberate hybridisation. This shows that improving a fruit crop doesn't always begin with complex breeding programmes. Sometimes it starts with someone recognising an unusually good plant and choosing to preserve it.

If we can already grow rowan berries that are considerably more palatable than their wild relatives, who's to say that future generations couldn't develop varieties with fruits the size of cherries, with sweet, juicy flesh suitable for eating straight from the tree?

The same potential exists with other overlooked fruits. Himalayan pheasant berries (Leycesteria formosa), for example, have a distinctive caramel-like taste, but this is often accompanied by a strong, musky flavour that many people find off-putting. Through generations of selective breeding, perhaps we could develop varieties that retain and enhance that caramel-like taste while reducing the musky aftertaste, eventually transforming them into a genuinely desirable dessert fruit with a caramel-like flavour unlike any other fruit we enjoy today.

Or even a sweet, juicy medlar that can be eaten straight from the tree, without needing to undergo the traditional softening process known as bletting.

Medlars were once a familiar and widely cultivated fruit in Britain, appearing in orchards, gardens, and markets alongside apples and pears. Yet over the past few centuries, they have fallen almost completely out of favour, partly because of the bletting process, which requires the fruit to soften and develop its characteristic flavour before it becomes enjoyable to eat.

As more convenient dessert fruits became widely available, medlars gradually disappeared from commercial production and everyday diets, to the point where many people today have never even heard of them.

Imagine developing a cultivar with all the distinctive flavour of a medlar, but with the sweetness, texture, and convenience of a fresh apple or pear. A fruit that was once commonplace could become popular again, not through rediscovery alone, but through continued breeding and improvement.

These are possibilities rather than guaranteed outcomes, and achieving them could require many generations of breeding, if they're achievable at all. It certainly isn't something we expect to accomplish within our own lifetime.

But that's also what makes long-term plant breeding so important.

Someone had to grow the first generations of apples, pears, cherries, and countless other crops, selecting plants with slightly better characteristics and passing those improvements on to the next generation.

The people who began domesticating maize thousands of years ago could never have imagined the extraordinary diversity of corn grown around the world today.

Our interest is in helping to continue that same process, even on a very small scale, by growing, preserving, and exploring unusual and underutilised fruits that might otherwise be forgotten.

Every improved cultivar, unusual hybrid, or naturally occurring variation represents another opportunity to build upon the work of previous generations. Even if we never see the finished result ourselves, preserving these plants gives future growers and breeders the chance to take that work further.

After all, the next apple won't be a new species waiting to be discovered. It will be a fruit we've known about for centuries, but never fully developed.

 

 

Our Future Plant Buy List 

Alongside what we already grow, we maintain a large and carefully selected list of plants to add over time. 

This list includes hundreds more additions, taking the system to over 800 unique species and cultivars once fully established. 

It expands every layer, from additional climbers like grapes and kiwis, through to nut trees such as pecans, walnuts, and chestnuts, and a wide range of orchard trees, shrubs, and groundcover plants. 

The aim is not just to collect plants, but to build a complete and balanced ecosystem where each species has a role, whether that is producing food, supporting wildlife, fixing nitrogen, improving soil, or increasing resilience, while also preserving valuable genetics through both productive modern varieties and older cultivars. 

 

 

Food Diversity From Around the World

Many of the plants in our system come from different native ranges across the world. 

By combining species from Europe, Asia, North America, South America and beyond, we are building a system that produces a wide range of foods, including fruits, nuts, leaves, roots, herbs, and spices. This allows for a much longer and more varied harvest season while also increasing genetic and cultural diversity within the system. 

While native planting plays an important role in supporting local ecosystems, we are also exploring a different approach. By growing a wide range of non-native but well-adapted food plants, we aim to reduce reliance on imported produce and lower the carbon footprint associated with transporting food long distances. 

With careful selection and thoughtful design, these systems can support high levels of biodiversity and, when done correctly, will outperform more traditional planting approaches. 

We also focus on growing plants that offer similar flavours or uses to foods that would normally need to be imported but do not grow well in the UK. This allows us to create a more self-sufficient system while still enjoying a wide range of foods inspired by different parts of the world. 

 

 

A Different Approach to Land Use

In many cases, farmland is supported through grants to plant wildflower mixes to improve biodiversity. 

While this has clear environmental value, we believe there is also strong potential in agroforestry-style systems. 

A well-designed food forest can support pollinators and wildlife while also producing large amounts of food. Once established, these systems require relatively little ongoing input and can continue to produce for decades or even hundreds of years. 

This creates an opportunity for land to feed families and local communities while also generating income through surplus produce. 

Our aim is to show that it is possible to combine biodiversity, food production, and long-term sustainability within the same system. 

 

 

Rare Breed Chickens & Waterfowl

In the future, we plan to free-range rare breed chickens and waterfowl through parts of the food forest. 

They will play a natural role within the system by scratching and lightly turning the soil, feeding on insects and fallen fruit, cycling nutrients back into the ground, and helping to manage pests in a natural way. Waterfowl can also contribute to wetter areas, helping control slugs and supporting nutrient cycling around ponds and damp zones. 

Alongside this, we will use careful breeding to help maintain and diversify rare genetic lines. 

As with our broody button quail, the focus is on preserving natural behaviours and strengthening genetics over time, rather than intensive production. 

 

Please note that Chinese Painted (Button) Quail do need to be kept in secure enclosures, as unlike chickens and other poultry, they do not naturally return to a coop or home area, and due to their small size are highly vulnerable to predation.

 

 

Grey Partridge Recovery & Repopulation Within a Food Forest System

Alongside the development of the food forest, we aim to support the recovery of the Grey partridge, a once widespread farmland bird that has declined significantly due to habitat loss, reduced insect availability, and changes in farming practices.

Our role focuses on breeding and rearing genetically appropriate, wild-type birds (rather than tame, feed-dependent stock with lower survival rates) in controlled conditions, producing strong, healthy juveniles while maintaining natural behaviours and good genetic quality. Due to our agroforestry-style management, high insect populations mean young birds can actively forage within their pre-release areas from an early stage, reducing reliance on supplemental feeding and improving resilience. Numbers will be kept small, around 5–6 coveys per year, prioritising quality over quantity, with the aim that well-prepared releases establish quickly and develop into self-sustaining local populations. Breeding stock will be housed in habitat similar to their natural environment, allowing consistent annual releases without reliance on external sourcing.

Rather than releasing birds on our own land, the intention is to work with external sites where suitable habitat, predator management, and long-term support are already in place. Subject to the appropriate licensing and guidance, older juveniles can then be released into these landscapes, giving them a far higher chance of survival and integration.

By focusing on the breeding stage and working alongside established habitat projects, the aim is to contribute to long-term population recovery in a responsible and effective way. While we would like to support the restoration of other declining native species in the future, our experience with species such as Chinese painted quail within the pheasant family means this is currently the most suitable and realistic place for us to start.

 

 

Education & Working With SEN Students 

As the project develops, and the labour needed to maintain the food forest drops, we hope to work with students with Special Educational Needs (SEN). 

The food forest will provide a calm, natural, and low-pressure environment where people can step away from more traditional classroom settings and connect with nature in a meaningful way. Surrounded by plants, animals, and seasonal change, it creates a space that is naturally engaging without being overwhelming. 

Through hands-on activities, students will have the opportunity to take part in real, meaningful tasks such as planting, watering, harvesting, caring for animals, and helping maintain different areas of the system. These are simple but valuable skills that build confidence over time and give a strong sense of achievement. 

Spending time in this kind of environment can help develop independence, practical life skills, confidence, focus, and a stronger connection to food and nature. 

The presence of animals, including our quail and future chickens and waterfowl, adds another important element. Caring for animals helps build empathy, patience, and consistency, while also creating a more engaging and rewarding experience. 

We aim to create a space where individuals feel comfortable, capable, and involved, regardless of ability or background. Rather than being purely educational, the focus is on participation, experience, and gradual personal development. 

Over time, the goal is to build something that not only produces food, but also provides real value to people, supporting wellbeing, confidence, and a deeper connection to the natural world. 

 

 

Final Note 

We are still in the early stages, but the foundations are already in place. 

With hundreds of plants already growing and hundreds more planned, we’re building towards something truly diverse and resilient, with the aim of creating a one-of-a-kind site. 

From button quail to rare plant species and future livestock integration, everything is connected by the same goal - to build a natural system that becomes more productive, stable, and self-sustaining over time, supporting the health of both the animals and the people involved.  

Thank You All! 

BQE