How to grow a LARGE SCALE Food Forest | What's Ripening

Want to grow a BETTER Food Forest? Go here 👇
www.backyardparadise.co.nz
Want the FREE Syntropic Agroforestry Training?
Go here 👇
www.skool.com/food-forest-family
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If you're new to the channel, my name is Byron. I specialize in syntropic food forest design, education, installation, and management. My journey began in 2020 when I started working to convert my family's diseased citrus orchard into an agroforestry farm + demonstration site in NZ. Since then, I've continued to learn from top experts & practitioners around the world (New Zealand, Brazil, Costa Rica, Florida) at these agroforestry hotspots.
How I Got Here:
- 2020: Began transforming a citrus orchard into a thriving food forest.
- Shared free agroforestry education online.
- Installed countless food forests for clients in the last few years.
- Traveled to Costa Rica, Florida, and Brazil, documenting and sharing my experiences.
- Learned from and worked alongside the top names in Syntropic Agroforestry.
- Launched the 'Food Forest Pioneers' teaching others how to start their design business.
- Created an accessible group-consulting/education community 'Food Forest Fellowship'
- Launched the FREE Training: Food Forest Secrets
.....
Today:
- My program helps people design and manage regenerative food forests.
- Cutting-edge content from global experiences & professionals shared within the Fellowship.
- We continue to innovate to make agroforestry education accessible to everyone.
To all aspiring agroforestry practitioners, remember that every challenge is part of your epic journey. Keep pushing forward. You'll either achieve great success or gain invaluable stories.
Both outcomes are victories.
Byron
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🌿 Exploring Matt Reece's Syntropic Agroforestry Farm in Punta Gorda, Florida 🌿
Join me on a fascinating tour of Matt Reece's commercial food forest in Punta Gorda, Florida. Known as What's Ripening on KZbin and PRO Agroforestry, Matt specialises in growing mangoes, coconuts, bananas, pineapples, sugarcane, and bamboo varieties with a Syntropic Agroforestry methodology.
Follow his account here 👇
/ @whatsripening
In this video, we dive into:
- Management of support species
- Impact of hurricane season
- Cycling organic material and nutrients
- Thoughtful pruning techniques
- Earthworks to retain water in flat, sandy conditions with swales
- Grafting and selecting characteristics when planting from seed
- And much more on food forest design and syntropic agroforestry
- Don't miss this in-depth look at professional agroforestry practices!
#Agroforestry #SyntropicAgroforestry #FoodForest #Permaculture #WhatsRipening #PROAgroforestry #Florida

[@MaxLemayian]

Nice to see the 2 guys I follow meet each other! Ponts I got: 1. Plant alot of support trees. 2. Aim at creating a thick layer of mulch. 3. Make your own local based reserch to selects right species for you. 4. Be ready for unexpected setbacks out of your control.

[@MaLiArtworks186]

Thanks so much.

[@Dirt-Fermer]

Small small, small scale here. It’s so rewarding even in an arid environment. Trees change the whole environment here

[@exodusfamilybelize]

Yay two of my favourite channels!

[@eth_fish]

Really enjoyed this tour, thanks! I find the music distracting though and also blocks the noise of the local environment which is nice to hear with these kinds of tours

[@byron.in.new.zealand]

Noted!

[@justaGardeningGamer]

Love both of you. such inspirations!!!

[@themangovista]

That last part about weedeating is the real deal. I have a small food forest and there are times I want to put in more trees, but then that means I won’t be able to get my lawnmower in those areas. I don’t mind weedeating, but I’d rather spend more time enjoying my food forest than working it. Thanks for sharing👍

[@laddieokelley6095]

Music distracting, but I'm an old man. Your guest has a good low-key way of presenting himself, a likeable sort. It's mango season for me (as a consumer); I wish I had access to that variety he's enthusiastic about. Thanks for another video . . . you do a good job.

[@chriswong8659]

Yup, music is too distracting.

[@byron.in.new.zealand]

Noted! Glad you’re enjoying the videos. Matt’s a great vibe

[@SulcataGrove]

Great video! Matt’s place looks great!

[@byron.in.new.zealand]

It was!

[@Stephthechickenlady]

Didnt need the music over top. Love your videos. Inspiring.

[@byron.in.new.zealand]

Noted! Glad you’re enjoying them

[@dirtywhiteboy7922]

Great, video, Byron. You could not have picked a better person to represent SW Florida, Matt, is super knowledgeable and always willing to share his knowledge.

[@charlotteking8123]

Studied Florida before buying here, I'm north of Tampa in the least hurricane prone area. It's somewhat of a band from the gulf coast across through the Orlando area. Have been envying Matt for his mangoes and coconuts until that hurricane came. It was forecast to hit us but hit south instead. Grateful for the update on Matt's syntropy and sorry to hear it was so devastating. I had the "Pokemon" idea and from researching others' work have come to Matt's concept, "what grows where you are" being best.

[@CoconutInformation]

Cool video, kinda bummed no info was given about the coco's & the future overstory this forest will have. Byron - if you come out to Hawaii, hit me up :)

[@OrlandoBackyardGardening]

Love what Matthew is doing…

[@TheDiversifiedFarmer]

I was watering some Peace River Organics Banana plants when this notification popped up on my phone. We just broke about month long drought. Mulched bananas made it look pretty easy excluding the 100°F + days last week.

[@byron.in.new.zealand]

Amazing how the universe works. Stoked to hear things held in there

[@TheDiversifiedFarmer]

@@byron.in.new.zealand well, the last two days they blasted us with Cadre herbicide mixed with 2 4 D. My 4 year old woke up choking on mucus and threw up everywhere. Open to legal ideas from professionals. It looks like this is a long game using subsidized crops to push chemicals onto rural areas, and once they are at a certain point, can enable the legal ramifications, and once the science catches up, which it has, (How can a fungicide be expected to control the biology of many acres but yet only a few hundred feet away not impact the biology of an area the size of the human digestive tract)it will be used to grab land once farmers have to pay the lawsuit. That governing body used similar tactics dealing with minority farmers and are having to pay for that now. Google (U S D A discrimination lawsuit Black Farmers) this is no theory. So they are using that as a smoke screen to run this op in. Check it out. Vet it. It sucks

[@ajcsonsforge6370]

I'm about 2 hours north on the coast. I've been wanting to go down on a Saturday so bad.

[@TheVigilantStewards]

Super episode, glad to be watching

[@MiAdi9]

Danke

[@Vitex1107]

Thank you for the amazing content very inspiring! its nice to see those sistems running and all those beautiful species just awsome. I am a gardener in the mediterranean and it would be nice to see a sistem and some insights on this weather with the lack of water and all the species that could be used here. love your content, grateful for all your videos and insights.

[@nuturalagri.4357]

Very nice food forest

[@OscarOwenn]

Our economy is afflicted by uncertainty, housing troubles, foreclosures, global shifts, and the aftermath of the epidemic, all of which contribute to instability. To restore stability and drive growth, all sectors must urgently address rising inflation, slowing GDP, and trade disruptions.

[@AlexClarkcompany]

The US dollar is losing value due to inflation, while other currencies are gaining strength, creating uncertainty. Nonetheless, many people remain confident in the Dollar's perceived safety. I'm concerned that my 420K retirement funds may lose value, therefore I'm looking for other financial stability.

[@BaileyJames-zv2ddd]

With my stressful career, I don't have time for investment analysis. For seven years, a fiduciary has managed my portfolio, responding to market situations, ensuring for effective navigation and informed decisions. Consider taking a similar plan of action.

[@OscarOwenn]

Do you mind if I ask you to recommend the coach you employed? It seems you've figured it all out.

[@BaileyJames-zv2ddd]

My CFA, 'Leah Foster Alderman', is a well known figure in her field.

[@BaileyJames-zv2ddd]

I recommend looking into her qualifications further. She has extensive knowledge and is a treasure trove for anyone seeking to manage the financial markets.

[@4ofse7en]

When you are talking about support species and mention eucalyptus, which kind of eucalyptus are you referring to?

[@champagnegardening5182]

This is gold

[@chessman483]

Awesome thanks, didn’t mind the music. We have a food forest and I planted fairly heavy on the support trees , for mulch right from the beginning. So now in our 3rd year and seems enough to support itself. Had never been told by anyone but just thought would be nice not to have to cart it in from outside sources.

[@mena2138]

thank you broder.

[@philinit6476]

Sick!

[@Lucyorganicgarden]

Please list support species?

[@danielnaberhaus5337]

Planting in rows creates wind tunnels during storms. I think it's not talked about enough, the first place I start when designing is the windbreak. Sapodilla, jackfruit, tropical almond, bamboo, pili nut, there are a lot of food producing trees that are good for windbreaks. Pollarding them makes them less likely to windthrow and just drop branches instead. I think I'm going to use a lot of colombian bamboo for the windbreak. I also wonder if you made large rock piles around the base of your trees if that would keep the roots down during storms. I'm currently experimenting using large stone piles place with an excavator to plant trees here in puna, Hawaii. I think if the roots are interwoven into a thousand ponds of rock it will anchor the tree pretty well. Salt damage is hard to combat, I'm thinking more rainwater catchment and ponds would really help. Rain is acidic so that helps your ph problems a lot more than watering with ground water.

[@SulcataGrove]

We had 65 year old live oak trees completely uprooted even with windbreaks of eucalyptus behind them. Hurricane Ian was a very strong, destructive storm.

[@danielnaberhaus5337]

@@SulcataGrove that's crazy. Oaks don't bend so they aren't necessary the best for high winds. If they were to be pollarded they would be more effective. Bamboo bends instead of breaking in high winds, especially when thinned and managed properly. It's also mining silica, the culms are literally made out of rock. Besides ficus species they may be the best windbreak option. Guadua angustifolia is the one I'm planting.

[@danielnaberhaus5337]

@@SulcataGrove that's the thing about storms it only takes 1 every few decades to cause long lasting damage. So it's worth investing a lot of energy into the windbreak initially to ultimately save you energy later on.

[@SulcataGrove]

@@danielnaberhaus5337 one of our huge Dendrocalamus giganteus clumps uprooted with hurricane Ian too. The ground was pretty saturated once Ian hit landfall, which led to a lot of trees and plants being uprooted. The hazards of growing in Florida can be unpredictable, but the mangos do so well, it’s worth it overall.

[@danielnaberhaus5337]

@@SulcataGrove that's terrifying, nothing scarier than a hurricane.

[@ErnestOfGaia]

Ill come work in your nursery so you can go to brazil. Looking for 2 years of work 20$/hr min. I live in a van in oregon happy to move. Midwest Permaculture Grad.

[@bhoom2tika]

Hey friend, a great video indeed, I want to know if soil is prepared in syntropic food forest the way they do while creating a miyawaki forest ?

[@colleenmacinnis935]

If ya need a place to crash here in central FL. I have a spare Jack and Jill. Just send a note and I’ll change the sheets 😊

[@bradleylancaster101]

Awesome video thanks. Can you please tell me the name of the support species he mentions after Eucalyptus sounds like he said Labic but i can't find it online. Do you have a video on the best support species for Food Forests?

[@MaxLemayian]

The best support species differ depending on climate. Personally I use Sesbabia, cassia, castor, croton and leucaena which grows great in my area.

[@WhatsRipening]

Albizia lebbeck

[@nuturalagri.4357]

My side morning