fukuoko & semi-wild veggie patches

[caithnesscrofter]

anybody ever tried the fukuoko method of semi wild veggie gardening or natural farming? Read about this a long time ago and yesterday saw it in action but was happening accidently. Came across this field on the moor yesterday.. Field that looked like fairly normal over grown field with long grass, thistles, docks and even rushes growing but, i could see lots of neeps interspersed amongst it, beets and kale, the odd potato and probably other things as well if i'd had a proper look. Think it was probably an abandoned veggie patch, it all seeded and the veggies that did well in that environment were continuing to do well despite nothing being done to it. This the kind of garden i would definately prefer... Not to mention all the bizarre and wonderful veggies you would get from plants cross breeding. I've harvested a load of kale and neep seeds this year and am thinking about trying fukuokos method of seed balls. Basically, mixing a load of veggie seeds with white clover seed and mixing it up with clay, manure and soil in my cement mixer. The cement mixer will turn this dry mix into little balls which i can then just broad cast sow in my field. Anyone ever tried it and any advice??

[Millymollymandy]

Yes, several of my neighbours share a small field which belongs to a local farmer and grow spuds, pumpkins, french beans and a few other things there. It's full of weeds and doesn't get watered because it's too far for them to cart water (even though it's only just up the road) so they don't plant things like tomatoes there. But then all those weeds might help in shading the soil and keeping it moist - though at the same time also competing for moisture and nutrients, so I really don't know!

I didn't know there was a term for it though - I just think of it as a weedy veg plot!

[Milims]

Fukuoko - Sounds a bit like a rude message to John Lennons widow!

[Millymollymandy]

[eccentric_emma]

i know a little bit about Fukuoko's method although i dont have a huge amount of experience with it. I recently stayed on a quinta in Portugal and they had a great garden built with his methods. The drawback with using his methods in the UK is that slugs will hide in the mulch whereas out in Portugal, the slugs they get tend to go for the dead stuff and leave the live plants alone which is great!

I love the idea of seed balls. At my allotment I tried something similar - I made a seed mix inspired by Sepp Holzer (Austrian permaculture farmer). Mine wasn't as thought out as his is - I just flung together all my left over seeds into a tub and planted them wherever I had space. I found that I have huge amounts of nasturtiums growing everywhere now which is great, but the rest of the seeds didn't really seem to take (the odd radish here and there though).

I would probably consider my allotment to be semi wild. I tend to let most of the weeds take over empty space but pull them back when I want to plant. The only things I pull out regularly are bindweed and brambles. I have a lot of self seeded stuff too - this year I got chives and garlic everywhere which was great, the garlic was a good size too! So I have let a lot of other things go to seed this year too!

[southeast-isher]

caithnesscrofter, have you tried this yet? Or anyone? Successful? I'm very interested in seeing this in practice...

[alec-ish]

i am currently using this method, i dont have a garden as i live on a canal boat so i grow most my vegetables in containers on the roof, two years ago i planted a 'wild' fruit and veg plot in my dads garden so everytime i go to visit i have somethink to pick without putting in the work
it works very well but i would never use this method if i had my own garden or allotment, but works well as a top up of food
i have rasberries gooseberrys chives mint burdok sorrel ramsons horseradish nettles (of course!) cowslip and many other things i cant think of off the top of my head!
give it a try!

[Milims]

I just googled for fukuoko - erm....... I discovered you mean fukuokA - not some dodgy pink vibrating glove!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masanobu_Fukuoka

[southeast-isher]

Hey Millims, yes i think it can be spelt either way - it seems anyway. There's some vids on YouTube about his seed ball making technique. All seems pretty interesting.

[Millymollymandy]

I googled too and I don't get anything to do with gardening if I spell it with an O at the end of the word.

[grahamhobbs]

Fukuoka developed his ideas mainly based on growing a rotation of rice and barley undersown with clover on his farm in Japan. This seems to have been very succesful. He did also start what we'd call a forest garden for fruit and vegetables.
I remember he set up a farm in Italy on these principles as well.
John Hart is well known in this country for his Forest Garden, although he is dead, his garden is open to the public I believe. There are other places in this country (a college in Devon?) that have a well established forest gardens.
In terms of vegetables within these gardens, generally from what I understand, they tend to be grown in clearings and fairly conventionally although with mulches.
Fukuoka did say you could just let your veg. self seed and grow wild - personally I can't see this happening unless you are willing to eat very stunted crops and/or drastically alter your diet.

[southeast-isher]

Is it John Hart, or, Robert Hart?

[grahamhobbs]

Sorry, Robert Hart

[southeast-isher]

no probs, and there's this guy too:

Martin Crawford.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Ggwa5irxmg