I know someone who let clover take over their backyard where the garden is and they literally had tomatoes and zucchini BEFORE July 4th in zone 5 which is unheard of! The whole yard was covered with bees and butterflies! Clover is a host plant for some butterflies also!
You are a breathe of fresh air!!! I enjoy your knowledge so much! And your personality is a super duper bonus 😁 I was born and raised in Brooklyn NY, moved from an apartment in the Bronx to a house on a 1/4 acre of land in Missouri. I didn't know what was about to happen to me! I have been here for 3 years and nature, flowers, bugs and weather have grounded me more than anything I have experienced before. I love my little piece of heaven and im learning to appreciate all of mother nature's gifts (even the creepy crawly ones 😱). I do enjoy a clean garden bed but have a many unruly spots that are left to it's own devices. Thank you for teaching true repect for everything around us!!! I have learned so much from you! Looking forward to your next video!!!
@Kathleen - I was born and raised in the Bronx and went from a Bklyn apartment straight to 10 acres in Florida off a dirt road with pigs, cows, horses, etc. in '97. Stayed for over a decade. I kinda had the camping/nature bug already by then, but I know now I could never move back to the city on a permanent basis. I do what I can now in the suburbs of Michigan, but if I had my druthers I'd straight up be living off-grid or close to it right now. Nice to hear I am not the only one. 😊💪
I love clover, by not cutting my lawn as often as city requires, it is slowly taking over. , leaving a lush dark green thick ground cover. The tall red clover we cut around it, the bees love it and I eat it. The only weed is grass, in my opinion.
We were in the desert for a few years and the grass would not survive in our lawn. It didn’t matter how much we watered. Everyone was like you need to put these nasty chem fertilizers on it and in 4 or 5 years and it will look good. I planted inoculated white clover and in one season I had no more dead patches and threw that entire winter I had a lush green lawn. By the following season I couldn’t even keep up with mowing it and the amount of beautiful blooms and bees we were feeding between the clover blooms and our rosemary bushes we probably filled a hive. And the grass started coming in and filling in any dead spaces under the clover plants.
This is one of my favorite series. I’ve watched it repeatedly and take notes. Very beneficial planting strategies for food forests, fruit tree guilds and pastures.
That’s the way just think saving on buying the spray the time saved going to store then mixing and spraying it’s just another great benefit to gardening this way once your mind gets over the look factor and switches to the benefits it all makes perfect sense. Cheers
THAT's alfalfa??? When I was a little girl, there was a big field of that bordering the state park we visited and it smelled SOOOOO good, made a big impression on me! I won't tell you how many decades ago that was, but it was THAT plant with purple flowers and I never forgot it.
I moved to my 1/2 acre forever home. The family before me lived here many many years and loved plants. Only one fruit tree sadly but I'm so grateful for all their work. Taking my time and not cutting a thing until I know what it is. I have a fig, a plum, and a Surinam cherry ready for planting. The Cherry will be potted so it can winter inside with the orange, lemon and lime to be bought soon.
As a total aside note... when I got my stargazer lilies, the old timer I got them from told me that the secret to maintaining the plant in my zone 4 Maine winters was to keep the main stem in tact over winter and try to keep the tip above the snow. He claimed it'd help the bulb breath... I've had the same plant flower each year for over 25 years, whereas relatives a hundred miles so. of me have lost theirs... For whatever reason, some plants like to keep their stems... probably some reason Mother Nature creates them that way 😉🤔
I find that last year’s dried stems serve as a natural support for the present year’s growth as well. Gives a little structure to those newly forming plants. 🌱
A lot of our backyard in the city is covered in white clover. In the spring our front yard has many dandelions. We don't treat our lawn with anything, just let nature do it's job. We love your series very much. Thank you for sharing all this wonderful information.
Unfortunately, dandelion is considered a noxious weed in my city. The city will warn you first if you let them grow crazy, and if you don't get rid of them, they will spray. On the other hand, the city uses clover in the grass, so I am replacing my lawn with clover.
I use clover as a cover crop in my garden. It keeps the soil cool, captures and retains water, and draws pollinators! It also feels great on bare feet while gardening! Iowa
The disdain for clover in lawns is actually a result of a marketing campaign in the 1950s. After failing to produce an herbicide that left lawn clover intact, chemical companies simply "rebranded" clover so that people would accept weed killers that only grass could survive, and they must've been very pleased with the resulting increase in fertilizer sales when the beneficial plants were destroyed.
That plant you are referring to is Senna. In my garden, it is a slow growing shrub. Already loving the series on soil improving plants. Thank you very much.
Prune that wisteria, prune it hard, and then it will bloom beautifully! TY for the info!!!!!!! I have to start a garden from scratch. With clay soil! Yeah. It’s gonna be a job! Lol
I have a field Stone wall in Massachusetts at my home and I was preparing it for planting in the spring and I found out that our local bumblebee population clearly uses my wall when I came across hundreds of small little single dens. They had Doug small holes between the rocks and covered them back up with mud. I will never prepare my wall for planting in the fall ever again I will always wait until spring
I harvested my garlic yesterday. In the area the garlic was growing, today I broadcast alfalfa, crimson clover, buckwheat, oats, peas, barley and white mustard. First time with this mix of cover crops. Last year I planted red clover with the garlic. Garlic didn't seem to mind at all. But the clover twisted up the garlic leaves and about a month before harvest, we had a downpour of rain and the garlic was flatten because of the clover. I was still able to save the garlic by cutting back the red clover. It was a lesson learned. If I do it again, I'll cut the clover back to about 6" tall.
If you want your wisteria to flower you have to prune it. It is happy to just grow and grow until it is faced with the adversity of pruning. Then it will flower followed by seeding in order to reproduce in case it can't save itself! Thanks for all the good info. I'm starting my orchard this year and expect to be more successful thanks to your videos.
Hi Stefan! Whiteclover is growing in my front lawn And i can't wait until it takes over from grass and I don't have to mow anymore. Red clover is very good for fighting cancer and also for regulating menstrual cycles and hot flashes. Were you talking about caragana? It is a prairie shrub, tree that also serves as a very good windbreaker! Another very good video! Cheers!!!
@@StefanSobkowiak been watching a lot of permaculture videos, including yours for the past 5-6 years. Have learned a lot about gardening and growing my own food. Thank you!
Since I live on a corner property have lots of what people call weeds and neighbours with emaculate lawns compared to mine. I like my lawn even kept some grasses in the garden this year. Wild bird friends like that the wild grasses. I sit outside and they chatter away. Made my own forest for privacy.
I will never understand why people like perfectly manicured lawns and shrubs. I think a front yard looks better with birds and bugs and thriving plants, even if they're considered to be weeds. Instead of trying to fight it, we should work with it.. like a living privacy fence. Sounds like you've got a lovely setup
@@grudge5150 to understand you need to go back...way back to prince Albert and his wife. They created a ton of gimmicks we call tradition. Why? Money. The ideas of Christmas and well kept lawns comes from that couple. Everything they did was a sales gimmick and they pretty much owned the media so it got publicity. That well manicured lawn is an image thing meant to impress the gentry and show dominance.
Hi there from NZ. Yes, there is a reason for everything. An elderly friend (who has passed away) said he remembers the trial planting of English Fir (otherwise known as GORSE) on the hillside of Lyttleton, Christchurch. It was nicely fenced off and sign posted. I wish that government person had 2 grey cells that were talking 2 each other; one called caution and the other concern. That plant has cost this country more than a Billion dollars. The main problem was the earlier settlers and immigrants wanted to make another England and had NO IDEA OF THE IMPACT IN OUR CLIMATE. The only people that want the plant are bee keepers. They use it to feed them up on Gorse and Broom (another pest) before they send the bees after the honeydew (excretion from an insect) which was collected from OUR NATIVE BEECH TREES!
Wisteria vines are going to be one of the first landscape plants I put in on our new property. Hey are great for chop and drop and they release nitrogen as they decompose vs many that use up nitrogen. And because they are such vigorous growers and do well with heavy pruning you can get a lot of use out of them. Plus eventually they will flower and man is that a site to see.
Be careful what kind you buy. I have invasive chinese wisteria and it's nightmare. it pops up all over the place even with lots of pruning. Research it before you plant it.
@@TheWBWoman So. Many. Suckers. We missed one one year, and it crawled 20 feet under the deck and rooted on the other side. It's original spot wasn't so great, so we cut down and dug it up, and the shoot is now the main plant. 5 years later I'm still pulling suckers from the original. Even the bittersweet hasn't been this tenacious.
@@Bamboo4U2 After years and years of fighting this wisteria, if I can ever eradicate it, you can bet I won't be replacing it with any wisteria even if non-invasive. Probably grape vines instead.
Prune your wisteria down to two leaflets along down each leaf (four leaflets in total to remain on each leaf) just before spring to promote flowering that year
Neat trick, i never heard of it. I suppose your wisteria keep their leaves all year?? Just before spring in our clime is winter snow. Do you mean just before flowering or when the leaves first emerge ?
Great video Stephen! I think clover is great in my lawn. People have the same opinion about Bamboo, which I love (because I know how to control it) via rhizome pruning, but what a great plant to soak in tons of CO2.
Flax flower is a great phosphorus fixing plant I use cover crop on my indoor and outdoor completely pulls out more genetic potential. Only down fall is spring tail which aren't the worst just annoying
Thank you Stephen you make me laugh! Thank you I need it. I have purchased a quarter pound New Zealand white clover from Johnny's seeds. I want to plant it in moderate to high foot traffic area. I am unclear from the sowing instructions and have contacted Johnny's its just that I am such a novice. I am asking your instruction please as you are so good at it. I imagine I will hard rake the area and then sprinkle the clover seed. Then cover lightly with straw and keep moist? A no-brainer? Thank you Stephan take care
Watching this series again for about the third time. Got Caragana seeds to germinate but still waiting for the Seaberry to germinate. Stratified as suggested but still nothing. I’m going to throw them in the food forest (still under construction) and let them overwinter there. Maybe they’ll grow someday. I fed dry crimson clover seed heads to the chickens in hopes they’ll spread it throughout the pasture. Also broadcast white clover seed. There was supposed to be some cow peas in the mix but I haven’t yet seen any. After watching this series, I got Redbuds, Honey Locust, Kentucky Coffee, Black Locust, Red Alder and some others for nitrogen fixing. Then my dogs ate my fruit trees. So that set things back a bit.
Seems like you missed breakfast! (LOL) Good to know info Stefan! Thanks 4 taking time to share your talents knowledge with us! Health and God's Blessing on you and yours! You prove the fact that there is REASON for EVERYTHING!
Nice video I love the nitrogen fixers. I have a massive Black Locust tree close to my house. I use its pods for improve my soil. Thanks for your videos. I enjoy them. Your blind gardener Greetings from South Africa
We live in an area where Bermuda grass is very prevalent and we have issues Bermuda and Johnson grass trying to take over. I love your permaculture method and was curious if there are any nitrogen fixers we could plant around our fruit trees that could compete with Bermuda and Johnson grass? Love your channel!
I saw a ground cover nitrogen fixer in Belize that seemed to do exactly that. Some species of ground cover mimosa (since it closed its leaves when touched).
Ah! Nitrogen fixers. Knew legumes were supposed to be good at it. Looking forward to the additional videos on the topic! Total sidetrack. You tell us there are good uses for dandelions and other weeds and bugs that we tend to think of as nuisances. Now is there any good use for poison ivy? Answer me that if you can!
First I have to say is because of your videos I've learned a lot and I also convinced the woman to not kill all the dandelions... but I have some creeping charlie that wants to show up... not a lot, but I'd like to get rid of it. before i do that is it good for anything?
Unknown plant. If it has purple or lavender flowers it might be vetch. Small seed pods look like most legumes, dry black with BB size seeds. I'm in U.S.A. zone 8.
one peer-reviewed paper I have says cowpeas give 20% of their nitrogen to corn/maize during the current growing season. probably via fungi. don't know about trees. but locusts produce around 60 pounds per hectare. but clover do up to 100-150#/hectare. so I'd use them to prevent wasting space for the N-fixing trees. mowing the clover "releases" the nodules to make the N2 available. see my book Sustainable Food Gardens for. a list of the N2 product by woody n-fixing plants - trees and shrubs.
Good point the main difference is annual vs perennial. You will need to till and reseed the annuals every 1-3 years (assuming good natural reseeding), setting the soil back down the succession ladder to bacterial. Nice hearing from you Robert. Keep up the great work writing.
My Wisteria has to be pruned hard after blooming. I love that vine but it’s stout and gets too heavy when it attaches itself to trees growing around it. It has nearly killed a locust that’s growing near it just because of the weight of the vine and the huge amount of tendrils wrapping themselves around the trunk and up into the highest branches. I have it growing on a chain link fence. The vine grows in and around the metal grid of the fencing and actually engulfs the chain link so that it looks like I replaced part of the fence with wood. We have a drip hose in that bed. One branch used the hose as a highway to another tree quite a distance from the mother wisteria plant. Before I even noticed it had rooted at the base of that other tree and it had grown high in the branches. It’s a good nitrogen fixer just don’t allow it to bully the other plants around it.
Hello. I like your videos a lot and plan to start an orchard in my home country. I am considering to landscaping fabric with some wood chips on top to control weed. I sae that you used plastic for it. I am just concerned that plastic will not be good with irrigatio system.
Plastic is great with irrigation system. Landscape fabric is good until tree and grass roots grow through it, then it will take a tractor to remove it. I would use cardboard and wood chips if you can renew the wood chips every one to three years depending on the thickness you use. It usually degrades by 2-6cm per year.
It's a cool season pasture and lawn species in the north. You probably have a better adapted species for florida (mimosa? crimson clover?...) i don't know what it is but am sure one or several exist. Check out Pete Kanaris' channel he is closer to you and see what he uses.
Great video but i have Question : the lagumes or clovers while they are alive and consuming the nitrogen from the air can feed the next plants and in the same time can fix the soil , or after the decomposition of the lagume can feed the soil and fix it with nitrogen?
I'm curious about the foregoing of fall cleanup... could one wait until late fall, when the insects have all hunkered down, and then remove those stalks carefully to be kept over winter safely? Such as in a planter pot with a tomato cage with, what, sand in the bottom to stick them in? Perhaps kept in a sheltered corner or nestled in with some shrubbery? I leave mine, but the 'tidy grass lawn' folk I landscape for tend to want everything gone, even the old leaves...which of course feed the plants for next year, and insulate the roots for winter, but this is a hard habit for people to change.
Hahaha i did a video on that subject. The disadvantage of the permaculture orchard. Mosquitos are meant to keep people out of certain areas during the breeding season.
Thistle is wonderful for nitrogen and building the soil. It didn't get it's bad press until the 1920s I or 30s when commercial fertilizer became available. Also, never plant a wisteria. It will kill everything it climbs on, and it climbs on everything. Plant a dwarf lilac instead. Kudzu! No one in their right mind would plant kudzu. It is worst than wisteria. No offense Stephen. What you have to say is very much valued at my house. But, I'm also cleaning up a farm that belonged to a botanist that went rouge. I know the end result.
That would be a good idea but white clover will remain a solid stand for one or at most two seasons and then will have to be renewed as grasses will certainly move in. Clover is great at preparing the soil for a good pasture full of grasses. That’s my observation anyway.
You are my new favorite channel, I mean it! I just bought over 100 acres in Western New York to start permaculture orchard. Needless to say, I am blessed to have found your channel! Thank you, you have taught me so much!
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I know someone who let clover take over their backyard where the garden is and they literally had tomatoes and zucchini BEFORE July 4th in zone 5 which is unheard of! The whole yard was covered with bees and butterflies! Clover is a host plant for some butterflies also!
You are a breathe of fresh air!!! I enjoy your knowledge so much! And your personality is a super duper bonus 😁
I was born and raised in Brooklyn NY, moved from an apartment in the Bronx to a house on a 1/4 acre of land in Missouri. I didn't know what was about to happen to me! I have been here for 3 years and nature, flowers, bugs and weather have grounded me more than anything I have experienced before. I love my little piece of heaven and im learning to appreciate all of mother nature's gifts (even the creepy crawly ones 😱). I do enjoy a clean garden bed but have a many unruly spots that are left to it's own devices. Thank you for teaching true repect for everything around us!!! I have learned so much from you!
Looking forward to your next video!!!
Glad you made a transition. Since you passed the two year mark you’re likely to stay in the country.
@Kathleen - I was born and raised in the Bronx and went from a Bklyn apartment straight to 10 acres in Florida off a dirt road with pigs, cows, horses, etc. in '97. Stayed for over a decade. I kinda had the camping/nature bug already by then, but I know now I could never move back to the city on a permanent basis.
I do what I can now in the suburbs of Michigan, but if I had my druthers I'd straight up be living off-grid or close to it right now. Nice to hear I am not the only one. 😊💪
I love clover, by not cutting my lawn as often as city requires, it is slowly taking over.
, leaving a lush dark green thick ground cover. The tall red clover we cut around it, the bees love it and I eat it. The only weed is grass, in my opinion.
We were in the desert for a few years and the grass would not survive in our lawn. It didn’t matter how much we watered. Everyone was like you need to put these nasty chem fertilizers on it and in 4 or 5 years and it will look good. I planted inoculated white clover and in one season I had no more dead patches and threw that entire winter I had a lush green lawn. By the following season I couldn’t even keep up with mowing it and the amount of beautiful blooms and bees we were feeding between the clover blooms and our rosemary bushes we probably filled a hive. And the grass started coming in and filling in any dead spaces under the clover plants.
Fully agree, I just said that earlier!! Love my white clovers!
My daughter loves to eat the clover flowers. Bees are not the only thing that likes if if it's tried.
I love the clover because you can string it and feed it to bunnies. They look so cute eating it. They eat it like spaghetti noodles.
This is one of my favorite series. I’ve watched it repeatedly and take notes. Very beneficial planting strategies for food forests, fruit tree guilds and pastures.
I was going to spray the clovers in the lawn，after seeing this video, I am not going to spray it now. Let it fix my soil.
Fantastic. One healthier lawn in the world.
That’s the way just think saving on buying the spray the time saved going to store then mixing and spraying it’s just another great benefit to gardening this way once your mind gets over the look factor and switches to the benefits it all makes perfect sense. Cheers
maybe you spray your lawn now, in the clovers! lol! just kidding
Always a good day when someone stops spraying poison 😊
THAT's alfalfa??? When I was a little girl, there was a big field of that bordering the state park we visited and it smelled SOOOOO good, made a big impression on me! I won't tell you how many decades ago that was, but it was THAT plant with purple flowers and I never forgot it.
Your enthusiasm is absolutely infectious. Thank you for sharing your love for plants and gardening
Just picked up a bag of red clover seeds and planted 5 silverberry shrubs-edible and a Montana native where I live😀
Thanks for another great video!
I moved to my 1/2 acre forever home. The family before me lived here many many years and loved plants. Only one fruit tree sadly but I'm so grateful for all their work. Taking my time and not cutting a thing until I know what it is. I have a fig, a plum, and a Surinam cherry ready for planting. The Cherry will be potted so it can winter inside with the orange, lemon and lime to be bought soon.
That is awesome!
I never clean up my beds until after the last frost. The insects love them.
As a total aside note... when I got my stargazer lilies, the old timer I got them from told me that the secret to maintaining the plant in my zone 4 Maine winters was to keep the main stem in tact over winter and try to keep the tip above the snow. He claimed it'd help the bulb breath... I've had the same plant flower each year for over 25 years, whereas relatives a hundred miles so. of me have lost theirs...
For whatever reason, some plants like to keep their stems... probably some reason Mother Nature creates them that way 😉🤔
Great story and observation. Thanks
I find that last year’s dried stems serve as a natural support for the present year’s growth as well. Gives a little structure to those newly forming plants. 🌱
You can also use dried woody stems as plant stakes; I find irises, sunflowers, and hollyhocks to be really great for this!❤
Alfalfa makes a great lawn
A lot of our backyard in the city is covered in white clover. In the spring our front yard has many dandelions. We don't treat our lawn with anything, just let nature do it's job. We love your series very much. Thank you for sharing all this wonderful information.
That is awesome! Keep it growing natural.
Unfortunately, dandelion is considered a noxious weed in my city. The city will warn you first if you let them grow crazy, and if you don't get rid of them, they will spray. On the other hand, the city uses clover in the grass, so I am replacing my lawn with clover.
@@joanies6778 the city spraying your property is horrible 😔
What wonderful and practical knowledge! Thank you Stefan!
Glad you liked it!
Thank you, Stefan. You are an educator, sir. Impressive and thoughtful, even at 2x speed! (sorry, but I have a lot of things to do.)
2x is great, you can get all the content in half the time. I speak slowly.
I use clover as a cover crop in my garden. It keeps the soil cool, captures and retains water, and draws pollinators! It also feels great on bare feet while gardening! Iowa
The disdain for clover in lawns is actually a result of a marketing campaign in the 1950s. After failing to produce an herbicide that left lawn clover intact, chemical companies simply "rebranded" clover so that people would accept weed killers that only grass could survive, and they must've been very pleased with the resulting increase in fertilizer sales when the beneficial plants were destroyed.
Wise information. Unfortunately the effect of that brainwashing still persists.
I love your videos, so informative and fun to watch!
That plant you are referring to is Senna. In my garden, it is a slow growing shrub. Already loving the series on soil improving plants. Thank you very much.
Yes! Thank you! That's it. Yellow flowered.
I have a persian friend who does a senna tea cleanse a couple times a year. I didn't know that's what it looked like. Cool.
Prune that wisteria, prune it hard, and then it will bloom beautifully! TY for the info!!!!!!! I have to start a garden from scratch. With clay soil! Yeah. It’s gonna be a job! Lol
Excellent information as always. Thanks.
Thanks for watching!
Love that clover brings the pollinators in droves! (But watch out-the deer love it as well. )
Just another great reason to plant extra!
Safe eating areas become great hunting areas in times of need.
Thank you so much sir. I'm building my first food forest and organic gardens, i'm incredibly excited about nitrogen fixers.
Best of luck!
I have a field Stone wall in Massachusetts at my home and I was preparing it for planting in the spring and I found out that our local bumblebee population clearly uses my wall when I came across hundreds of small little single dens. They had Doug small holes between the rocks and covered them back up with mud. I will never prepare my wall for planting in the fall ever again I will always wait until spring
I harvested my garlic yesterday. In the area the garlic was growing, today I broadcast alfalfa, crimson clover, buckwheat, oats, peas, barley and white mustard. First time with this mix of cover crops. Last year I planted red clover with the garlic. Garlic didn't seem to mind at all. But the clover twisted up the garlic leaves and about a month before harvest, we had a downpour of rain and the garlic was flatten because of the clover. I was still able to save the garlic by cutting back the red clover. It was a lesson learned. If I do it again, I'll cut the clover back to about 6" tall.
Good info.
Thanks
I have white and purple clover in lawn bees love it and I call the verge which I also have meadow
If you want your wisteria to flower you have to prune it. It is happy to just grow and grow until it is faced with the adversity of pruning. Then it will flower followed by seeding in order to reproduce in case it can't save itself! Thanks for all the good info. I'm starting my orchard this year and expect to be more successful thanks to your videos.
Thank you for explaining compound leaves.
Thanks so much
Hi Stefan! Whiteclover is growing in my front lawn And i can't wait until it takes over from grass and I don't have to mow anymore. Red clover is very good for fighting cancer and also for regulating menstrual cycles and hot flashes. Were you talking about caragana? It is a prairie shrub, tree that also serves as a very good windbreaker! Another very good video! Cheers!!!
Alda you’re ahead of the game, shrubs video is out Friday.
@@StefanSobkowiak been watching a lot of permaculture videos, including yours for the past 5-6 years. Have learned a lot about gardening and growing my own food. Thank you!
Since I live on a corner property have lots of what people call weeds and neighbours with emaculate lawns compared to mine. I like my lawn even kept some grasses in the garden this year. Wild bird friends like that the wild grasses. I sit outside and they chatter away. Made my own forest for privacy.
I will never understand why people like perfectly manicured lawns and shrubs. I think a front yard looks better with birds and bugs and thriving plants, even if they're considered to be weeds. Instead of trying to fight it, we should work with it.. like a living privacy fence. Sounds like you've got a lovely setup
@@grudge5150 to understand you need to go back...way back to prince Albert and his wife.
They created a ton of gimmicks we call tradition. Why? Money.
The ideas of Christmas and well kept lawns comes from that couple. Everything they did was a sales gimmick and they pretty much owned the media so it got publicity.
That well manicured lawn is an image thing meant to impress the gentry and show dominance.
@@mikeries8549 Hence the start of all HOA and Condo Commandos all across the land.
I'm from NZ and you cracked me up mate, thanks for that and the tips.
You sir are a national treasure!!! You earned my subscription when you scarfed down that pea plant 😂
Thanks for the sub!
Hi there from NZ. Yes, there is a reason for everything. An elderly friend (who has passed away) said he remembers the trial planting of English Fir (otherwise known as GORSE) on the hillside of Lyttleton, Christchurch. It was nicely fenced off and sign posted. I wish that government person had 2 grey cells that were talking 2 each other; one called caution and the other concern. That plant has cost this country more than a Billion dollars. The main problem was the earlier settlers and immigrants wanted to make another England and had NO IDEA OF THE IMPACT IN OUR CLIMATE. The only people that want the plant are bee keepers. They use it to feed them up on Gorse and Broom (another pest) before they send the bees after the honeydew (excretion from an insect) which was collected from OUR NATIVE BEECH TREES!
Yes we saw lots of gorse in NZ. Mostly in overgrazed and overworked lands. Didn’t notice it in woodlands.
I love clover
Me too. Me too CLOVER.
I am learning so much✌️👍 love it! Thanks 🙏❤️
Wisteria vines are going to be one of the first landscape plants I put in on our new property. Hey are great for chop and drop and they release nitrogen as they decompose vs many that use up nitrogen. And because they are such vigorous growers and do well with heavy pruning you can get a lot of use out of them. Plus eventually they will flower and man is that a site to see.
Be careful what kind you buy. I have invasive chinese wisteria and it's nightmare. it pops up all over the place even with lots of pruning. Research it before you plant it.
@@TheWBWoman So. Many. Suckers. We missed one one year, and it crawled 20 feet under the deck and rooted on the other side. It's original spot wasn't so great, so we cut down and dug it up, and the shoot is now the main plant. 5 years later I'm still pulling suckers from the original. Even the bittersweet hasn't been this tenacious.
@@TheWBWoman there's an American variety that isn't invasive. Look for that one.
@@Bamboo4U2 After years and years of fighting this wisteria, if I can ever eradicate it, you can bet I won't be replacing it with any wisteria even if non-invasive. Probably grape vines instead.
@@TheWBWoman i understand but for others who want wisteria, it's an option.
Prune your wisteria down to two leaflets along down each leaf (four leaflets in total to remain on each leaf) just before spring to promote flowering that year
Neat trick, i never heard of it. I suppose your wisteria keep their leaves all year?? Just before spring in our clime is winter snow. Do you mean just before flowering or when the leaves first emerge ?
@@StefanSobkowiak the leaves don't really drop but they do turn crappy. Take them down to just a couple of buds if you loose all of yours
@@StefanSobkowiak just before the plant becomes active. When the sap is rising again
I often leave the Sedum stalks but only about 6 inches...your idea I never knew before so longer they will be.
Love it. More habitat for wild critters.
Great video Stephen! I think clover is great in my lawn. People have the same opinion about Bamboo, which I love (because I know how to control it) via rhizome pruning, but what a great plant to soak in tons of CO2.
Thanks for sharing!
Yeah, slowly changing my opinion too, the more i learn
Flax flower is a great phosphorus fixing plant I use cover crop on my indoor and outdoor completely pulls out more genetic potential. Only down fall is spring tail which aren't the worst just annoying
Thank you Stephen you make me laugh! Thank you I need it. I have purchased a quarter pound New Zealand white clover from Johnny's seeds. I want to plant it in moderate to high foot traffic area. I am unclear from the sowing instructions and have contacted Johnny's its just that I am such a novice. I am asking your instruction please as you are so good at it. I imagine I will hard rake the area and then sprinkle the clover seed. Then cover lightly with straw and keep moist? A no-brainer? Thank you Stephan take care
People should get over having grass who wants to mow let it grow and feed yourself
Loved watching this video.
New to this and trying to find ways to nourish the soil.
Thank you.
That’s certainly a great way, especially growing one or two species well adapted to your conditions.
Watching this series again for about the third time. Got Caragana seeds to germinate but still waiting for the Seaberry to germinate. Stratified as suggested but still nothing. I’m going to throw them in the food forest (still under construction) and let them overwinter there. Maybe they’ll grow someday. I fed dry crimson clover seed heads to the chickens in hopes they’ll spread it throughout the pasture. Also broadcast white clover seed. There was supposed to be some cow peas in the mix but I haven’t yet seen any. After watching this series, I got Redbuds, Honey Locust, Kentucky Coffee, Black Locust, Red Alder and some others for nitrogen fixing. Then my dogs ate my fruit trees. So that set things back a bit.
I absolutely love your videos! Wish I lived near so I could glean your knowledge.
You can in a binge watch of videos. More than 120!
I think I have watched them all so far.
you are JUST LIKE the rabbits that get near my plants. lol ♥
Seems like you missed breakfast! (LOL) Good to know info Stefan! Thanks 4 taking time to share your talents knowledge with us! Health and God's Blessing on you and yours! You prove the fact that there is REASON for EVERYTHING!
Received thanks. God bless you too.
Nice video
I love the nitrogen fixers.
I have a massive Black Locust tree close to my house.
I use its pods for improve my soil.
Thanks for your videos.
I enjoy them.
Your blind gardener
Greetings from South Africa
Jaco thanks for the comment. I'm sure you see and observe more than many people who can see. You have several sense but we tend to use just sight.
I love your attitude. (And knowledge)
We live in an area where Bermuda grass is very prevalent and we have issues Bermuda and Johnson grass trying to take over. I love your permaculture method and was curious if there are any nitrogen fixers we could plant around our fruit trees that could compete with Bermuda and Johnson grass? Love your channel!
I saw a ground cover nitrogen fixer in Belize that seemed to do exactly that. Some species of ground cover mimosa (since it closed its leaves when touched).
Watching you go rabbit over beans was hilarious 😂
Ah! Nitrogen fixers. Knew legumes were supposed to be good at it. Looking forward to the additional videos on the topic!
Total sidetrack. You tell us there are good uses for dandelions and other weeds and bugs that we tend to think of as nuisances. Now is there any good use for poison ivy? Answer me that if you can!
I plant mimosa and perinneal peanut as ground covers under my fruit trees.
Fantastic, great plants
I like my pea brakes too! Nothing like a good pea !
We have lots of clover in our grass, the bees love it.
I really wanted to grow white clover in our yard but i don't know if they grow in tropical climate.
First I have to say is because of your videos I've learned a lot and I also convinced the woman to not kill all the dandelions... but I have some creeping charlie that wants to show up... not a lot, but I'd like to get rid of it. before i do that is it good for anything?
Great for springtime beneficial insects.add to the diversity of a lawn.
is it Canada Milk Vetch?? :)
Unknown plant. If it has purple or lavender flowers it might be vetch. Small seed pods look like most legumes, dry black with BB size seeds. I'm in U.S.A. zone 8.
Probably one of the vetch species.
one peer-reviewed paper I have says cowpeas give 20% of their nitrogen to corn/maize during the current growing season. probably via fungi. don't know about trees. but locusts produce around 60 pounds per hectare. but clover do up to 100-150#/hectare. so I'd use them to prevent wasting space for the N-fixing trees. mowing the clover "releases" the nodules to make the N2 available. see my book Sustainable Food Gardens for. a list of the N2 product by woody n-fixing plants - trees and shrubs.
Good point the main difference is annual vs perennial. You will need to till and reseed the annuals every 1-3 years (assuming good natural reseeding), setting the soil back down the succession ladder to bacterial. Nice hearing from you Robert. Keep up the great work writing.
I see some Black Medic at the 5:00 mark, another nitrogen fixer.
the best is autumn olive, so tasty!
I can’t wait to try them.
Question would bush beans be a good idea to plant in my food Forest. Would they come back every year and be able to handle the shade
First 3 years when planting ok then not.
My Wisteria has to be pruned hard after blooming. I love that vine but it’s stout and gets too heavy when it attaches itself to trees growing around it. It has nearly killed a locust that’s growing near it just because of the weight of the vine and the huge amount of tendrils wrapping themselves around the trunk and up into the highest branches. I have it growing on a chain link fence. The vine grows in and around the metal grid of the fencing and actually engulfs the chain link so that it looks like I replaced part of the fence with wood. We have a drip hose in that bed. One branch used the hose as a highway to another tree quite a distance from the mother wisteria plant. Before I even noticed it had rooted at the base of that other tree and it had grown high in the branches. It’s a good nitrogen fixer just don’t allow it to bully the other plants around it.
Good point. I wish it grew so vigorously here. Often does back in winter here.
I love clovers....red one is attractive which I haven't got , also they are edible.
Our red clover is edible
Hello. I like your videos a lot and plan to start an orchard in my home country. I am considering to landscaping fabric with some wood chips on top to control weed. I sae that you used plastic for it. I am just concerned that plastic will not be good with irrigatio system.
Plastic is great with irrigation system. Landscape fabric is good until tree and grass roots grow through it, then it will take a tractor to remove it. I would use cardboard and wood chips if you can renew the wood chips every one to three years depending on the thickness you use. It usually degrades by 2-6cm per year.
I love this nerd
What about the fern? What does it indicates on my land, we have it so much.
Many types of ferns but usually acidic conditions, perfect for ferns. Some in dry some in flooded areas.
He knows the names of each birds that pass by! I like him!
When you talk about the Honey Locust being a Nitrogen fixer. Does this include the Black Locust and Sainfoin? Thanks. Great video.
Yes and yes.
my lawn is like half clover... people wonder why it's always so green :P
No wonder that’s a lot of soil building happening.
But, in North America, Kudzu is non-native, invasive. What are your thoughts on same?
Interesting how the worst invasives are nitrogen fixing soil improving plants. Maybe they’re trying to tell us something.
What are some nitrogen fixing trees for north east Texas
And nitrogen fixing bushes
I think you have mesquite. Not sure about a shrub.
Kentucky Coffee tree, maybe?
You are the best.
just become ur fan after watching this 😁👍
Welcome aboard for the voyage.
I have been trying to get white clover to grow in my yard in Orlando Florida
It's a cool season pasture and lawn species in the north. You probably have a better adapted species for florida (mimosa? crimson clover?...) i don't know what it is but am sure one or several exist. Check out Pete Kanaris' channel he is closer to you and see what he uses.
Can we use wisteria as a rootstock for grapevines?😁😁😁😁
I don’t think so but try it and find out.
What is wrong with
my soil no worms nothing
Not even worms😢very hard dirt. Use to be very good soil would goow anything
What to do with it.
If you can get pruning crews to dump a few loads of their chipped prunings your soil will come back to life.
But the allelopathy phenomenon does not always work with each plant.
Great info.
Glad it was helpful!
Thank you❤️❤️❤️💃
Do you have Japanese Honey Suckle up there? I'm wondering what you think of it if so. Here in s.Ohio, I hate this vine.
Yes I’m growing them for the flowers which attracts hummingbirds. Doesn’t spread here.
@@StefanSobkowiak Yes it is good for that but here it's just more work.
I'm in my thirties, and all my life I've never understood the "just grass" people
Great video but i have Question : the lagumes or clovers while they are alive and consuming the nitrogen from the air can feed the next plants and in the same time can fix the soil , or after the decomposition of the lagume can feed the soil and fix it with nitrogen?
Mostly give the nitrogen as the roots die but some given as they are alive. I don’t know the proportion but it would be a great study.
I'm curious about the foregoing of fall cleanup... could one wait until late fall, when the insects have all hunkered down, and then remove those stalks carefully to be kept over winter safely? Such as in a planter pot with a tomato cage with, what, sand in the bottom to stick them in? Perhaps kept in a sheltered corner or nestled in with some shrubbery?
I leave mine, but the 'tidy grass lawn' folk I landscape for tend to want everything gone, even the old leaves...which of course feed the plants for next year, and insulate the roots for winter, but this is a hard habit for people to change.
Is there one pea variety that is best?
Perennial is best since you don’t have to replant.
Perhaps along with nitrogen, they also fix carbon di oxides
They certainly do as do all plants through their root systems.
Hi Stefan, I heard you mention even mosquitos have a purpose. What about ticks?
I'm getting to them soon, hopefully.
You went full orsen welles on those peas
Hahaha 😂
I get some 🍀 clovers now!
Can I grow beans in summer?
Hey Stefan, please tell us the purpose of mosquitoes from your perspective. Thanks
Hahaha i did a video on that subject. The disadvantage of the permaculture orchard. Mosquitos are meant to keep people out of certain areas during the breeding season.
@@StefanSobkowiak 😂
What are clover equivalent in the tropical regions? Thanks.
I don’t know but there are many.
Thistle is wonderful for nitrogen and building the soil. It didn't get it's bad press until the 1920s I or 30s when commercial fertilizer became available.
Also, never plant a wisteria. It will kill everything it climbs on, and it climbs on everything. Plant a dwarf lilac instead.
Kudzu! No one in their right mind would plant kudzu. It is worst than wisteria.
No offense Stephen. What you have to say is very much valued at my house.
But, I'm also cleaning up a farm that belonged to a botanist that went rouge. I know the end result.
Thanks. Am testing wisteria (it’s borderline hardy here and have never seen on get old enough to flower). I get the rogue botanist mindset.
Is Morning Glory that grows in lawn and into my house?
Not likely. Although most annuals have rampant growth.
It's bind weed and it's a thug.
Is there any way you could have a variety of perennial nitrogen fixers in your alleys instead of grass?
Yes but you will have to work very hard to keep it that way. Grass and legumes are companion plants that belong together.
Would it be a bad idea to establish a cover of white clover in between rows with little or no grass?
That would be a good idea but white clover will remain a solid stand for one or at most two seasons and then will have to be renewed as grasses will certainly move in. Clover is great at preparing the soil for a good pasture full of grasses. That’s my observation anyway.
You are my new favorite channel, I mean it! I just bought over 100 acres in Western New York to start permaculture orchard. Needless to say, I am blessed to have found your channel! Thank you, you have taught me so much!