Please check out my youtube channel for ideas about how to propagate, site, plant, and maintain all these wonderful plants!
https://www.youtube.com/user/jkochosc
A summary of our growing practices
Our farm produces all the nursery plants sold on this website in Highland, NY on the land we steward. The nursery began as a result of an insatiable desire to plant more food bearing and otherwise helpful and useful plants in our landscape. The goal of planting a 20 or so acre food forest wouldn’t be possible without growing a lot of plants, and so the nursery began unofficially in 2014, and has continued to grow to the present day.
Pest and disease control
We don’t use any sprays of any kind. We simply don’t control pests. If insects destroy plants, then we lose the plants. Because we don’t want to plant anything that can’t make it on its own, that rules out anything that might need any pesticides. Similarly, if diseases kill or injure plants we usually let it run its course, or sometimes remove the plants and compost them. We don’t make any special plant-based or biological sprays, we just don’t spray anything.
The exception to our laissez-fair attitude is protecting plants from herbivory while young. We will protect trees from voles with window screen and the presence of cats. Deer and rabbits are kept away from plants with the help of our sweet but terrifying dog Tucker, and with branches that we place around trees to keep the deer from eating them.
Fertility
No synthetic fertilizers of any kind are used in the nursery. Organic fertilizers are for the most part dubious at best, so we don’t use them either. We do use some natural minerals occasionally. The only manure used is from our own chicken flock. The vast majority of the fertility for the plantings comes from compost we make or some we buy from a local neighbor farm when we don’t have enough. We also collect food scraps which we compost with our chickens. Cover crops provide the remainder of the fertility needs.
Weed management
We use no herbicides of any kind, instead we plant and mulch and hand weed. All mulches are procured locally including hay, woodchips, and leaves.
Seeds
We harvest the vast majority of seeds and other plant material for the nursery from our own plants or from trees and shrubs we visit. We also buy seeds from friends and sometimes online if we want to grow something that isn’t already growing nearby.
Plastic
Our commitment is to buy no new plastic for any part of the production systems, all plastic used in production is second or third hand. This includes crates, greenhouse poly, even twine. We do not use landscape fabric in nursery production.
Water and soil testing
All water used from our well has been tested for all known chemical and heavy metal contaminants, and the soils have also been tested and contain no detectable contaminants.
Field prep and Harvesting
These are the major types of soil disturbance that occur as part of the nursery. Field prep is done with broadfork and shovel. All plants are dug by hand.
A note on our packaging
In addition to our nursery work, we grow about 10 acres of organic vegetables. To grow our plants for the vegetable fields, we use McEnroe organic potting mix, produced here in New York. I have found that the bags are perfect for shipping plants, so we set them aside as we use the soil to be used later for shipping. All packing material that is used to stuff into boxes is freecycled mostly from other people’s used packaging material, we never buy anything new other than tape. The boxes are for the most part USPS priority boxes. The packing material around the roots is generally wood shavings…we used to use leaves but got worried about sending ticks around the country. We also take care to ensure that there are no jumping worms or their eggs mixed in with the roots.
All of this stands in stark contrast to conventional nurseries, which use enormous amounts of chemical pesticides, herbicides and synthetic fertilizers. If our plants look different than what you’re used to seeing from larger stores or nurseries, it is likely because we don’t use any of the chemicals or fertilizers other producers use. We are committed to leaving the land we work with healthier than when we found it.