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Fruit tree guild

scarepanda · 2023-09-29 18:30:25

Has anyone here done a fruit tree guild? I'm clearing a bed on one side of the driveway. It's approx 30m2 in a triangular shape. The house is on the South Easterly side of the garden so it would get early morning and afternoon sun. The previous owners planted evergreens and covered the ground in weed membrane and gravel,…

29-09-2023 6:30pm

#1

scarepanda

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Has anyone here done a fruit tree guild?
I'm clearing a bed on one side of the driveway. It's approx 30m2 in a triangular shape. The house is on the South Easterly side of the garden so it would get early morning and afternoon sun.
The previous owners planted evergreens and covered the ground in weed membrane and gravel, so I have a lot of clearance to do to get the area into a workable state. Once I have it cleared I'm thinking of giving it a light dig over and covering it with farmyard manure, compost and then top it off with bark mulch and hopefully the worms will do the rest for me. Going by other areas in the garden that had the same type of planting the ground will basically be dead of any goodness. How quickly would you expect to be able to plant in this sort of area?
How many trees would be ok in this area? At the moment I'm hoping for 1 apple, 1 plum, 1 pear, but I'm not sure if I'm pushing it. Both the pear and plum varieties are self pollinating and I have 2 apple trees in the back with 2 more going in next spring for pollination of the Apple tree. The Apple seems to be on a m26 rootstock.
As for companion planting, what's good? I'm thinking of strawberries as ground cover, some rhubarb at the front area, lupins, nasturtiums around the trees and comfrey in the more shady areas.
Will this plan work?

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