Anyone have experience of agroforestry?

[Woodworks]

We are run a small sheep farm and we are looking at ways to manage it better. Thinking of trying mob grazing as its apparently better for locking carbon into the soil and more productive. To do this we need to make some of the fields smaller. The idea is to have double fencing and plant trees down the centre but just wondering if any of you have had any experience of this and if so how best to combine farming and forestry.

 

Thanks

[Rough Hewn]

A living hedge will take many years to establish and will need protection on both sides from livestock.
It will need laying every few years as well.
But it's so worth the wait,
Absolutely fantastic for nature.
I've only planted a few kilometres, there are several pro hedge types on here, look for the threads.
[emoji106]

[gary112]

Done quite a bit of double fencing and planting a native hedge down centre with damson trees every 20 mtrs then lay the hedge as required

[Woodworks]

I was rather thinking of not laying and letting it grow up tall into a future crop. It's only a small place but we already have 3km of Devon bank with some of it layed and some of it as maturing trees. I was hoping to add to it possibly with some different species. Here is one which could really do with a cut back ?

[Rough Hewn]

Get some sweet chestnut, hazel and ash mixed in.
I've seen French farmers coppice hedges and extract milling logs too.
[emoji106]

[gary112]

12 hours ago, Woodworks said:

I was rather thinking of not laying and letting it grow up tall into a future crop. It's only a small place but we already have 3km of Devon bank with some of it layed and some of it as maturing trees. I was hoping to add to it possibly with some different species. Here is one which could really do with a cut back ?

Seen similar to this in the Cotswolds done with scots pine

[Paul in the woods]

Do you have any other aims other than dividing fields? I've done something on a smaller scale but more the forest garden side of agroforestry rather than agriculture.

 

If you want food rather than fuel from the hedge you'll be planting different trees and shrubs. I'd also avoid ash and chestnut due to the various diseases.

 

You'll shade out part of your fields, I know the farmers round here like to shave there hedges within a few inches of the ground to gain as much ground as possible.

 

My wide hedge is really to provide a wind break but I've managed to mix in damsons, myrobalans, crab apples, hazel along with hawthorn, field maple etc. Hopefully we'll get something out of it if the wild life doesn't beat us to it.

 

My main problems has been slow growth as the soil if fairly poor, along with wind and deer.

[Woodworks]

9 minutes ago, gary112 said:

Seen similar to this in the Cotswolds done with scots pine

I am really unsure what to plant. I have in my head some tall trees with a dense understory for wildlife.

 

What naturally grows well on our banks is beech, ash (well it did but almost all dying), oak. hazel, hornbeam and hawthorn.

 

Only one sweet chestnut and that has recently died. We have fir doing OKish in a corner but it's had some wind damage over the years. Next door have a few larch but they have recently died. We have high rainfall but relatively well draining ground. It's pretty acid and exposed to easterly blasts.

[gary112]

6 minutes ago, Woodworks said:

I am really unsure what to plant. I have in my head some tall trees with a dense understory for wildlife.

 

What naturally grows well on our banks is beech, ash (well it did but almost all dying), oak. hazel, hornbeam and hawthorn.

 

Only one sweet chestnut and that has recently died. We have fir doing OKish in a corner but it's had some wind damage over the years. Next door have a few larch but they have recently died. We have high rainfall but relatively well draining ground. It's pretty acid and exposed to easterly blasts.

If you went for hazel then you have a product every few years if you keep it coppiced and it quite fast growing

[Woodworks]

5 minutes ago, gary112 said:

If you went for hazel then you have a product every few years if you keep it coppiced and it quite fast growing

Excuse my ignorance but whats the product?