Species for Dryland Mediterranean Food Woodland

Following along this thread because I have a lot of similar issues to you, I am in Serbia and we have similar very long, hot, dry summers, although we also have cold winters, snow etc. too, and plenty of rainfall outside of summer, so that's not quite the same as your context, obviously. Main issues are:

- VERY dry weather in summer - weeks without rain usually, even months
- off the water grid and no chance of a well, so a zero-water strategy required - even if I had water I wouldn't want to irrigate.
- very hot sun in summer - hard to grow traditional vegetable crops or to protect young seedlings
- early warm weather followed by frost very often destroys blooms
- very free-draining soil (sandy)
- very low organic content (1.65% humus according to my neighbour's recent test)
- being on a hillside which complicates everything further
- inherited a traditional orchard on the hillside, so small vineyard, and trees mostly planted to traditional spacings - plums, apples, cherries, quince. The quince and plums generally grow the best, the grapes are quite prolific in a good year.


So what can we do? I have been on this land for 4 years now and I wish I had looked into permaculture techniques and "food forest" approaches earlier. Looking at the woodland at the bottom of my land, it's dense, green, flourishing, with deep organic material on the floor - so what's going on? Well, of course, my land must have been cleared of its native forest at some point, and by planting to a traditional "orchard" there has been massive erosion of the topsoil and it's all washed down to the valley. My neighbour dug a well at the bottom of the valley, he confirmed they found an old oven several METRES beneath the humus layer - that's all my topsoil washed down there.

So we need to try to recreate something approximating a forest on our land too. Some of the strategies I am now implementing:
- digging swales on-contour and filling them with organic material to trap water - not necessarily all along the property for now, just behind any trees I plant from now on: sort of like I show in this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FlpFjnEbZ4
- never planting trees in isolation, but trying to create little systems or guilds, with understory plants etc. etc. (cf. "permaculture guilds") so it's not just trees standing alone but multiple plants creating symbiosis and also increasing organic material through leaf-drop (or manual chop-and-drop) over time. Planting support plants on the north side of the tree if I think they will suffer in the sun. Planting far more densely.
- continually scrounging organic material and dumping it on the land, especially under trees - doesn't matter if it's leaves, woodchips, manure, whatever (sadly we can't get free woodchips here, that I know of so it's a constant struggle), to build organic material in the soil more rapidly than would happen naturally.

I am quietly confident that thinking in terms of creating a forest-type environment rather than an "orchard" or "garden" will pay dividends in the long run.

By the way, I am also experimenting with popular "permaculture" crops that aren't native or typical around here in order to diversify away from plums, apples, cherries etc. - these include jujube (Ziziphus jujuba), sea buckthorn/seaberry (a well-respected pioneer and nitrogen-fixing plant, also considered very healthy fruit), black locust (nitrogen-fixing, invasive but that ship sailed a long time ago), honeyberry, pawpaw, persimmon and others. Some of these are quite hard to source in my country, I don't mind telling you. Will they all succeed? I doubt it, but right now I am focusing on covering the land with growing things, I'll worry about culling or thinning out later, this is about survival of the fittest.

I am not speaking from some position of authority on this, your mileage may vary, but it's just some thoughts that are making more and more sense to me as I look at the alternatives and see that none of them are good (artificial fertilisers, insecticides, traditional orchards, endless irrigation etc. etc.), and that approaches I have tried so far (like no-dig and Ruth Stout) have their place but aren't a sustainable, long-term solution.

A good resource - online catalog - for what you are looking for are the plants sold by:

Fruitwood Nursery, northen California, Koppen Csa zone

They don't have many pictures up.  They are in northern California, which has a hot, dry summer climate.

This nursery sells most of Fruitwood's plants at retail, with lots of pics:

Planting Justice nursery - landing on the page for Lotus Persimmon

I linked that above to the Lotus persimmon, which I think may be called guiaca in Spanish...?

That's a persimmon native to the Mediterranean, and might be a fun one to add to your system, or might already be there?

Great thread! Lots to learn here.

Thank you.

The lotus persimmon is called 'caqui' (read kahkee). My grandfather had one tree in his fields, so definitely it can be grown. We call them 'pérsimon' when the fruit is matured in a jar with alcohol (typically anise / anisette). This way the fruit stays turgid while it gains sugar and loses bitterness.

Tagasaste Tree Seed Available End of February - Apologies for the delay - The world is upside down when trying to get anything done. But getting closer now

Hi Abraham,

Are you located in Malaga city or in the Malaga province? I'm asking, because the proximity to the sea/ocean makes a difference.
There are a lot of species that can be grown in Los Angeles, but they would fail on my property, where it's hotter, sunnier, colder and freezing in winter and sometimes even in May.
What grows without irrigation:
olives (very little fruits on Manzanilla, Picual nothing)
pomegranates - impossible to get fruit established without irrigation
pistachios - 8 year old, no blooming, no nuts
bitter almonds - planted from seed, no blooming, no nuts
So it grows, but gives no fruits, so why bother? I tried different dry farming practices - it just does not work here, simply there is no moisture to sustain any growth.
Last year I finally set up a drip irrigation with pressure compensating emitters and I noticed that following trees like my climate:
apples, pears, quinces, Manjurian Apricot, but also plums and sour cherries. Walnuts to less extent (they drop leaves with late frost, but so do pistachios and pomegranates).
Figs are complete failure in this harsh climate, no citrus of course, chestnuts do not like it. I'm not even trying apricots anymore - late frost would destroy the bloom.

Your initial post was asking for the plants that you don't have to irrigate. I would divide plants for our climates into three categories:
1. Plants that will grow without any initial irrigation - everything that I tried failed and only native species could survive that.
2. Plants that need initial watering to get established - worked for pistachios, olive, pomegranates, almonds. However stopping irrigating for some of them may lower or eliminate any fruit/nut yield.
3. Plants that my thrive in the climate as long they are irrigated.
The rest will fail due to extreme heat and drying winds, even when irrigated.

Thank you, Cristobal.

This is 5 km from the harbor, still on low hills. In this location the climate is a bit warmer and more humid than the average, frost is a rare occurrence, and snow is unknown. This is a very good climate for growing with irrigation, but it's very harsh as drylands.

About fruiting, I've been told that many fruit trees take up to fifteen years before going to bloom. That's why most fruit trees are planted with 5 or 6 years already. It is also not reccomended to let the fruit trees give fruit before they are well established. While they establish, I may grow something underneath.
Malaga has a Manzanilla olive variety that we call Aloreña (from the city of Alora), it's a good table olive, a bit smaller than Manzanilla. I think we have two of those in our terrain.

Last summer gave me an insight. For growing more species without irrigation we need to use nursery trees. The big problem comes in midsummer, when UV rays are killers. A plant with irrigation may stand this sun burning, but only the bravest mediterranean species can stand that without irrigation. And in addition to that frustration, most drought tolerant plants are very slow growing. I've decided to use broom, carob and fig trees as nurseries, then try different plants underneath. My saplings are still very small and few, so I don't know yet if this will work.

Abraham,

I agree with all above. Drought resistant, tough plants will grow very slowly. Regarding nurseries, here I have to be very careful - they sell a lot of plants, good looking on the images, but grafted on some "disposable" short living, shallow root rootstock that will always need water. When I shop for trees, rootstock selection is the most important for me. The next is trunk size - they boast in their catalogs that diameter 10mm or so was considered to be most adaptable by some university. it's just an excuse to sell young plants at high cost. Such specimens never survived summers here - they were destroyed by rodents or quickly dried by hot winds. Plants that were large survived and thrived.
Initially I had seven olive trees, but only two survived, even with watering, discing, mulching.
One thing that is missing in the discussion about establishing trees is multi-generational approach. Grandfather was planting slow growing trees for his grandson and we want to have it right away :)
I have climate  similar to yours, but my area gets even more sun and I have freezes sometimes in May, so it's even more difficult. I lost my 8 year old fig - two freezes - month apart finished it. It's a little bit of irony that I can not really grow Mediterranean plants, but my climate is more continentilized - like Extremadura  but still with more sun and less rain.

Kym Orrock wrote:Tagasaste Tree Seed Available End of February - Apologies for the delay - The world is upside down when trying to get anything done. But getting closer now

Thank you for bringing it up again, Kym!

I bought tagasaste seed from Kym a few years ago. The germination was excellent when I followed this nursery's directions:

Lucerne Tree Farm - really great directions for germinating tagasaste/tree lucerne

And for anyone else interested, here is a list of my fav resources and articles about tagasaste:

Redwood Hill Farm - Growing Our Own Drought Resilient Goat Feed – Tagasaste

Deep Green Permaculture on Tagasaste

Ag Tips from Australia for growing Tagasaste in silviculture

I'm still having a challenge finding the conditions they like on our property, but this will be my third year working on it and maybe third time's a charm?  

Abraham and Cristobal,

I came upon this guy's tree establishing method that still has me flummoxed, but obviously works well for him in Australia.  Here is a quote:

David’s Auria Arid Region Forestry Project near Minnivale, in the Western Australian wheatbelt, has planted nearly a million trees in trials that began in 2001.

Some of David’s techniques are counter-intuitive, but after a million trees, there is no question they work.

Just before planting, trays of trees are placed in water, until the root-balls are fully saturated. The trees are then planted with the root-balls 20 centimetres below the surface. With just a few leaves exposed, the transpiration rate and evaporative loss from the root-balls are reduced.

Contrary to expectations, the trees do not suffer from collar rot.  They produce roots from the buried trunk in the same way that cuttings do. David also plants late in the year, after winter weeds have died off...

...Dead weeds are slashed and ploughed in, adding vital organic matter to the soil, stimulating microbial activity, and improving the heat-insulating and moisture retention qualities of the soil. Trees planted in this way, over the months from September to January, have proved to have outstanding survival rates, even when planting is undertaken on days when the temperature is well over 40 degrees celsius - and despite the fact that trees are never watered.

David says that watering destroys the insulating qualities of the dry soil that encapsulates the stems of the seedlings. If the trees are watered, the water on the surface evaporates away quickly due to heat, wind and low humidity, which then draws all the moisture out of the soil and root-balls via capillary action. Belts of trees reduce evaporative loss from sheltered crops while elevating the humidity of the air – both of which benefit crop yields. David advises planting as wide a diversity of species as possible, always including eucalypts, melaleucas and acacias, to create more effective windbreaks while capitalising upon the symbiotic relationships that exist between them.

In the infertile soils of the arid zone, planting a diversity of trees in a shelter belt minimises competition between them for scarce nutrients - another important factor in survival and growth rates.

The above article is on page 10 of this linked PDF.

I want to try this now, here.  I've read more of his stuff and his method works on many sorts of soil types.  If it can work here it would be game changing for me...

I started last year with just a couple little seedling trees I started from seed I collected, just to stick my toe in so to speak.  It was SO HARD not to water them!  I felt so bad... but I'm still giving it a go.

To do a real test of this, I think I need to grow out a few hundred trees.  So I'm working on that.  The things I've decided on for my area (SW NM, zone 8a, 12 inches rain per year, semi-arid grassland Chihuahuan desert) are black locust, golden leadball tree (Leuceana retusa), tagasaste (Tree Lucerne, Chamaecytisus palmensis syn. proliferus), Texas live oak (Quercus fusiformis), some mimosa (as in Albizia) and Jerusalem Thorn palo verdes to start with.   I was able to collect the seeds for most of those locally and I bought the tagasaste from Kym Orrock (see above a few posts).

I'd love to add in things like Siberian elm and chinaberry but people here would freak out.  They would survive though!  :-)  In our locale, the palo verde, leuceana, and Texas live oak qualify as native, so that will be easier for people here to ignore if I start getting some success with this method!

Kim,

I just read "David advises planting as wide a diversity of species as possible, always including eucalyptus, melaleucas and acacias".
So basically he plants native Australian species, but I and I think Abraham also, are interested in fruit trees. I already have over 500 eucalyptus that I consider weed on my property and I want to eradicate them. It grows super fast, when cut to the ground it will regrow 3m per year. Not bothered by drought, freezing, wet mud of winter, nothing. I'm cutting them now, because the weather is perfect for such a heavy labor.

Cristobal Cristo wrote:Kim,

I just read "David advises planting as wide a diversity of species as possible, always including eucalyptus, melaleucas and acacias".
So basically he plants native Australian species, but I and I think Abraham also, are interested in fruit trees. I already have over 500 eucalyptus that I consider weed on my property and I want to eradicate them. It grows super fast, when cut to the ground it will regrow 3m per year. Not bothered by drought, freezing, wet mud of winter, nothing. I'm cutting them now, because the weather is perfect for such a heavy labor.

I get that because I'm attempting to do the same thing as you and Abraham.  Maybe I didn't carry the thought far enough to properly explain.

David Auria plants those trees because they are native ones that grow there.  Maybe his method is a stepping stone, something that could fill in the gaps that occur in aridland permaculture between planting pioneer species trees on water catching earthworks and increasing their survival rates... to planting trees that do require a lot more water, like fruit-supporting trees.

People could try trees most likely to grow in our areas. Mixes of nitro fixers and leaf litter producers and soil web builders, natives or non-native (like my mix I'm trying here).  And possibly a combo might work out, build soil and microclimes, and eventually help the space to be able to support fruit trees.  An inspiration for this I see in my region-fruiting mulberries growing wild, usually along roadsides where there is obviously a bit of extra water infiltrating.  Road "swales".  So I'm observing those and trying to figure out how I can fast track that on my land.

So first I'm trying the pioneer species that are not fruit trees.  And it's way easier to start with these trees as I can get loads of seedlings or rooted cuttings started.  

Moving on to fruit....I think that in my region, it may be possible to grow lotus date persimmons, mulberry, jujube, Mexican elderberry, Hansen's bush cherry (sand cherry), autumn olive and pineapple guava (feijoa).   I've been able to grow and/or propagate several of those well so far.  The lotus persimmon can also be used as rootstock for Asian persimmons - a neat future possibility to me where I can hopefully add variety... and a next step.

This year I'm trying a few new varieties of  fruiting trees/bushes on their own roots here to see how they do and where they fall on the water usage scale (using irrigation first to gauge this usage).  I've put in American plum, Chickasaw plum, seedling apricots, Persian mulberry seedlings and next on the list are crabapples and species/seedling pears.  Hardy, hopefully deep-rooted trees for future rootstock potential.

Here is a resource that may be of interest to you. It has water use of some fruiting plants, but not all:
Garden Oracle Tucson and Phoenix gardening - water use and difficulty level of hot arid land trees

And that's the last strategy  - get the most drought tolerant rootstock trees in after the pioneer species.  Then once the rootstocks are established, graft yummier varieties on them like Steven Oldham of Skillcult does on his Frankentree:


So my plan is long term and takes a few steps:

Plant pioneer species. See who survives.
Add hardy rootstock fruit species. See who survives.
Graft on as many tasty fruiting scions as I think each can handle.  Find out what that is for each tree.

And hopefully, end up with a variety of fruiting plants that are getting their water from permaculture means.

It will take awhile. But it'll be fun to see what happens!

Kim, it seems it's a good plan.

I was already planting my seedlings deeper than what it is reccommended, and I have yet to see a tree failing because of too much humidity!
Not watering the new saplings, now that's something else. I heard of this technique for reforestation. Since it is not posible to keep them irrigated, the strategy in reforestation is to plant massively small seedlings, not older than one year, and forget about them. Many will die, but the few that survive will be there forever.
We've tried to plant a few trees with the reforestation method, but we are giving them some water just out of fear of losing them too. I didn't know it was counter-productive.
The ancient wisdom here is that little trees require watering when they are younger than three years, and might still need some water in harsh summers when young. That works for orchards with some irrigation. Other orchards just plant olive, almonds and fig trees, when they are old enough to not require watering.

Cristobal, if your climate is alike Extremadura, then go for oaks! Bonus point if you can grow pigs with the acorns. That's extremely slow, though, so you would be planting for your grandchildren, :)

Abraham,

I'm surrounded by oaks, but they don't want to grow on the floor of my local valley despite shallow underground water level. Now I think I know why. I can see right now frost all over the place ending where the oak line starts. So maybe they don't like every night freezing temperatures. When I was buying the property I did not think about temperature inversion and that I will be living in a cold pit. I was excited about having 3 m deep soil, versus 30-50 cm on the hills. My neighbors 30 m above me grow citrus. Late/early frost is my major challenge here and water is not a problem - my well pump can pump 100 l per minute. So after discovering that apples, pears and quinces like it, I purchased 20 more of them and will be planting in late March together with peaches (first time try), more plums, cherries and native blue elderberries.

Anne Miller wrote:

Abraham said, "thyme, fennel, and rosemary. Good for spices, little more.

These also have medicinal benefits, too!

I use rosemary for mouthwash.

Here is a thread to offer suggestions on how to water your trees and plants:

https://permies.com/t/138768/Water-Plants-Trees-Drought-Conditions

I use rosemary and white sage as a hair rinse .

I've been throwing a bunch of wild seeds, labeled for rewilding meadows. And I am happy to say that we have a new species sprouting that wasn't there before:
Sinapis alba. That's white mustard.
I'm torn between reseeding every seed and collecting it for myself XD

Hi there,

I was intrigued by your post because I am living in Croatia and we started to have the same problems as guys due to the climate change.
I have read a numerous articles and Youtube videos on that matter, but then I came across with Hugekultur  techniques.
If you didn't tried already , maybe you could give a shot.
This technique seem to me very promising, at least for edible plants, shrubs and small trees.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Th0-nMd5kKE

Pavlimirus Kvarneranin wrote:Hi there,

I was intrigued by your post because I am living in Croatia and we started to have the same problems as guys due to the climate change.
I have read a numerous articles and Youtube videos on that matter, but then I came across with Hugekultur  techniques.
If you didn't tried already , maybe you could give a shot.
This technique seem to me very promising, at least for edible plants, shrubs and small trees.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Th0-nMd5kKE

Hi, Pav, welcome to permies!

Yes, I'm already doing something hugel-alike, but mine is underground. I mean, dry climate, no irrigation, unless you bury these logs very deep, they'd never rot but dissicate instead. It works better than regular beds, but I am still unhappy with its performance. I documented it in my sunken bed thread.

start with what you know works - fig trees. plant loads of them and give them water to help them thru the first two or three summers. experiment with other plants amongst and below the fig trees. fig trees are easy to propagate, grow fast, tolerate aggressive pruning, and send deep roots, they are a gift as a pioneer tree in your setting.

Abraham Palma wrote: Where we wanted a lush garden, our fauna found a lust garden.

I have thoroughly enjoyed reading the comments here, and your exchanges have significantly contributed to my own plant list for my imminent move to a similar-ish climate.

But I could not let this gem go uncelebrated. What a chuckle, thank you.