You can have aesthetic appeal and practicality and this is what edible landscaping is all about. Creating an attractive garden is all well and good. But what about creating a beautiful garden that also provides an abundance of food?
General Tips for Edible Landscaping
Remember, when landscaping a garden, you need to think about practical things like garden structures, any decking or paving, pathways and garden boundaries. But the first and most important thing in any landscape design should be the planting.
Choosing edible options which selecting plants for your garden can bring benefits to you in the yields they provide, while also ensuring there is plenty to share – with your community and with the wildlife that shares your space.
Creating edible landscaping in your garden is all about recognising the different edible plants that can be grown in your space. First, you should learn which edible plants might work in the environmental conditions that your garden provides. It is always important to understand the needs of plants, and the site, to determine the best plants for the best places.
Next, you should think about how those different edible plants might be combined in a huge range of different ways to create delightful landscaping around your home.
In order to inspire you and help you to create edible landscaping on your property, let’s take a look at some of the ways that you might be able to incorporate edibles in a range of different ways around your home:
How To Incorporate Edibles on Garden Boundaries
One good place to begin when thinking about how you might design elements of edible landscaping is on the boundaries of your site. Around the edges of your garden, you might already have fencing, or walls, or sections of hedge.
But existing garden boundaries often leave something to be desired. You will often be able to make big improvements to a space by thinking very carefully about how you define the outskirts of your garden.
If you already have suitable fencing or walling in place, you might consider using edible climbers and vines to soften this feature and make the most of the space.
You might also consider growing fruit trees or fruiting shrubs espalier or cordon fashion against the existing structures.
In certain settings, you might also consider adding a vertical garden, to maximise the production of strawberries, herbs, or annual leafy crops, for example.
If you don’t yet have good boundary structures of planting in place, or wish to replace an ugly or boring hedge, you could consider creating a hedgerow. Hedgerows of native plants can be filled with food, producing a range of nuts and berries, perhaps, and providing other yields such as edible leaves.
Edibles In and Around Garden Structures
The landscaping scheme in your garden will often include structures other than those on the boundaries of the site. You might have a polytunnel or greenhouse, for example. You might have a garden shed, a summerhouse, a pergola or gazebo… the options to incorporate structures to help you make the most of the space are almost endless.
No matter which structures you choose, remember that these should not be plonked into the space without any regard for their impact, and how they interact with their surroundings. Planning your edible landscaping around, on and in these structures should help soften these spaces and tie them in with the rest of the garden design.
Climbers and vines with edible yields can, again, be used to create a more harmonious, lush and natural feel. Green walls and vertical gardens might again be used in certain settings. You can also take advantage of the different environmental conditions created by any structures you add – growing more tender plants in covered areas, and shade-tolerant edibles in areas of shade that they create, for example.
Forest Gardens & Perennial Borders
As you think about edibles in your garden, it is important to remember that we are not just talking about fruit trees and common annual crops.
By exploring the concepts of forest gardening, and learning more about perennial options, you will discover a huge range of trees, shrubs, climbers, and herbaceous perennials that provide you with an attractive vista and something to eat.
When thinking about edible landscaping, your goal should be to aim for as much biodiversity as possible, to maximise the beneficial interactions between the different species in your garden and the environment around them.
By mimicking natural forest or woodland ecosystems, but choosing plants that provide you with a yield, you can create thriving and abundant, ecologically functioning systems in your garden.
Adding Edibles Along Pathways
Another area to consider is how you can incorporate edibles along the sides of pathways, and perhaps even within pathways themselves.
You might add edible edging along the sides of a path – a row of ground cover edibles like strawberries, or Mediterranean herbs, for example – or leafy greens like sorrel and hostas, for example, in a shaded spot.
A number of herbs like hyssop, thymes and chamomile might work in a pathway too, as low growing greenery between pavers or stepping stones perhaps.
You might even incorporate fruiting shrubs, or step-over apple trees to define the edges between paths and different growing areas…or send a pathway through the middle of an arch trellis on which you grow edible climbing plants.
How to Add Edibles in a Lawn
Exploring the wonderful world of edible plants, you may will discover that you already have edible plants growing in your lawn. Dandelions are just one obvious example, but there are plenty of other plants commonly considered to be lawn weeds that are actually useful edible plants.
There are many wildflower edibles that you might incorporate in a lawn or wildflower meadow area.
Considering Edibles in and Around Water Features
Another interesting thing to remember is that you can use landscaping choices to create a range of different habitat types within your space. Add a pond or other water feature, and/or a bog garden or wetland area, and you could explore a whole host of more unusual edibles which grow in and around water.
These are just some design thoughts to help beginners think about how they can use edible landscaping to make the most of their outside space.
Elizabeth Waddington is a writer and green living consultant living in Scotland. Permaculture and sustainability are at the heart of everything she does, from designing gardens and farms around the world, to inspiring and facilitating positive change for small companies and individuals.
She also works on her own property, where she grows fruit and vegetables, keeps chickens and is working on the eco-renovation of an old stone barn.
To get in touch, visit https://ewspconsultancy.com.