Hi you all, I have the pleasure today to release this amazing interview with Mike Garcia - syntropic practitioner and farmer in Florida ! This interview is really geared towards logistics of his operation and his diverse enterprises ! He does intensive market gardening on two acres, has a poultry operation (chicken tractor), produces fruit (bananas, papayas, ect) and has a nursery ! A really godo interview for those of you interested in the details of a syntropic operation !

Most conventional ornamental landscaping is far more dependent on herbicides like Roundup and synthetic fertilizers than most people realize. The quantities are lower than in industrial agriculture, but the dependency is often similar. In ornamental hedge maintenance, it’s common practice to apply chemical fertilizer after pruning -especially since hedges are trimmed frequently to maintain that “perfect” formal appearance. Then there’s the establishment time. Depending on the species, a conventional hedge can take anywhere from 4 to 10 years to properly fill in and reach the desired density. Over time, another issue comes up : repeated pruning in exactly the same place year after year can cause plants to become overly woody. This often leads to gaps, reduced vigor, disease pressure, and eventual plant losses. And honestly... most hedges end up looking pretty boring anyway. At my job, I plant several hundred meters of ornamental hedges every year. Instead of following the conventional landscaping model - which here would require more irrigation and could take close to a decade to establish properly; I went for something else : Rather than planting a single-species hedge, I designed a stratified living hedge, combining: - Emergent and high trees - eucs, acacias, grevillea robustas, bottle trees, casuarinas, mulberry - Medium and low strata shrubs - myoporum, pittosporum, tree germander, viburnum, boldo. The result is already seen after 3 months : instead of waiting years for density, the space fills visually in about a year and a half or less. To accelerate the effect even further, I also introduced succulent plants - tree aeoniums (Aeonium arboreum). These create a sense of fullness within the first 6 months. As the longer-term species establish, these pioneers can be chopped and dropped, feeding the system and making space for the next stage of succession. I also planted white mulberries every 5 meters. The idea is they’ll eventually produce fruit for guests walking along the path. As well, I will plant some stonefruit seeds like apricot or plums, probably 1 to 2 years down the line.

Part 2 is out ! Pruning, strata, lifecyle, and how to propagate it. All is explained in the video !

Hey guys, had to take a little break to think of other things in the last week ! But I wnated to share with you a very good example of when planting trees alone is not an option. In poor soil like this one, that is so compacted and has 0 topsoil, planting plants at an even higher density is key, because some won't even make it. Will share an update of how this planting went at the end of Summer !

The thing that has changed the most, while I have been learning and experimenting with syntropic planting is the space between rows , row width, and what is planted(or not) in between the rows . I think now I'm settling on narrow 60cm wide rows 4m apart with pasture in between to start , followed by a inter row of vegetables the second year for two years, then soft fruit/berries.