Woodchips

Woods chips are a great resource for creating a permacuture food forest. They provide multiple benefits. Most notably, they decompose into fertile soil. For my situation, wood chips were also very useful for erosion control. When I first moved in, most of my growing area was so sloped that during a heavy rain, water would flow rapidly along much of the property.That was easily corrected by laying down woodchips in such a way as to reduce the incline of the land in some locations, and soak up water like a sponge. I also use woodchips to create a ring of mulch around fig trees; this insulates the roots during the winter, as well as generating heat as they decompose.

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  Wood chips

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  More woodchips

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  And more woodchips

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  Happy to receive yet another truckload of woodchips..

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  And another truckload.

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  Before the woodchips, this area used to be a gully, hollowed out by years of erosion.

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  Steaming pile of decomposing woodchips.

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  Ring of woodchips around young tree.