Geoff takes us on a tour of the 66-acre Zaytuna Farm. It went into development in 2001 with earthworks for the mainframe water system. He takes us along the oldest, largest swale on the property, and it supports a well-established food forest, which includes jackfruit, mango, custard apples, Brazil cherries, pecans, and more. The productive forest is designed to mimic a natural forest, and the swale helps to hydrate the property. With systems like these, the farm is continually improving into a drought-proof, flood-proof, and extremely stable landscape.

Swale: A swale is a water-harvesting and tree-growing system that resembles a ditch, only it sits level and holds water until it soaks into the landscape rather than draining water away. Swales are on slopes, and the lower side of swales are bordered with berms (mounds of soil) into which trees are planted.

On the mid-slopes of the property, Geoff walks us through smaller, younger swales that are very well managed and supporting new food forests. The maintenance includes free-ranging poultry through the landscapes to scratch out the weeds and fertilize the trees. Young food forests are managed by how they fall, building up on layers of mulch production until ultimately the result is fruits and nuts. Older food forests, then, require very little maintenance besides an annual chop-and-drop clean up. They could be left untouched for ten years and put back into shape in just a day of work.

Food Forest: A food forest is a designed forest meant to replicate what happens in natural forests but with a diverse collection, a polyculture, of productive (and supportive) trees and plants operating from the root level to the overstory.

Chop-and-Drop: Support trees and plants, particularly grown for their nitrogen-fixing and biomass-producing abilities, are regularly cut (“chopped”), and the prunings are left on the forest floor (“dropped”) to decompose, creating fertile soil and fostering fungal networks.

From there, Geoff takes us quickly through several features on the property. He demonstrates how a swivel pipe, created with an unglued plumbing fitting, can be moved up and down to control large flows of water and holds back small flows. He shows us a large fringe system of banana circles and a kitchen garden, which could be replicated as a smaller system that would be highly suitable for a suburban kitchen garden. He shows us a lotus paddy, which could be a rice paddy, that has been re-engineered to drain into a newly developed chinampa system for growing aquatic crops and raising fish.

Chinampa: Chinampas are an ancient agricultural method that combines shallow water systems for raising fish and aquatic crops with artificial islands and/or peninsulas for growing land crops. This method is considered one of the most successful and sustainable in history.

Chicken tractor: A chicken coop that, beyond just raising chickens/eggs, is used to process waste materials and produce compost. They are typically movable and often relocated to also aid in weed and pest control via the chickens feeding on them.

From the main gardens, Geoff shows us some of Zaytuna’s fertility systems. The two main garden chicken tractors function by combining bedding with manure, food scraps, and weeds. The pile is turned over weekly for five weeks, at the end of which it has produced high quality compost for the gardens. Each tractor fertilizes 10 garden beds that are 15 meters long and 1.2 meters wide. And, the tractors only occupy 16 square meters of land, while housing 12 chickens that provide eggs. There is also a mobile chicken tractor that is moved around to thwart weeds and pests whilst tilling and fertilizing. Three bathtub worm farms also help to process waste, and they provide a bucket of worm juice every day and a bathtub of castings every three months. And, there is a composting system with special ingredients (flour is added during it being turned) for fungal composition.

Bathtub worm farm: Worms make fantastic fertilizer via their castings (poop) and the juice, and bathtubs make great homes for worms, as well as easily harvesting these castings and this worm juice. The bottom of tubs are lined so that juice drip through the drain, and they are filled with manure and organic materials for the worms to eat.

The larger animals on the farm have systems as well. There is a one-cow milking machine for dairy, and the dairy cows are fed minerals and natural supplements every time they are milked, A cattle lane goes right around the farm with 43 gates to implement cell-grazing in varying sizes for beef cows, dairy cows, and horses.

Cell-grazing: Animals are fenced in and allowed to graze small sections (cells) of the land for a set amount of time, often a day or a few days, before being moved on. This maintains the land and feeds the livestock without degrading the landscape.