Our living food forest
't Hazelbos is a food forest of over one and a half hectares on the Akkermansstraat in Zelhem, in the countryside of the municipality of Bronckhorst. On the transition from old farmland to the brook valley, on a sandy ridge where a farm has stood since the nineteenth century, a diverse edible forest is now growing.
With nature, not against it
The food forest is free of chemical pesticides, fertiliser and irrigation. Instead we work with nature: perennial trees, shrubs and plants that strengthen one another and together form a resilient ecosystem. The result is a landscape that produces good food all year round, from apples, pears and berries to herbs and nuts, while offering a rich habitat for birds, bees and other pollinating insects.
A landscape that carries on
From the Akkermansstraat you walk up the drive, under the row of trees, and the world falls away. The yard lies hidden behind hawthorn and blackthorn, elder and bird cherry. Planting that was already here when the farm was built in 1934.
The food forest is not a garden with a fence around it. It is landscape that carries on, joining the ditches along the field edges, the sandy paths and the silence of the Bronckhorst countryside. One of the quietest corners of the Netherlands, where the night sky is still dark enough to see the stars.
Map
A pact with the soil
A food forest is not charity towards nature. It is a pact. The trees lock carbon into the soil, year after year, layer upon layer. The dense planting holds on to the water that would otherwise wash across the land in a downpour. The soil life, which you don't see but which is there, everywhere, always, builds up fertility where monoculture had worn it out.
The bees have known it all along. The butterflies, the hedgehogs, the buzzards above the brook valley. They were here before us and they will stay longer. We walk among them, pick what is ripe, and try not to break too much.
For people
't Hazelbos is also a place for people. For those who want to learn about food and landscape, about how to harvest without robbing. For those who want to wander among the fruit trees with nothing that needs doing. And for those who want to stay the night, in the middle of the forest, with the smell of wet earth and ripe fruit, and morning light through the leaves.
Come by or get in touch
Curious about the food forest? Feel free to contact us for a guided tour.