Learn About Seattle's Beacon Food Forest

Did you know Seattle is home to the largest urban food forest in the world? And right here at Jefferson Park on Beacon Hill, too!

Food forests have been around since the stone age, back when nearly all of humanity were hunter-gatherers in a post-Ice Age world. These ancient techniques of landscape management place natural cohabitation at the center and are the reason rural communities have continued to thrive in a modern world.

Read on to learn more about food forests in general and our very own one right here in Seattle!

The inspiration behind the Beacon Food Forest

History of food forests

For all of human history, people have influenced the natural environment around them by bringing new plants to existing forests. Early European inhabitants in middle stone age times expanded across the continent following the retreat of the glaciers around 10,000 B.C., and they brought the hazel plant with them wherever they went because it was a high source of protein and fat. 

It wasn’t just the life-saving hazel plant that made its way into human surroundings. Hunter-gathering people all over the continent recognized the benefit of managing many pieces of their landscape to better serve people and wildlife. Controlled burns around settlements led to bountiful harvests of wild fruits, nuts and plants, and strategic clearings and plantings of ivy encouraged deer to bed down in areas where it was more convenient to hunt. Regular pruning of bushes and shrubs resulted in regrowth that increased its lifespan and yield, as did the regularly cutting trees to the ground in order for them to grow back younger, healthier and more manageable.

Over time, the landscapes around human settlements evolved to contain more of what people needed and less of what they didn’t. Poisonous species were phased out as nutritious plants were cultivated, and the forests were full of nuts, berries, fruits, vegetables and herbs that humans had so carefully protected. These food forests sustained villages for millenia, even after hunter-gatherer communities turned into farming and agricultural communities. Even today, food-rich forests sustain local populations through both income and food security. 

What is a food forest made of?

There is no one definition of a food forest, of course, as they exist all over the world in different climates, cultures and capacities. However, English horticulturalist Robert Hart identified a system of seven levels that nearly every forest garden could be divided into.

1. Canopy layer: this is the tallest layer and is usually made up of mature fruit and nut trees.
2. Low tree layer: consisting of smaller fruit and nut trees that are either younger or smaller in overall size.
3. Shrub layer: a lower, bushier layer that contains berries, currants and other fruit bushes.
4. Herbaceous layer: contains — you guessed it — herbs, as well as perennial vegetables. 
5. Rhizosphere: a layer containing crops grown for their roots and tubers, such as potatoes and beets.
6. Ground cover layer: a low, surface-hugging layer of plants that spread horizontally across the forest floor, such as ginger, bergamot and cardamom.
7. Vertical layer: made mostly of vines and climbing species, these plants grow vertically up the trunks and stalks of other plants in the system.

This system of food forest formation showed how each layer of the forest could support other layers, whether through shade, weed control or water retention. Some plants that require full sun, such as carrots, don’t integrate well into this system, so it’s important to identify which plant species integrate well and support their leafy neighbors. 

As more research and scientific examination has been put into the history and efficiency of food forests, people began to see how a more natural approach to land management could lead to more flourishing ecosystems. The term permaculture emerged to describe the philosophy of working with nature and examining the whole ecosystem, rather than the individual plant, and this approach has been used in everything from grazing practices to marine agriculture to domesticated animals and more!

The Beacon Food Forest

Seattle’s Beacon Food Forest plays a significant role in the global discussion around permaculture, as it is considered to be the largest food forest on public land in the world! 

It’s goal? To showcase successful implementation of permaculture models to urban areas, as well as to provide the Beacon Hill community with access to healthy and affordable food. 

The Beacon Hill Food Forest was first introduced at a 2009 conference in Wallingford by a team of permaculture design students. The presentation showcased how seven acres of Jefferson Park could be transformed into a flourishing ecosystem of fruits and vegetables, backed by research, designs and science that showed what the park would look like and how it would function once completed.

Jefferson Park is listed as public land under the management of the City of Seattle’s Department of Public Utilities, and through tireless negotiations and plenty of planning, the city granted permission to plan the Beacon Food Forest in 2010. In September 2012, the very first trees were planted on the site. 

Today, the Beacon Food Forest covers seven acres and is split into four different sections. 

The P-Patch is a subscription-based program that allows residents to grow and harvest on their own plot of land. The public harvest area is open to anyone to harvest and take what they please, and it operates on a trust system that, so far, has been incredibly successful. The third section is the plaza where volunteers meet and classes are held. The fourth, of course, is the food forest itself, which is carefully designed to be a self-sustaining ecosystem of fruits, nuts and vegetables. This forest, while still requiring watering during summer months, is on its way to being fully self-sustaining, imitating the food forests that sustained local populations for millennia.

If you live in our luxury Seattle apartments, then the Beacon Food Forest is a must-see if you’re even remotely interested in gardening. It’s the premier example of the modern food forest movement and, being the largest in the world, is the template for how other cities can incorporate food forests into their own neighborhoods.

Have fun!

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Featured photo courtesy Pixabay/Bruttos