Yesterday, Sunday, 22 August 2021, browsing Facebook I saw again Aida Page’s sharing, “The Most Beautiful Tree in the World” (image on top), and I could not resist this comment: “Most colorful, yes. Most beautiful is different.”
“The World’s Most Beautiful Trees” are different to different people – and they should be enjoyed as such.
There is science and there is art hidden in my statement above of 17 words. The science is agroforestry, agriculture+forestry, or the cultivation of forest farms. The art is landscape horticulture, or the growing of food in eye-pleasing arrangements, structures & systems. The bottom multi-image[1]is from Growing With Nature, and it asks: “Types of Food Forests: Which is Right for You?”
Thinking aloud of food and forest, I am also thinking of climate change. You don’t have to completely understand the concept of “climate change” to be part of the solution.
I believe we should be planting at least 1 million hectares of any of the 3 types above, or any other type of forest gardens, to change the economic as well as the terrestrial climates in the villages and, indirectly, in the cities.
In other words, forest gardens are how we grow the climate we want! If slowly.
And you know what? Literally “the most promising site” is the one where it looks impossible to plant & cultivate The World’s Most Beautiful Trees! It could be the one within your reach.
If I had space, I would choose the one on the left in the bottom image, so that I could grow trees & food crops. Together, they would make up “the world’s most beautiful trees” to me.
When I say “The World’s Most Beautiful Trees,” I am referring to their association; I am not separating one tree from another even visually.
Anywhere in the Philippines, you can construct your own food forest – your landscape garden. If you wish and it’s wide enough, it’s good for farm tourism!
Bamboos with dragon fruit?
Chicos with corn?
Coconuts with coffee?
Lanzones with roses?
Mangoes with vegetables?
Rambutan with pineapple?
Strawberries among the pines?
The World’s Most Beautiful Trees are what we can plant today starting with their earliest form, either seed or seedling – even sapling or bud grafted to a scion.
For me The World’s Most Beautiful Trees are the native species in my country the Philippines:
Banaba, Lagerstroemia speciosa
Bani, Milletia pinnata
Dap-dap, Erythrina orientalis
Ilang-ilang, Cananga odorata
Malabulak, Bombax ceiba
Molave, Vitex parviflora
Narra, Pterocarpus indicus
Salingbobog, Cratevareligiosa
If you plant any or all of them in your forest farm, you can call them The World’s Most Beautiful Trees because they are yours!
I say that in growing your forest garden, if large enough, you learn 3 lessons of health simultaneously:
One, you need trees to aerify, not only beautify, your surroundings, to nourish your mind.
Two, you need fruits and/or vegetables to nourish your body.
Three, friends and others will visit your place, to nourish your pleasure and treasure!@517
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