Growing food sustainably is not always easy at Pine Ridge, with a three month growing season, harsh weather, pests and poor soils. A number of gardening programs on the rez have had a fairly high failure rate because of the harsh weather and amount of maintenance required. We will be using a system we feel will be easier to maintain and hardier against the elements. It is patterned after natural systems already surviving in the area, and is called a “food forest.”
As such, it contains several layers of plants, like a regular forest, but they are mostly or all edible. This type of food production takes very little maintenance once it is established, and is more resilient against harsh weather, pests and disease because of the diversity of species and the climate control a forest setting provides. Vegetable plots can be grown in a forest clearing and are more protected. This type of food production has precedence in a number of indigenous traditions and is still being done very successfully in many cultures around the world. It provides a healthy variety of organic foods which can easily feed a family on a small plot of land. Animals can also be integrated into the system. Traditional Lakota foods such as buffalo berry and choke cherry can be included in the forest.
We will also expand our “kitchen garden” vegetable plot and will add several items to it including mushrooms and select berries. We are experimenting with “value added” crops that can be grown at Pine Ridge as a possible income source for people at the rez, such as shitake mushrooms, medicinal herbs and exotic fruit. The kitchen garden will serve as a community supported agriculture model. We feel this is potentially a good model for the area in conjunction with other programs to provide local, healthy food to people on the rez. We plan a medicine wheel medicinal herb garden with traditional Lakota herbs in it.
We will use sustainable rainwater catchment and irrigation to water the food forest and gardens.
Along with these activities will be a nursery, created from cuttings and saved seeds, which will provide free plants for a gardening outreach program on the rez, as well as a training ground, an income source and a possible rez-wide cooperative business/job source.
We are currently in discussions to consider coordinating with Running Strong, an existing gardening program which has gotten 500 organic gardens planted on the reservation. They are interested in implementing food forestry in their program, and this project will serve as a demonstration site to show how it is done and why people would want one. The project will also serve as a training site for other organizations on the rez, including youth-at-risk programs (garden and nature therapy as well as vocational training – currently we’re in negotiation with Sweetgrass to provide services to their youth), the beginning Farmer-Rancher program (which our principal has been a mentor/teacher for), and other existing programs.
The purpose of this project is to show people of Pine Ridge that it is very real and possible to produce a good portion of healthy food in their own backyards, and that it can be easy to maintain and care for. This project addresses many needs of the reservation in present time including preventative health care, youth at risk, unemployment, resilient food supply, and more.
Funding needed for purchase of plants, planting, water catchment/irrigation system, equipment and bioshelter is $21,350