How to make a home micro-forest

In this 54 minute presentation, Landscape Architect and Founder of The Climate Factory, Edwina Robinson shares how to make a micro or tiny forest at home. In the introduction she covers the extremes of drought, floods and fire we will experience in a hotter future. A well-positioned micro-forest can keep your building cool in hot weather.

She explains how to choose your site, select plants, improve your soil using local organic waste, direct water into the soil via water harvesting and maintain your micro-forest by hand.

Edwina shares her experience building her home micro-forest in Moruya, New South Wales over 5 years whilst her partner built their small sustainable home. The end result is a deeply satisfying private slice of 'coastal bushland' in a suburban front garden and an eco home.

Continuing to develop their 2000sqm block she explains how she will establish a 25sqm micro-forest in her back garden using the Miyawaki method. Using this dense planting method, she will plant local endangered coastal rainforest species at 3 plants per square metre. This method is reported to result in 10 times faster growth than a naturally occurring forest.

During COVID, Edwina has also worked with local communities to build community micro-forests in Downer and Watson in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) using the Eight Step Method. In 2022, she will build a third ACT micro-forest and she has started planning the Moruya Micro-forest in New South Wales.