Nuts for Nuts: Seeding a Nut Industry in the Northeast
May 7, 2018
Story by Mark Phillips, Capital Institute Field Guide to a Regenerative Economy
Photo above: Kalyan and Seva pose proudly with their diversified nut orchard at Nutwood Farm in Cummington, Massachusetts. Winter 2018. Credit for all photos: Mark Phillips
IN THE SPRING of 2017, 35 people gathered at Back the Lane Farm in Stephentown, New York, for a workshop with Mark Shepard, author of Restoration Agriculture, to witness the design and implementation of a permaculture inspired chestnut and hazelnut orchard. As the founder of New Forest Farm in Viola, Wisconsin — a commercial scale, perennial agricultural ecosystem that mimics the native ecology of its Wisconsin bioregion — Shepard has served as resource and inspiration for farmers aspiring to use agroforestry, or the intentional cultivation of trees, as a vehicle for ecological restoration and financial profitability. Our story highlights the work of three diversified tree farms in the Hudson valley area, united by the bold vision that chestnuts and hazelnuts can one day be the staple food of the Northeast region and beyond.
As woody perennials that produce nuts year after year without the annual tillage required of grains and vegetables, chestnuts and hazelnuts are ecosystem services providers par excellence–reclaiming degraded landscapes while sequestering carbon in topsoil and plant biomass.