Organic permaculture or drought-tolerant xeric landscape designs all benefit from a rich ecology. Creating habitat can be as simple as some wood with holes in it facing South.
A source of mud can also be very helpful for native Mason Bees.
If wasps try to move in on your masonry bee habitat, their hives can be cleared out with soap and water in a spray bottle in the cool of the evening. Waspinator can also be a solution telling Wasps that this area is already occupied.
Blueberries in Colorado?
Given our dry climate and alkaline dense soils, you could grow lots of fruit-producing plants that would be a lot less work than Blueberries. Yet, we have had success growing blueberries and here is the formula.
Step 1: Locate your blueberry patch next to a drainage swale or low spot that will hold seasonal water. The plants will also need supplemental irrigation water to get through the dry times. Hand watering or drip irrigation will work.
Step 2: Amend and loosen the soil by turning over (Over tilling can actually make clay soil more compact overtime) and adding Peat Moss, Pine Needles, or more severe elemental Sulfur. Just about any Nitrogen compost helps to balance soil pH of 4.5 to 5.5 is the ideal pH for Blueberries.
Step 3: Plant your blueberries add wood mulch around the blueberry plant. The mulch will provide habitat for mycorrhiza and keep the soil moist between waterings.
Step 4: Inoculate your Blueberry plants and mulch with mycorrhiza
Step 5: If plants are not leafing out well or putting on fruit and have plenty of water think about adding an acidic fertilizer in Spring before blossoming and one more dose the last week in Spring. Be sure to continue to keep mulch cover. If you can get more acidic mulches (oak leaves, pine needles, and pine bark) utilize them.
We use natural succession while designing Food Forest landscapes. In this Lyons landscape design the Asian Pear in the foreground grows to size while the fast growing Aspens in the background reach maturity in the background. These Aspens will live another decade at most on the hot Colorado front range environment. As the Aspen are removed the slower growing Asian Pear will become dominant utilizing the organic material from the Aspen.
The most important aspect for creating and Orchard in arid Boulder county is grading and soil amendment. In this Boulder County permacuture landscape design we are using Hugukultur to help hold water and improve the humus content of the soil. When trees are sent to the chipper much of their carbon is released as a green house gas. This permaculture design sequesters the carbon from the trees and the long term health of the future orchard will be bolstered by water holding/wicking capacity and trace minerals released into the soil.
Summary of Mikl's article on Cherry trees
In our on going quest to provide resilient edible gardens in the Boulder Lyons area we turned over this article below. The in depth knowledge provided by Mikl of Harliquins Gardens provides a way forward in the face of a changing climate.
Cherry Trees on the Front Range
Most brilliant articles are filled with a lot of technical information that can be hard to get through so I have summarized some interesting information from this article.
Mikl discusses past events of 1951 and 1990 with hope for the future Mikl goes on to list some varieties that may be more resilient in Front Range orchards of the future.
Montmorancy among many others in the Prunus family did not fair well. Bali Cherry is Mikl's current favorite having survived this event. Bali Cherrys are also known as Evans Cherry discovered in an old orchard in Edmonton Alberta Canada. This amazing cherry tree can be grown on its own root stock which excludes some problems associated with cherry grafting problems. For more information visit Mikl's article better yet visit their Nursery in North Boulder you will not be disappointed.
We utilize sheet mulch providing a biodegradable weed barrier for establishing food forests.
We are using water to hold this layer together before adding mulch and creating seed beds to start the food forest under story plants.
We spend a lot of time in Front Range orchards. Tasting forgotten heirloom apples while absorbing the deep sense of piece that these old trees emit. Generations before us provided these natural wonders for us. Many of these orchards have fallen into disrepair because commercial viability is almost impossible with erratic front range weather. We love restoring these places through old school pruning and by utilizing new permaculture concepts like stacking functions (Michigan State study Pigs and Apples symbiotic relationship).
