Green Belt Forestry Management held an Agroforestry Field Day on a farm outside Rathmullan last Friday. The farm walk explained the process and let farmers see how the scheme works. Green Belt provides professional forestry expertise across the country and their local representative in Donegal is David Sweeney from Golan, Milford. One of their schemes, Agroforestry is very suitable for Donegal farmers where they will plant between 400 and 1,000 trees per hectare paying premiums of €975 per hectare for ten years. The trees are planted in straight lines at 3metre intervals, with an oak tree planted every third tree. Other species planted among the 412 trees per hectare, are birch, rowan, hazel, hawthorn and alder. Over the next ten years as these species grows, they will be thinned out leaving plenty of space for the oak trees to thrive. The revenue from the timber also goes to the farmer. The trees are planted in straight lines to allow space them for tractors to cut the silage and general farming, as well as topping the trees. Each tree is planted in a bio degradable protector tube and attached to two posts to protect from animals until they get established. The tree guards also provide good shelter for the first few years. There is generally a 98% survival rate of trees and Green Belt will identity if a tree is not germinating and will replace them. The trees are planted 20 metres for rivers and streams and 60metres from houses while on poor ground birch and alder trees normally perform best while on better ground they are not limited by what is planted and even some fruiting trees
