Q: Could you have a one tree food forest?

The intentional food forest is designed to mimic what we see in thriving forest ecosystems with plants of our own choosing.  The question posed was, can you have a one tree food forest?

The forest consists of 7 layers; the tallest layer is the canopy where 95% of the sun can be blocked by the tallest of trees.  Smaller trees form the second layer.  The shrub, herbaceous, and ground cover layers fill in the gaps between the trees while climbers shoot up towards the canopy and the roots find home in the rhizosphere.  So at minimum a food forest design must have two trees to meet the canopy and shorter tree requirements.

In the question, the designer asked about how to build a food forest around a single maple tree.  While the question was more about what is the smallest food forest one could make, it raises a larger question about shared vocabulary of systems.  Consistency in terminology is paramount because the words we choose create the picture in the mind of the listener.  

A monoculture is a single crop planting dominates and where it is hard to find a plant other than the one scheduled to be harvested like an incredibly large corn, wheat, alfalfa, or corn field.

A polyculture system is where many plants are planted together like an apple orchard with a clover ground cover crop.  

For a polyculture system to fall under the classification of the food forest it must have the seven layers seen in nature.