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From Grass to Syntropic Food Forest: Lessons along the way

You could do it alone, but why would you?

12 people joined Session 3 of the Fast Track your Food Forest series here in Mangawhai last Sunday, led by Arthur McInnes and James Andrews.

Melissa opened the day by sharing how this land found her and Mike, and expressing deep appreciation — for being here, and for the steady support Mike brings. Later, she invited us to “go slowly, with no rush.” Those simple words set the tone for the day, much as a queen bee sets the tone for her hive.

Our first task was to add sandy soil, then topsoil to each bed. Fourteen of us worked together — a living hive, each person instinctively finding their role. Looking back, what struck me was how little urge I felt to direct or manage. I was content to play my part, fully and happily trusting the collective rhythm at work.

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Syntropic Agroforestry – introduction

The syntropic or successional approach to agroforestry outlines a way of interacting with ecosystems which marks a step in the right direction: the ecological (not social/cultural) indigenisation of humans and agriculture. If we put aside cultural factors, what is the biological and ecological role of humans within the ecosystems they are part of?

The uniqueness of Syntropic agriculture lies in this ecological perspective, as opposed to the utilitarian and culturally anthropocentric one which is typical of modern agriculture. That such an approach should strike us as revolutionary gives us a measure of our deep separation not only from our ecosystemic role, but also from the integrated relationship that indigenous cultures have with the land.

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Fast Track your Food Forest – Maintenance

It’s often said that Planting is 10%. Maintenance is 90%. And certainly a food forest grows not by chance, but by the cut of a blade and the return of light. 🌳  Maintenance is at the heart of syntropic agroforestry. The ongoing disturbance and renewal, drive the growth. 

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The Regeneration Pulse — September 2025

by James Samuel, Growing Radicles

The Curve We’re On

This month felt like a hinge. At our Whangarei Fast Track your Food Forest session on 31 August 2025, participants leaned into collaboration tools, laying the foundations of a shared regenerative culture. Meanwhile, a gathering of Kiwi and Aussie dairy farmers in Leeston signalled that regenerative systems, with their reduced external inputs, are no longer fringe. These aren’t parallel threads—they’re weaving together into something stronger.

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Productive and support trees in syntropic system

Growing Syntropic Food Forests and Community


This was the fourth time we’ve offered Session One of our three-part Fast Track Your Food Forest series, and I’m glad to see how it has evolved since we first delivered it in April at the Nature School in Mangawhai.

A forest is a great analogy for human society or community. We started by looking at how much collaboration there is in a forest, but how easily collaboration can fail in our disconnected-from-nature, industrial society. I shared some of the work Janet and I have been developing, and the four foundations for collaboration that lasts:

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Money and Nature

Can we rediscover nature as kin, not as commodity, and find ways to incentivise regeneration?

Just remember that you’re standing, on a planet that’s evolving, and revolving at nine hundred miles an hour – Galaxy Song, by Monty Python

Evolving. Now there’s a word that if pondered for a moment, should make your hair stand on end and fill you with wonder.

Earth formed around 4.5 billion years ago. If all time since then was put on a 24 hour clock, Photosynthesis and oxygen came 2.5 billion years ago ~10:00 am, and Homo Sapiens appeared around 300,000 years ago, at 11:59:56 pm – four seconds before midnight, on the first day of the evolution of planet earth, nature expressed herself in the form of Homo Sapiens.

Read the article at:

https://blog.archanpermaculture.com/p/money-and-nature: Money and Nature
Prepping the tree rows

Fast Tracking your Food Forest

What matters to you?

This is how the latest Growing Radicles event began. It was the first in a series of “Fast track your Food Forest” one-day trainings.

Fellow Archan Permaculture founder, James Andrews opened with an Holistic Decision Making exercise that gave space for deepening the context of each person’s why.

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Regenerative food systems, at the end of the industrial food era

The era of centralised, industrialised, corporatised, monocultural food systems is over, it is a failed experiment. This article will show why, then point to ways of creating an abundance of food that simultaneously build vibrant, diverse ecosystems, and a promise of healthy society.

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Looking for land? Can’t afford it?

Home and land ownership in New Zealand is at its lowest rate since 1951 and is expected to fall further. There is evidence of a structural shift—younger people are less likely to achieve home ownership than ever before.

Advertisements by banks on TVNZ, are suggesting that “first home buyers are an endangered species.” Why?

One reason is that in New Zealand, land has increasingly become a commodity, traded on the open market to be bought and sold as an ‘investment’, and not just to New Zealand residents.

Land has been commodified.

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Landshare Communications training

12 people brought their incompetence and courageous commitment, to a day of learning about effective communication. It was August 2024 in Motueka, Land sharing was the context, and the why, was knowing that so many awesome collaborations unravel because of human misunderstandings and failed communications.

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