Agroforestry week: getting to know trees in a hands-on way

Our Agroforestry Summer Week is centred around agroforestry systems and initiatives. In lectures, workshops and excursions, we would like to familiarise various groups with the concept of agroforestry – the combination of woody plants with arable crops and/or livestock farming on one area. The system may be more complex to manage, but offers many positive effects, such as erosion control and higher yields. The Agroforestry Summer Week provides insights into this sustainable branch of agriculture.

TREE RALLY WITH STUDENTS IN THE KLEVE FORSTGARTEN

An agroforestry system without woody plants, i.e. trees and/or shrubs, is unthinkable. A first step towards understanding this land utilisation system, which has already proven itself in the past and is also forward-looking, is certainly knowledge of native groves. The Forstgarten in Kleve is home to a diverse tree population, including a large number of botanically valuable trees. The city of Kleve has also created a fruit tree arboretum to the east of the Prinz-Moritz Canal. An ideal place to get to know trees in a playful way. The planners of the Agroforst Summer Week thought so too and invited students from the Agribusiness and Sustainable Agriculture bachelor’s degree programmes to take part in a joint tree rally.

Equipped with a map and pictures of the leaves of the trees they had to search for, the teams roamed the Kleve Forstgarten for around two and a half hours to identify the trees they were looking for. Smartphones were used to research information on the tree species and the results were presented to the groups.

CONCLUSION

With the tree rally, the team from our agroforestry living laboratory led by Prof Jens Gebauer and Julia Gorris succeeded in allowing young people to explore the Forstgarten and its tree population in a creative and educational way and to gain additional background knowledge about the trees. The tree rally was also a practical exercise for the students from the Faculty of Life Sciences, who had already received theoretical training during various lectures over the course of the semester.