Submitted by Jenna Ray
University of Minnesota Morris editor/writer
Tags: winter gardening, season extension, Cindy Conner, Virginia
Building low tunnels that are about 30 inches tall to protect your crops through weather that is outside of their comfort zone is fairly easy to do using plastic pipe and plastic sheeting. You will find directions for this at Homeplace Earth. The tricky part is securing the covers. I have seen directions to make the cover with enough plastic sheeting on each end to draw it together to tie to a post in the ground. Sometimes the design calls for simply gathering the extra….
A catalogues of vegetables
Garlic is Chandran Chaliyakath’s big test this year. Their wiry, green stems grow out of a couple of plastic cans on his terrace. Last year, he harvested onions. “I got about 20 kgs,” says Chandran who makes metal grills and shutters for a living and grows vegetables for passion. In the past eight years, ever since Chandran moved into his new house in Cheruvannur built on 10 cents of land, his family began to grow vegetables. From…
Green roofs produce food, cool buildings, and add a dash of color to the skyline. In the future, could they also generate electricity?
That’s the vision of Marjolein Helder and her Dutch startup Plant-e. Helder has developed a modular system that generates power from submerged plant roots. Eventually, it could power whole households, she says.
Gardening
Gardening gifts and what not to give! Click here
Weeds, seeds and bees! Click here
Making a Mali an organic garden. Click here
Food
Green food awards. Click here
Farming
Signs you’re a farmer. Click here
I don’t remember a thing but there’s a day 38-odd years ago that will be forever seered into the memory of my mother. One moment I was behind a high garden fence, the next a mad cow was using her horns to roll me down a nearby hill, hotly pursued by my screaming parents. I’m told they found me giggling, a few feet short of a drop into a creek. To this day I’m still quite fond of cows.
That’s good news because these days I corralled in by thousands of them on all sides. One neighbour breeds pedigree Friesians that are flushed for embyros, their offspring sent to China. Over another fence are several thousand organic dairy cows which produce deliciously sweet milk that, you guessed it, goes to China where they pay the princely sum of NZ$27 for a 2-litre bottle. Some of it is used to make the infamous Lewis Road Creamery chocolate milk and artisan butter. I gaze in awe at the udders of those particular bovines.
I grew up on a poultry farm, tried town life for a few years, and now live and work from a 3ha lifestyle block in the Waikato. My day job is editing NZ Lifestyle Block magazine so I’ve got to meet and talk with a lot of people who don’t have a farming bone in their bodies but are tackling the rural life head-on anyway.
When do they know they’ve made it? These are some of the rites of passage I’ve witnessed, or had to do myself.
You can get down and dirty
When your arm is inserted up to your shoulder in a septic tank pipe because it’s either that or something far worse, you start to realise you can handle anything. Actually, if you have your arm up anything that far, it’s highly likely you are well-prepared for whatever a farming life can throw at you.
Tip: get some arm-length plastic gloves from your vet. Invaluable, and…
The 2014 Urban Food Awards celebrate the capital’s urban spaces used to grow fresh fruit and vegetables
A look at the shortlists reveals some impressive endeavours, including the Crisis Skylight Cafe and urban cheesemaker Wildes Cheese. The awards are part of Urban Food Routes, an initiative supported by the Mayor of London and Seeds of Change. The success of those shortlisted demonstrates the brilliant use that funding and advice from the project can be put to.
You may expect just adrenaline and chalk dust at the Castle Climbing Centre, set in a Victorian ex-pumping station in Stoke Newington. But it also boasts a hardcore sustainability policy, an organic garden and a cafe that was nominated in the eatery category.
Cafe manager Jojo Heather says: “We are a green space…
More here: http://www.theguardian.com/seeds-of-change/2014/dec/08/climbing-to-green-success
