Posts from — August 2011

Thayne Tagge displays a cantaloupe grown on land Salt Lake County is leasing near the Holladay Lions Recreation Center. The county leased three parcels as part of its urban farming initiative; Tagge says Holladay soil is particularly productive for melons. Photo by Erin Alberty | The Salt Lake Tribune.

Tagge’s fruits and vegetables are sold at the Holladay stand, at the South Valley Unitarian Church.

By Erin Alberty
The Salt Lake Tribune
Aug 15 2011 04

Excerpt:

That’s the goal of the farming leases, said Julie Peck-Dabling, director of Salt Lake County’s urban farming program. The three parcels — one in Holladay and two in Draper — were originally bought for future parks land, but funding shortages left them undeveloped.

“It actually takes staff time to go out there a few times a year and cut the weeds and spray them,” Peck-Dabling said. Until the space is converted to parks, leasing the land to local farmers is more productive, she said.

[Read more →]

Portland Farmers Market.

Portland Planners Threaten Local Resiliency, Local Food and Local Economy

By Vince
The Daily Attack
Aug. 13, 2011

Excerpt:

In an attempt to increase “gardening opportunities to support Portlanders’ access to healthy, locally grown food” and encourage “small entrepreneurial food ventures and urban farmers that contribute to the city’s economy,” the City of Portland, Oregon, is considering regulatory and zoning code changes that will accomplish precisely the opposite. Under consideration are measures such as:

Limiting the size of urban market gardens.

Limiting the sale of produce on-site at market gardens; presumably to limit the sale of produce in residential neighborhoods.

[Read more →]

“For the first time, citizens are taking power away from the politicians”

By Linda Gyulai
The Gazette
Aug 16, 2011

Excerpt:

MONTREAL – A group of Montrealers is about to test the public’s newly bestowed right to initiate public consultations in the city.

The threshold is high, though.

The Work Group on Urban Agriculture, composed of university and community groups, will have to collect 15,000 signatures on a paper petition by Nov. 8 to oblige the city to hold a public consultation on the state of urban agriculture in Montreal.

[Read more →]

Milwaukee: An Emerging Model for Smart Water and Food Management

By Steve Hamm
Building a Smarter Planet
August 4th, 2011

Excerpt:

The IBM team spent the first half of their stay in Milwaukee interviewing government officials, scientists, community organizers and the leaders of the aquaponics outfits. They visited some of the test sites, helped harvest fish and ate meals at restaurants that served the fish and salad greens. “It was really good,” says Carey Hidaka, one of the team members, who is a water management specialist.

[Read more →]

Bigg Slice is checking on his front yard garden. It’s doing good with lots of sunlight and lots of attention. Life lesson being learned. “We going to eat yall”.

Bigg Slice builds cars for Snoop Dogg

By Lee Cantelon of “Wordz from the Street”

He appears from the other side of the open hood of a ’66 Cadillac, the “Snoop de Ville,” one of Snoop Dogg’s cars, something he had customized, hung chandeliers in, had pinstriped in platinum. The car gave off a crazy glow in the fading light of the city street, caught the headlights of passing cars, sparkled like the entrance to a hotel in Monte Carlo. “What it do?” Slice says, and tosses off a fast pattern of hand shakes, the morse code greeting that is as important and identifying as dialect.

[Read more →]

Our two community-run farmers markets make fresh food available and affordable, while building our local economy and creating places for neighbors for meet and greet.

Video by Hugues Anhes – 2011
Excerpt from Natasha Bowens’ blog “Brown. Girl. Farming.”
July 12, 2011

“Some of you may remember the posts from my time at East New York Farms! last year – a place that meant so much to me and youth that blew me away with inspiration. Now I want to share some words directly from them, in line with the current theme of sharing stories from black and brown farmers and communities involved in food issues here on the blog!

[Read more →]

Urban farmer Perfecto “Jojo” Rom, an Agriculture graduate of the Xavier University- Ateneo de Cagayan de Oro, plants vegetables in plastic containers in his backyard in Davao City. Photo by Bong D. Fabe.

“There is a need for fresh food and urban agriculture, through Urban Container Gardening, gives us the opportunity to provide fresh, organic, nutritious food to the market”

By Bong D. Fabe
BusinessMirror.com.ph
14 August 2011

Excerpt:

Xavier University-Ateneo de Cagayan – Rom graduated from Xavier University-Ateneo de Cagayan in 2001 with a degree of Bachelor of Science in Agriculture Major in Crop Science through a full scholarship provided by the Xavier Science Foundation from 1997 to 2001. He has visited other countries teaching those willing to listen the concept of UCG.

Using discarded, broken plastic containers and even used tires, 35-year-old Rom has embarked on a one-man crusade teaching households and individuals to contribute to the Philippines’ food security program, as well as ecological sanitation and environmental protection through urban farming.

[Read more →]

Antique Map Of Barth By Braun and Hogenberg. From: Civitates Orbis Terrarum, Part 5. Köln, 1598. See a larger image here.

Town and country, rich in agriculture

Commentary By Braun: “Barth has a large market at which one can buy all the necessities of daily life at a fair price, thanks to its fertile land and its favourable location by the sea. For since there are fertile soils not only all around the city but in the whole duchy, it has an abundance of salt water and other fish, game, cattle, grain, butter, honey, wax and other such things. The wealth of the citizens comes from livestock farming and from trade, which they conduct very profitably with the kingdoms of Denmark, Norway and other distant lands far across the ocean. They brew a tasty beer, which they also trade in.”

[Read more →]

Coco de Mer co-founder Sam Roddick in her “bee buffet” garden in London’s Hampstead. Photo by James Ostrer.

Putting the Chic in Chicken Coop

By Jemima Sissons
Wall Street Journal
Aug 5, 2011

Excerpt:

Sam Roddick, co-founder of London boutique Coco de Mer and daughter of Body Shop founder Anita Roddick, is also passionate about the preservation of the honey bee. She is part of a new campaign entitled “Bee Lovely,” run by natural-remedy store Neal’s Yard, which aims to help address the problems facing bees and educate those who want to keep them. “I went to the Natural Beekeeping Trust course a few years ago and, soon after, started transforming my garden,” Ms. Roddick says. She has planted what she calls a “bee buffet” in her London garden, including lavender, rosemary, thyme and hawthorne, and plans to start keeping bees there soon.

[Read more →]

At TEDxManhattan Dr. Melony Samuels talks about using urban farming to empower low-income families to take control of their diets.

Dr. Melony Samuels is the Founder and Director of the Bed-Stuy Campaign Against Hunger. She not only helps provide food to low-income families in Brooklyn, she’s started an urban farm to help residents get the healthiest, freshest food possible.

[Read more →]

There are Aavla and Curry Leaves (kadipatta). Photo by author.

Garden by the Bay – Purvita’s terrace garden

By Anuradha Shankar
Urban Leaves in India
Aug 9, 2011

Excerpt:

Little did I know that the house itself was on the terrace of the building, and I had to climb five floors to get there! It had been a long time since I had climbed five sets of stairs, but as I huffed and puffed my way up, I couldn’t help admiring the old wooden staircase and the beautiful entrances that adorned the houses. I was welcomed by Purvita with a big smile, and we at once hit it off, even though this was the first time we had met!

[Read more →]

Local police who helped set up the allotments have reported an incredible fall in the amount of anti-social behaviour in the last two years since, the allotments were established

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall
Landshare
10th August, 2011

Excerpt:

In 2009, the early days of Landshare, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall visited a community allotment for local residents in Leigh, Greater Manchester, as part of a River Cottage programme. Two years on, the allotments are thriving, and local police are amazed to find that anti-social behaviour has fallen by over 50% in the area.

[Read more →]

See the larger HD video here.

Big City Farms converts vacant urban lots to vegetable and fruit producing gardens.

By Crafted Spoon
Aug 11, 2011
Must see video! (Mike)

Big City Farms is currently farming eleven lots on the near east side of Indianapolis.

The ideal farm would be in your neighborhood. Not only would it be close to home, but it would be accessible. It would use trustworthy, safe, traditional farming practices so you could rest at ease using the produce for your family. It would provide an exciting variety of fresh produce that could be distributed sustainably to the surrounding community.

[Read more →]

The urban farm in the Buckeye neighborhood of Cleveland is surrounded by homes and a busy road. Photo by David Joseph for The New York Times.

“Maybe there’s 40 to 50 acres under urban farming,” in Cleveland. “Maybe up to 100 acres.”

By Michael Tortorello
New York Times
August 3, 2011

Excerpt:

THIS city contains 20,000 vacant lots, more or less. Probably more. Every year, demolition crews knock down another 1,000 houses. And the housing market being what it is, few souls are returning.

A vacant lot may be a lot of things: an eyesore, a dump, a symbol of American industrial decline. But one thing it is not is vacant. When we leave a yard behind, the bulk of the biomass does not follow us in a U-Haul. Put another way, a dandelion is unmoved by foreclosure. It lingers where it pleases.

[Read more →]

A Richmond Villages resident tends a healthy crop of rhubarb.

Seniors Celebrate National Allotments Week 8 – 14 August 2011

Green-fingered residents at Richmond Northampton, the award winning retirement village built and operated by Richmond Villages in Grange Park, are keeping fit and enjoying each others’ company while growing their own food on their allotments. A bumper crop is expected this summer as they celebrate National Allotments Week.

National Allotments Week, run by the National Society of Allotments and Leisure Gardeners, is a great opportunity to demonstrate just how much fun allotments can be. For those who have sold their homes and gardens to retire to Richmond Northampton, time out tending plants is still possible thanks to some local allotments.

[Read more →]

Vincent Olsen (right) and volunteer construct a fence around the abandoned lot on Stockton Street. Photo by Lucy Butcher.

Guerrilla farm empire expands across Broadway

By Lucy Butcher
Bushwick BK
August 9, 2011

Excerpt:

A lot on the corner of Stockton Street and Lewis Avenue has been receiving lots of love from Bushwick City Farm and neighborhood volunteers over the last few months, and it’s quickly taking shape as a public park that will produce free food for the community.

The 9,000-square-foot lot had been abandoned for 30 years and was a place of illegal dumping, squatting, and violence, which came to a head with a homicide involving a rusty shovel last summer.

[Read more →]

Amp 150 from Kayla Barnes PR on Vimeo.

Executive Chef Jeff Jarret explains Amp 150′s Farm to Table concept, while whipping up a five star succotash.

Our passion for the seasons, and the food they bring, keeps us always searching for great new combinations.

4277 West 150th Street
Cleveland, Ohio 44135

For AMP 150, being “green” is a passion, not a marketing gimmick. With a farm-to-table approach for over 15 years in his restaurants, Chef Jeff Jarrett has spent his life exemplifying how ingredients define the experience.

[Read more →]

See larger image here.

The ‘Alpha Farm’ project which will seek to transform a disused office block in Wythenshawe into a fully-functioning vertical farm.

Manchester Evening News
Aug 9, 2011

Excerpt:

Manchester could be at the forefront of an ‘agricultural revolution’ if a radical plan to solve the world’s food crisis takes off.

Organisers of Manchester’s International Festival 2013 want to turn a disused tower block in Wythenshawe into Britain’s first ‘vertical farm’.

[Read more →]

Jenn Nelkin, center, the greenhouse director of Gotham Greens in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, with its founders, Viraj Puri, left, and Eric Haley. Photo by Chang W. Lee/The New York Times.

Want Fresher Produce? Leave Dirt Behind

By Glenn Collins
New York times
August 2, 2011

Excerpt:

Without question, modern hydroponic outfits display a growing degree of technological sophistication. While 25 employees at Gotham Greens propagate, hand-pick and hand-pack the produce at its 15,000-square-foot space, a rooftop weather station monitors wind, rain, temperature, humidity, carbon dioxide and light intensity. This data bonanza serves to regulate irrigation pumps, greenhouse vents, exhaust fans, gable shutters and shade curtains.

[Read more →]

Will Allen, “Farming is one of the most humbling things you can do.”

By Al Lewis
FOXBusiness
August 03, 2011

Excerpt;

What begins with worms employs more than 100 people, some of whom started volunteering when they were 8 years old. Allen says he pays “a living wage,” which in Milwaukee averages in the range of $35,000 a year. And he’s helped many of his workers land college scholarships.

Allen hopes to add 150 more employees, and he foresees thousands more employed in similar operations as the urban-farming trend he’s helped inspire keeps growing.

[Read more →]