Category — Canada

Mespilus germanica features an unusual apple-like fruit that requires bletting to eat; although not widely eaten today, consumption of these fruits was much more common in the past.

Mike: I am able to remember the tree’s name by calling it ‘Blet Medlar’ after the comic actress Bette Midler.

Today we met two people, born in Northern Iran, who were picking the fruit of a Medlar tree planted along a residential street in Vancouver. They loved this fruit, but hadn’t tasted it since leaving Iran 26 years ago.

The couple said that after taking the fruit home, they would let them ripen (blet) under a cloth on a tray in a warm place for a couple of weeks before eating. Finding these fruit brought memories back and tears to their eyes.

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Calgary appears to be rediscovering its gardening roots. Three years ago there were only a dozen community gardens in the city. Now, driven by grassroots gardeners in the downtown core, the inner city, and even in the ‘burbs, residents are getting their “grow” on at more than 100 community gardens.

Tuscany’s first plot made into gathering place

By Tony Seskus
Calgary Herald
October 12, 2011

Excerpt:

It’s part of a blossoming trend. In 2008, there were 11 public and private community gardens in the city.

By last May, there were more than 100 – a surge driven by residents at the grassroots. Now, gardens can be found throughout Calgary, in the core, inner city or the ‘burbs.

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Visions of Thanksgiving: Tilling a garden in inner-city Prince George this summer. Photo: Justin Foster.

Turning empty lots into inner-city veggie patches yields a harvest of goodwill in Prince George, British Columba

By Josh Massey
TheTyee.ca
Oct 10, 2011

Excerpt:

“We can grow lots right here in Prince George, while some species do better in other communities like Quesnel. I imagine a bartering system where we are exchanging produce between communities.”

One section of the Growing Community Gardens is dedicated to testing different strains of kale to see which fair best in the colder climate.

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Title: Cliffside Arbutus Tree. “He painted for over 50 years, totally unrecognized, every week, every month, every year.” See more of Donald Flather’s work here.

Flash from the past – 1979 article in City Farmer Newspaper

By Kerry Banks
City Farmer Newspaper
Vol 2 No. 1, October, 1979
(City Farmer began in 1978 by publishing a newspaper. Kerry is a founding member of City Farmer. He is an award-winning freelance writer and journalist. See bio further on.)

(1979) – Dr. Donald Flather and his wife Grace have one of the more unique vegetable gardens in Vancouver. It’s the last remaining ‘victory garden’ from the city’s World War Two home food production effort.

Beginning back in the early forties, the Government of Canada made a concentrated effort to get city and town folk involved in growing their own food. Large advertisements were placed in the daily newspapers.

“Plant a wartime garden,” they urged. “Home production of vegetables is needed now more than any time during the war. Help by growing the vegetables your family needs.”

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Illustration: Tavis Coburn.

While we’re busy teaching our kids to tend school gardens, they’re failing provincial tests in reading, writing and math. The folly of the new enviro-propaganda

By Jan Wong
Toronto Life
October 2011

Excerpt:

This fall, hundreds of Toronto students are harvesting beets and zucchini from their school gardens. I say: nice photo op, bad idea. The argument for school gardens assumes that by grubbing in the dirt, kids will learn to love eating vegetables. They won’t think chickens hatch into this world as deep-fried nuggets. And they’ll develop a respect for nature.

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A gathering of Vancouver’s urban farmers

Friday, November 25, 2011 (evening);
Saturday, November 26, 2011 (all day)

Introduction from the website:

Vancouver has the goal of being the Greenest City in the World by 2020. Local food and green economy are two of ten areas of focus for achieving the greenest city goals. Urban farming is in a unique position to contribute to both of these goals. The number of urban farms in Vancouver is increasing and these green businesses are leading the way in developing economically viable food production models for the urban environment.

With urban commercial food production being a relatively new occurrence in Vancouver, it is not accounted for in current city policy. There are a number of factors affecting urban farms’ ability to operate as legitimate businesses in Vancouver including land zoning and business licensing. This forum comes out of an interest from both the City and Urban Farmers to work together toward policies, best practices, and land-use decisions that can support urban farming practices now and into the future.

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Video clip here.

Vancouver’s Inner-city farms uses restaurant produced compost to grow food that is delivered back to that restaurant

September 22, 2011
News, Canada, BC

A Vancouver company grows vegetables in front yards donated by homeowners, reports the CBC’s Bob Nixon.

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Jodi Peters and Jeffery Radke are fighting back against orders to tear down their garden. Photo by Matthew Burrows.

Tenants challenge explicit orders to remove their veggie patch.

By Matthew Burrows
Georgia Straight
September 14, 2011

Excerpt:

Two gardening renters in East Vancouver are headed to provincial arbitration on September 30. This will come after their landlords demanded they dig up their extensive vegetable garden, and remove a greenhouse and rain barrel, along with other instructions sent in writing on August 5 and 14.

“It was like an absolute slap in the face,” Jodi Peters, project coordinator with the Environmental Youth Alliance and an avid gardener, told the Georgia Straight while sitting in the back yard of their multi-unit dwelling at 1922 Adanac Street.

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Jardin du marché rue Ontario is a small oasis in an alley at the corner of Ontario and d’Iberville Sts.: Projects like this one are springing up as interest grows in urban agriculture. Photograph by: Pierre Obendrauf, The Gazette.

Urban agriculture could possibly be discussed in public consultations that are planned for early 2012

By Monique Beaudin
Gazette Environment Reporter
September 17, 2011

Excerpt:

Demand for a plot in one of Montreal’s 97 city-owned community gardens is so high some people wait as long as four years to get a plot, said Marie-Ève Chaume of the Conseil régional de l’environnement de Montréal. But even these internationally-renowned community gardens, where residents can use a small plot of city-owned land to grow vegetables or flowers, are threatened, Chaume said. Three were shut down four years ago because their soil was contaminated, and Mayor Gérald Tremblay personally intervened last year to stop the city from selling a community garden to a developer.

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GrowTo: the What, How, Where and Why of Urban Agriculture

Ryerson University.
Toronto Oct-Nov 2011

Hear from local and international urban agriculture experts and participate in interactive discussions designed to expand local food production in Toronto.

Session 1: Oct 4. What can we grow? New Crops and Marketing for a Multicultural City

Session 2: Oct 20. How can we grow? Food Hubs – from Concept to Practice

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Current Initiatives include TRCA-FarmStart McVean New Farmers Project, Toronto Urban Farm, Permaculture Design Course

The McVean New Farmers project is a partnership between Toronto and Region Conservation (TRCA) and FarmStart. The New Farmers project is based on the historic McVean property located within the Claireville Conservation Area, in the City of Brampton which is owned by TRCA. The project is the first of its kind in Canada, leading the way towards sustainable, local agriculture that serves the needs of growing urban and peri-urban communities and protects the local greenspace and ecosystems.

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Future Lufa Farms greenhouses will measure 80,000-120,000 square feet, and will sit atop LEED-certified industrial buildings. Above, an architect’s concept.

“Projects like those envisioned by Le Groupe Montoni and Lufa Farms, can be an important step to a more energy-effective and food-independent Montreal.”

Sept. 12, 2011, Montreal

Excerpt:

Lufa Farms Inc., creator of the world’s first commercial-scale rooftop greenhouse, yesterday announced a co-operative agreement with green industrial-park specialist Le Groupe Montoni of Laval to develop LEED-certified industrial buildings capable of supporting commercial greenhouses.

The agreement is expected to result in several new rooftop farms in and around Montreal, beginning next year.

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“For urban gardeners, you really have to do it for the fun of it.”

By May Jeong
Globe and Mail
Sep. 13, 2011

“In the summer, my garden gives me 80 per cent of my produce. Whatever I have as leftovers, I am able to freeze.”

The yield is impressive. Ms. Lee-Macaraig counts two pints of cherry tomatoes, at least three cucumbers, an eggplant, some cabbage, blueberries, a zucchini and an endless array of herbs. And that’s just one recent week’s harvest.

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Wally and Gail Satzewich.

“It’s a trend that’s being revitalized these days. And that’s probably good because there’s a lot of land in the city that’s not being utilized.”

By Charles Hamilton
The StarPhoenix
September 8, 2011

Excerpt:

Satzewich is a pioneer of urban gardening in Saskatoon. He is also credited as one the founders of SPIN farming. SPIN stands for Small, Plot, Intensive farming. And one look at his farming techniques and you can tell why he pioneered the slogan.

His farm was originally dispersed over 25 residential backyard garden plots in Saskatoon and the growing area totalled a half acre. These days, he only has a few city plots. But he still manages to grow more than 2,000 pounds of tomatoes, red potatoes and garden salad greens. That’s on top of the 7,500 pounds of pumpkins, potatoes and onions he grows outside the city in the small town of Pleasantdale, Sask.

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“Urban farms and gardens are feeding the world – one inner city at a time”

Submission deadline: September 30, 2011

Nature’s Path is giving $65,000 in urban garden grants this year through its Gardens for Good contest. North American non-profits and registered charities are eligible to apply ( 2 winners to be crowned in the US and 1 in Canada) and anyone can vote. With the grant comes technical assistance for their Organic Program Manager, Dag Falck and the team at Organic Gardening Magazine.

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“It is an amazing space where you can learn more about urban gardening, explore vertical gardens, growing plants and food in containers and much more in a beautiful setting above the buzz of the Danforth.” Image via Grass Roots blog.

The Big Carrot Natural Food Market

Description:

Let’s make urban gardening fun! Join us catching the last rays of the summer sun on the brand new Green Roof on top of the Big Carrot (348 Danforth Avenue). Our host, Zora Ignjatovic will guide you through the hows-and-whats of preserving your garden through winter, and sheds light on mysteries like vertical gardening and growing tomatoes in a concrete parking lot. All this on the top of the Carrot, in a very pleasant environments. We will have some snacks to munch on as well.

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Potato Harvest Day – Students at Queen Mary Elementary School work with Summerhill Seniors

Video by Charlie Miller and Damian Inwood
The Edible Garden Project

Excerpts:

Two years ago the Queen Mary Community Garden was built in North Vancouver. Included in the garden were four large plots dedicated to the students at Queen Mary Elementary School – right next door.

Students take part in planning, planting, and maintaining the garden plots for their classroom. We work with students from grade 3, 5, and 7. They each have a compost bucket in their classrooms that they empty in the garden composters; a great was to learn about closing the loops between food waste and helping their garden grow.

See more here.

See City Chase adventurers in action in this video.

A unique urban adventure: counting worms, learning about composting

City Chase brought a few hundred explorers to the Vancouver Compost Demonstration Garden as part of a unique urban adventure. Participants had to dig through our worm bins and find 10 worms and also answer questions about the composting process. It was a wonderful way to introduce people to home composting.

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The string bikini tops worked best at the Vancouver Compost Garden

Sean and Maria built a small greenhouse this past spring at the Vancouver Compost Garden. The raised beds inside were filled with a soil blend that included leaves, various composts we had around the garden, and layers of ‘White Dragon’ compost made from our mid-scale electric composter that was fed food scraps from a local restaurant.

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Four videos about urban agriculture in Vancouver by Anja Schuchardt

By Anja Schuchardt
DieBioKuche
Aug 19, 2011

Mehr Gärtner in Großstädten? Der Demonstrationsgarten von “City Farmer” in Vancouver

Pflügen, Pflanzen, Pflücken – was bringt Städter dazu? Michael Levenston über seinen Demonstrationsgarten und die Probleme für Stadtgärtner in Vancouver.

Plowing, growing, picking – what makes townspeople to do this? Michael Levenston tells us about his demonstration garden and the problems which city farmers have in Vancouver.

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