Hotbed of Sustainability
I was excited to see the cover "Shades of Green: Alternative Ideas About Homes and Gardens"[May 28, 2009] on the Advocate. Sadly, I found the focus on lawns, organic ornamental gardens and photovoltaics a disappointment; it barely scratched the surface of what's happening locally, where there's a swirling ferment of exciting new and old practices.
People are rediscovering and integrating rainwater collection, heritage breeds, green roofs, solar-powered clothes dryers, pedal-power, composting, greenhouses, sheet mulching lawns, intensive food growing, and planting forest gardens (an integrated, productive eco-agriculture that mimics a forest), nut trees, alternative crops like shizandra berries, hardy kiwis and Native American crops like sunchokes and the three sisters.
There's local grain production, seed swaps, community gardens, student gardens, citizen-led design charrettes, chicken coop tours, driveway removal parties, fruit tree pruning and medicinal herb workshops, bio-char experiments, nurseries selling multi-functional plants, and nationally known authors writing on forest gardens and perennial vegetables. There's a Western Mass Permaculture Guild hosting events and discussing numerous topics in homesteading, self-sufficiency, small-scale agriculture, ecological design and sustainability. There's a local backyard chicken group, a Pioneer Valley Sustainability Network, and a graduate school of sustainable landscape design. In fact, I think this area is redefining what sustainability is, going much deeper than using a reel mower. Not that reel mowers are bad, but we need a lot less lawn (and parking lots) on the landscape and more gardens, farms, orchards, woods, and meadows.
There's really a lot happening in our little Valley's homes and gardens.
Jono Neiger
Leverett
Reeling Them In
Thank you, Jack Brown and the Valley Advocate, for your reviews of our free films every Friday evening at the Media Education Foundation. When I frequently ask the audience how they learned about the film, "through the Valley Advocate and Jack Brown's reviews" is most often the winner.
As we try to build a true participatory democracy these days for peace and justice, we are grateful to you and the Media Education Foundation for your help.
Frances Crowe
Northampton Committee to Stop the War in Iraq
