Cascadian Edible Landscapes

Party at our New Green house space! Want help with yours?

Jake — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 16:12:26 +0000

We have Greenhouse #1 up and are in the process of putting up #2–want to learn how it’s done (aka help)?

We will be hosting (bi) weekly work parties on-site with friends and interns throughout the From February-September. These are potluck style and we like to have music. Generally they last between 3-5 hours. Please contact us if you would like to participate in any of these

We are committing to having fun, supporting the community with high quality plants at affordable prices, keeping things orderly on site, and growing 40,000 plants from seed!

In food community,
–CEL

“Spring into Bed” – Get your Garden On -May 8th 2010

Michael — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 14:30:20 +0000

Please contact Stephanie for more information.

Spring into Bed is a city-wide garden building effort where individuals, communities, families and organizations, will be creating all types of gardens, from p-patches to home plots to guerrilla gardens on May 8th. Another component is the building of at minimum 10 Food Justice gardens to support people of lower incomes. Oh yeah, and there is going to be a party in the evening to celebrate the # of acres-and personal connections– we added to the urban food infrastructure. Website being developed soon. If you want to help with anything–from building gardens, organizing gardeners or throwing the party, please contact Stephanie

Hello Community, Wishing you a happy Wednesday and joyful week. Spring into Bed is a grass-roots city wide garden building event and fundraiser. We will be building community and gardens while making public the building of a sustainable city food shed.

Thank you for taking time to read this,. Our enthusiasm and number of supporters has grown so quickly in only a month’s time! Seattle is ready for this kind of event and there are so many skilled and talented people ready to make it happen!

If food security, food justice, community building, neighborhood resilience, gardening, permacutlure and/or sustainability are of interest to you, and the idea of a city wide effort to build food gardens is even remotely intriguing, please attend the meeting and bring a friend.We will:

Share information and inspiration gathered from the Survey.

Set the date and schedule the key success points leading us from today to the Day we spring.

Establish a core counsel — folks interested in dedicating an increased amount of time, skills and services to this event.

Create and delegate a list of action items that folks can take on.

If you are interested in being part of the core counsel and cannot attend this meeting, please e-mail us back and we’ll be sure to get you the important information.

We look forward to your presence and to working together to build an even stronger Seattle food shed.

Yours in community,

Stephanie

Please respond to Stephanie with comments and inquires.
——————————————————————-
Fwd Message…

Hello Community,

Warm wishes to you for health, happiness and vitality accompany this e-mail.

On Wednesday, January 6th 2010, a small group of people met at Solid Ground in Wallingford to discuss and begin organizing vision and action for the First Annual Seattle wide food-garden building event. In the week following much excitement and vision has been generated. This event is tentatively named “Spring into Bed“. We write you today to introduce you to this effort and to elicit your words, thoughts and feelings on participating such an event.

If food security, food justice, community building, neighborhood resilience, gardening, permacutlure and/or sustainability are of interest to you, and the idea of a city wide effort to build food gardens is even remotely intriguing, we would appreciate it if you could please fill out the following survey. It will take about 2-4 minutes.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/FX2DGW6

Next, We would like to call a second meeting for those interested in digging deeper into the planning piece of this event.

Follow this like to doodle scheduling tool. http://www.doodle.com/qm937yurpf3g9zpf

We look forward to your response and to working together to build an even greener Seattle.

–
Stephanie Snyder-Soulseed
206.708.9913
snyder.steph@gmail.com

1/9/2010 First Annual Garden Bed Bonanza (name TBD) – Planning Meeting

The first meeting had a great turnout for short notice over the holiday break. There was a lot of consensus that a coordinated day this year is a great idea, and we discussed the different structures and dates that this could be surrounded. A small group of people took on the project of refining the groups’ vision, deciding the name of the event from a list of 5, and making contacts for future meetings. Stay tuned.

Below is the original post describing the event.

Turn a seed of an idea–Building beds in a coordinated effort to create community, increase local food resilience, and support food justice–into the physical reality. This could be a one day per year event, or turn into something greater. A collaborative effort in essence, we are looking for people/partners to co-create this first ANNUAL event.

Lawns Contribute to Greenhouse Gases- Why you should tear it out

Jake — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 01:20:53 +0000

Urban ‘Green’ Spaces May Contribute to Global Warming. As it turns out, “green spaces” doesn’t mean pocket parks or wooded areas. It refers to grass. Grass in parks and grass covering athletic fields.
And, although the study – from the University of California Irvine – looked at grass in parks, the conclusions may give pause to lawn-proud homeowners, too:

Dispelling the notion that urban “green” spaces help counteract greenhouse gas emissions, new research has found – in Southern California at least – that total emissions would be lower if lawns did not exist.

Why?It’s not so much the grass — which does remove CO2 from the air and store carbon in the soil — but the care that the lawn needs: applying fertilizer, mowing, irrigation, leaf blowing, etc., all of which produce emissions (four times greater than the amount of carbon stored).
Read the whole article: http://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/Bright-Green/2010/0122/Lawns-may-contribute-to-global-warming

Fruit Trees, Edible Landscapes, and Veggie Starts for a Year!

Michael — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 02:14:53 +0000

Give the gift that keeps on Giving ! We have 3 ideas:

1. PLANT A FRUIT TREE We will come to your loved ones’s place to plant a fruit tree in the winter January/February are the best times for the tree. We will bring the tree, compost, and micronutrients, as well as a care guide for your new friend. **Our beautifully designed gift certificate and the promise within will delight your loved one(s) on the holidays.

Types of Trees Available: Apple, Pear, Cherry, and Plum. All varieties will be chose for their hardiness on West (wet) side of the Cascades, and will be announced by November 15th. Tree Size: We will have 2-3 year old trees with DWARF (4-8’ tall at maturity) & SEMI-DWARF (10-15’) rootstocks available.

COST is $65 for the first tree and $45 for each additional tree.

2. VEGGIE STARTS FOR THE YEAR. Grow more food by Pre-ordering a share of Community Supported Plant Starts and have flats of ready-to-plant seedlings arrive in your community throughout the growing season (March-September).

Cost is $130 for four sucessions (flats) of crops.

3. BUILD YOUR DREAM EDIBLE LANDSCAPE. This could be simple veggie boxes or an entire landscape complete with trees, shrubs, planter boxes, herbs spirals, and medicine wheels. Cost is $500 on up.

Grow Year Round with Cascadian Edible Landscapes (Seattle Times Article)

Jake — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 05:49:54 +0000

Jake Harris and Michael Seliga, in the Seattle Times article on parking strips. July 25th 2009

We build Fall gardens, so you can get the most from the earth throughout the winter. Our Community Supported Plant Starts program is of great value to first time and long time gardeners, and is a sustainable way to cultivate urban farmers.

We Build gardens in the Parking Strip Check out our mention in the Seattle Times!

Farming sustainably in the city is about using every inch of every space that is available. Contact us and we can help you use that space more effectively including shade gardens and parking strips. You can have a beauti-full and bounti- full garden.

CEL Family Growing- Internships available

Michael — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 22:19:41 +0000

Are you interested in greenhouse work, permaculture, edible landscaping, pruning fruit trees, and/or learning about the business side of things? If so, please read and fill out and send us cel-internship-2009.doc.

Community Supported Plant Starts-Sign Up for season

Michael — Wed, 20 May 2009 09:40:58 +0000

*About Community-Supported Plant Starts: we grow various plant starts throughout the year to help gardeners stay on top of succession planting

For a reasonable upfront fee, we get you the plants that want to be planted according to the NW Maritime Planting calendar. In Early Spring we start broccoli, kale, cabbage, cauliflower, etc. In late spring and early summer, we’ll supply tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, and other heat-loving crops. In August, when you should plant Brussel Sprouts and Fall Brocoli, we’ll get you those. In essence, we provide quality plant starts and a path towards year around vegetable production. Also, in purchasing a continual supply of plant starts, we can offer you discounts over retail prices.

Community Supported Plant Starts, had a successful pilot year in 2008, a great 2009 highlighted by Organic Gardening Magazine , Real Change Magazine, and Seattle Times featuring the program.

For more information, or to place an order, please download this form: 2009-csps-order-form-may-update.doc

Lastly, we are searching for a location for one of our urban greenhouses starting in 2010. If you know anyone with a large footprint with full sun and access to electric and water (we pay the bills), please pass this on to them.

CEL featured in Organic Gardening!

Michael — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 21:07:30 +0000

Check out the May issue of Organic Gardening Magazine. You have to peruse the actual magazine as it seems they don’t have the content available online quite yet. Check back soon as we hope to have the article loaded online.

Gardening is easy, thrifty and will save you money

Michael — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 01:58:28 +0000

FYI The numbers (of dollars you can save by gardening) this article are lower than most calculations.

Assumptions- you eat enough vegetables–(a very healthy choice might I add), which add up in cost each month.

Start a Community Edible Landscape!

Michael — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 04:50:48 +0000

A Community Edible Landscape, aka “Garden Node”, is a group of neighbors that decide to build an edible landscape together. It can be 3 neighbors, up to an entire block.

The idea is this: Neighbor #1 plants a Pear tree and has a nice sunny backyard for heat-loving crops. Neighbor #2 plants a Plum tree and had an excellent shaded area for Chard, Kale, Spinach, etc Neighbor #3 plants an apple tree and great soil for blueberries. All the neighbors plant what works best in their yards, and then they share the bounties.

The design process is very similar to what we would go through with an individual, justwith a group of people: Who likes to eat what, how much maintenance are the people of the neighborhood (and their children!) willing to do.