Mixed Messages
My guess is that traditional mixed farming strategies will come into their own again if, as seems likely, we move towards a more energy and phosphate constrained future.
Food & Water featured
Blackfeet Researcher Leads Her Tribe Back to Traditional Foods
“Our people survived genocide in part because of [traditional] foods and medicines,” Beck says. “And because our elders are passing away and global warming is changing how our environment functions, now is a significant time to capture elders’ knowledge and our own community’s history.”
The Future of Bread
While it may sound old-fashioned, home milling could have the potential to redefine one of the world’s oldest processed foods—bread.
Misconceptions of Meat in Healthy Eating
Today people are constantly bombarded by new diet trends and information on what is healthy and what is not, much of it contradictory. Within this debate, meat consumption is one of the current topics under scrutiny, with increasing calls for people to eat less.
Upcycled Mushrooms
Standing in the shade of some blossom filled apple trees, conversation turns to the wonders of fungi. “I got really intrigued by them, and the more I’ve read and learnt, the more I realise how critically important they are to the entire ecosystem,” Patrick muses. “They’re the ones doing all the recycling, they create soil, they live inside plants…. They’re very very weird and slightly magical things!” he points out with a grin.
Organizing Alternative Food Futures in the Peripheries of the Industrial Food System
Everywhere we look, whether in the Global North or Global South, we see people reclaiming an integral relationship with nature and each other through regenerative agriculture and regenerative community building strategies. Looking forward, there are many exciting intersections of regenerative agriculture and sustainability education to amplify.
Grazing At the Cutting Edge
Building off one another’s enthusiasm, the Irwins describe their model of ranching that pulls from agrarian traditions of the past and present to create diverse, resilient agricultural systems that are the engines for ecosystem restoration for our future.
Songs from the Wood
The woodland we’ve planted has brought various tangible and less tangible benefits. Fruit and nuts, tree hay, wind and sun protection, privacy (which surely helped in our successful planning application for a dwelling), children’s dens, and wildlife habitat
Food Can Make Michigan Great Again
In my book looking back at the time I managed the Toronto Food Policy Council, I identified gratitude as the major virtue of a food leader, and love for your little corner of the world, and a desire to make it better, as the ideal motivation for food activism.
Regenerative Agriculture: The Next Stage of Organic Food and Farming—and Civilization
Regenerative agriculture and land use encompass the traditional and indigenous best practices of organic farming, animal husbandry and environmental conservation. Regeneration puts a central focus on improving soil health and fertility (recarbonizing the soil), increasing biodiversity, and qualitatively enhancing forest health, animal welfare, food nutrition and rural (especially small farmer) prosperity.
Round Bale Gardening
The jury is still out on my 2017 gardening season, but I can definitely attest to the fact that vegetables will grow in round hay bales. This looks like my best gardening year ever, using raised “lasagna” or “keyhole garden” beds, cardboard/mulch/hay for potatoes, and the 4 X 6 round hay bales.
Off to the Polls Again: a Small Farm Future Election Special
There’s a lot of agitated Facebook chatter among my political friends locally about the labyrinthine tactical voting logics and ways of trying to stop Brexit in its tracks, while others claim to feel politically homeless and unrepresented by the political parties. What, only just now? Ah well, let’s get an election post out of the way…
