Urban forests play a vital role in helping communities adapt to and mitigate climate change, reduce air pollution, sequester carbon and save energy through natural heating and cooling. But urban forests are facing increasingly difficult growing conditions. Exotic pests, more frequent and severe storms, and the loss of soils in urban developments all contribute to stressed urban forests. In order to contribute to healthy, resilient communities, these valuable assets need to be managed proactively and supported consistently across the province. Green Infrastructure Ontario’s urban...
Twenty years ago, the stretch of land between Lamoureux Park and the bridge to Cornwall Island was a brown wasteland where the natural ecosystem had been stripped away by industrial pollution. Then, in 1997, the Raisin Region Conservation Authority with funding from the Cornwall Rotary Club put in the rushing creek that exists there today in an effort to restore the original ecosystem. This area would then became known as the Rotary Eco-Gardens. Two decades later, on Sunday, Transition Cornwall+...
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tp9gJgPGSGc&w=560&h=315] “This place is famous. People loving coming by here because at any time of year you can get something to eat.” Architect Mark Lakeman, co-founder of the City Repair project, gives a tour of the corner sidewalk outside his Portland office building, where a food forest is bursting with life. A diagram shows where over 80 plants are located in six or seven vertical layers. Tall fruit trees, flowers, a grape arbor, herbs, berries, small vegetables, and ground...
The big question often asked is: can agroecological farming really feed the world, with the global population hurtling towards 9.6 billion by 2050? It’s clear that there’s increasing evidence it could. A landmark 2001 study by Jules Pretty and Rachel Hine examined 208 projects from 52 countries and found yield increases of 50-100% for rain-fed crops like maize. The cases studied involved 9 million farmers on around 3% of all of the farmed land in Asia, Africa and Latin America...
While nobody is suggesting that we inherently begin detesting grass, growing it on the scale we do and with all that effort to keep it cleanly cut, fertilized and free of weeds, i.e. natural biodiversity, is proving a huge burden on the planet, its animals (who aren’t allowed to graze on lawns), and the people so determined to have a perfectly picturesque front garden. Amazingly, we have found a way to both destroy the environment and ruin animal habitat, all...
One question has cropped up repeatedly: In a world filled with melting ice caps, war, species extinctions, and economic peril, how can I possibly argue that the small-scale actions I write about can transform the bigger picture for the better? Belief in the possibility of change is a huge if intangible positive. So, too, is the proliferation of new social and economic models – from commoning, transition, and sharing, to local money, off-grid energy, and maker spaces. These are the infrastructure of...
In a new paper published Thursday, a team of researchers present a compelling case for why urban neighborhoods filled with trees are better for your physical health. The research appeared in the open access journal Scientific Reports. “Controlling for income, age and education, we found a significant independent effect of trees on the street on health,” said Marc Berman, a co-author of the study and also a psychologist at the University of Chicago. “It seemed like the effect was strongest for the...
by Daphne Miller M.D., reposted from YES! Magazine, Dec 6, 2013 I spend my days in a sterile 8×10 room practicing family medicine and yet my mind is in the soil. This is because I’m discovering just how much this rich, dark substance influences the day-to-day health of my patients. I’m even beginning to wonder whether Hippocrates was wrong, or at least somewhat misguided, when he proclaimed, “Let food be thy medicine.” Don’t get me wrong—food is important to our...