MGG-Conservation Archives - Page 4 of 11 - The future is what you make of it!

RichM May 13, 2014

Edible Landscaping

A few hundred years ago only royalty could afford to have gardens that didn’t produce food. After centuries spent on gardens that exist only for aesthetic value there is finally a movement towards arranging attractive and edible plants to produce spaces that are feasts for the eyes and the mouth.

Edible landscaping is a specialized form of gardening where your average, everyday ornamental plants are replaced with a variety of plants that have some food use. This style of landscaping has been gaining popularity in recent years as issues of resource conservation and sustainable living are becoming more visible and popular.

Ecologia founder (www.ecologiadesign.com) Michael Judd has spent nearly 20 years working throughout North and South America to promote edible and ecological landscape design. In Nicaragua his non-profit organization Project Bona Fide (www.projectbonafide.com) helps to develop solutions to provide food security and sustainable crops with higher market values in rural communities. In the USA Ecologia offers design consultation and installation of edible landscapes, rainwater harvesting and whole system farm design.

Inspired by the natural flow of the landscape, Ecologia works integrates its designs into the surroundings with Fibonacci inspired spirals, tiered rain gardens, dry stack stone terraces, earthen ovens and permeable drives and walkways. Ecologia is also famously responsible for the edible woodland garden at Frederick restaurant Volt where Chef Bryan Voltaggio can be be seen gathering herbs for his acclaimed culinary creations.

An important part of Ecologia’s approach to landscaping is rainwater and runoff management. Permeable hardscapes allow for passive irrigation of nearby plants. They lessen soil compaction and filters pollutants. A variety of designs and materials are used to create patios, walkways, driveways and garden paths.

Another approach to edible landscaping is the idea of a “food forest.” A food forest imitates the natural arrangement of a forest where multiple species of plants grow together symbiotically in close quarters. Rather than leaving a single fruit tree to defend itself in a sea of grass, the food forest approach produces a dense arrangement of edible plants and also allows the different species to build their own intimate and complimentary ecology.

Founder Michael Judd is also a lover of all things fungal and promotes the use of fungus to speed up habitat recover and building more fertile soil for projects. Using wood chips colonized by Wine Cap mushrooms to boost the growth of other plants can also provide a harvest of mushrooms to compliment the other plant species.

Using crowdsource funding through Kickstarter. com, Michael is publishing his first book, “Edible Landscaping with a Permaculture Twist“. The book serves as an introduction to all of the techniques, principles and materials involved in creating his distinctive edible landscapes. The book will be printed using 100% recycled paper and soy based ink.

Between food forests, permeable paths, edible landscaping, sustainable henhouses, holistic equine property design and charitable work in Central America, Michael Judd, Ecologia and Project Bona Fide are providing a wide range of services for Maryland locals and the world at large.

RichM March 13, 2014

Consumer Supported Agriculture

photo by AndyRobertsPhotos via flickr (Creative Commons)

Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) was conceptualized by a small group of Japanese women in the 1960’s who were concerned about the effects of pesticides and processed foods on their communities. The Teikei Movement, as they came to be called, connected consumers with local growers.

Organic gardening. Photo by April Sorrow.

Teikei translates to mean “partnership or cooperation” but the members of the group say it means “food with the farmer’s face on it.” It took nearly 20 years for the idea of locally grown food shared in local exchanges to reach the USA and now, in 2013, there are multiple farms and nurseries throughout Maryland area carrying on the tradition.

At its most basic level a CSA is about local consumers investing in a farm and sharing in the risks and rewards of small scale local agriculture. A fee is paid at the beginning of the season to reserve a rotating selection of fruits and vegetables, something new and different every week. Consumers can see where their food comes from, put a face to their farmer and can reap the rewards of having a garden without tending it or even having a yard to plant in.

An example of this is “House in the Woods Farm” (www.houseinthewoods.com) located in Adamstown, Maryland. From its unlikely beginning as a monthly music series, Ilene and Phil at the House in the Woods Farm have built a CSA and community farm that grows nearly 200 varieties of vegetables, herbs and flowers, all certified organic and GMO (Genetically Modified Organism) free. In order to further their goals of Environmental Education the House in the Woods CSA is founded on a participatory agreement. Some CSA members promise to help out on the farm several times during the growing season, developing a connection with nature and a strong sense of where their food
comes from.

Rich Maranto March 13, 2014

Solar in Maryland is Booming!

Maryland ranked number nine in the nation in terms of total installed capacity in 2012. We broke into the Top Ten, even though we are a small state. The previous year (2011) Maryland was 12th. In
2012, we more than doubled our installs from 2011 and put in 80 megawatts (MW) of capacity, passing up New Mexico, Pennsylvania and even Texas! Hard to believe.

And for distributed non-residential [commercial, but not utility scale], Marylandís own Mount St. Maryís University in Emmitsburg constructed a 16 MW installation, the second largest array in the nation, after Appleís North Carolina facility. The Mount St. Mary’s electricity is sold to the Maryland Department of General Services and the University of Maryland system.

Photo by: Constellation Energy Resources

Utility scale installations are much bigger than the commercial ones. The largest utility-scale installation was in Yuma, Arizon, 289 MW. Wow! Although that is impressive, I prefer somewhat smaller distributed arrays, so that you donít have to cover a corn field, or forest, with solar panels. Instead, keep them on the roof, or install PV as a shade canopy over the parking lot, somewhere where nature is already disturbed. Whatís driving all this solar? Federal loans, grants, renewable portfolio standards, lower costs and solar leases, such as those offered by many of our advertisers, now accounting for about 80% of all new systems. Go Solar!

Originally published, 2013 Maryland Solar Tour guide by Charlie Garlow