Saturday Tweets: Danes and Their Garbage, Big Food and #BlackCatAppreciationDay

...Wow! Cali to create the first farm-to-table community (7.4 acres w/ 540 houses): http://t.co/dHLqQ1MzhR @greenprophet pic.twitter.com/p1wRkDK355 — Danielle Nierenberg (@DaniNierenberg) August 20, 2015 Cool 3d printed chess set/succulent planter: http://t.co/FZzuclENbs — Root Simple (@rootsimple) August 20, 2015 Why we don't trust Wikipedia, and only use them for straightforward info: http://t.co/ODbYhLjoet — Root Simple (@rootsimple) August 1...

Read…

The Great Beekeeping Debate

...g natural beekeepers, “hippies” and “bee-havers.” I haven’t heard “hippie” used this way since Spiro Agnew left this mortal coil. And Agnew would have been right at home with an organization that still has a ladies auxiliary in 2016 (in contrast to natural beekeeping organizations I’ve seen that are integrated and, in fact, made up of a solid majority of women). The question of how we pollinate millions of acres of monocultured crops in different...

Read…

Native Plant Workshop

...birds, butterflies and hummingbirds. With only 4% of our wild lands left, urban and suburban native plant gardens will be the “make or break” difference to the support and preservation of bio-diversity. Lisa will show and tell you about several varieties of native plants as well as provide samples for sale. Immediately after the lecture in the garden we will be conducting a tour of the house to show and tell you about green products and renovatio...

Read…

The Homegrown Mailbox: How and Where Do I Get My Soil Tested?

...garden in my side yard and it just occurred to me that it is where people used to park their cars. I’m concerned about Oil or other pollutants from the cars that might still be in the soil. Any experience with this? Can I test without it costing an arm and leg? J.R., Los Angeles A: See my updated response here. [Note update at bottom of this post!] There’s basically two groups of things to test for: contaminants and soil nutrient levels. There ar...

Read…

Rubber Sidewalks Rescue Trees

...s. Trees are something we just need more of here in Southern California. I used to work at an urban forestry non-profit, TreePeople. So I am familiar with the challenges of the tree/sidewalk interface. I have fielded calls from people frantically trying to save trees that are being ripped out because they are lifting the sidewalk. I have also received calls from people eager to remove trees for the same reason. Sadly, I have also heard from people...

Read…