Just. Plain. Dirty.

It sure is “ironic” when a notoriously litigious company comes out with an ad campaign that looks and sounds awfully familiar. And I do mean awful. I can not bring myself to point to the website. Davin Risk’s photograph of my “dirt manicure” published last year. If the products based on fostering a chemical dependency,

Compostable Coffee Bag

I discovered this message on the bottom of the 1lb bag of coffee beans I purchased about a month ago and thought I would look into PLA and try my hand at composting the bag to see how easily it could be done. The issue here isn’t the paper itself (although that is an issue

Tokyo Gardening: Making Gardens with No Space

You must head over to Ping Magazine and take a look at this photo-essay on Guerilla Greening in Tokyo. With only 4% of the city allocated for green space and no yards to speak of, residents have found unique ways to garden and green public spaces. What an inspiration! I found the part about three-tiered

Everything’s Cool

I watched “Everything’s Cool” yesterday afternoon, hot on the heels of the UN conference on climate change held in Bali last week where my country was globally humiliated ONCE AGAIN by our Prime Minister’s refusal to support a new climate change agreement — an action supported by the rest of the planet, excluding our neighbours to the south.

Lessons Learned from an Unseasonably Warm Autumn

I took this photo of a field of Gaillardia growing on a hillside on the Leslie Spit back in July before The Worst Drought in Fifty Years took a hold and sent lots of plants into hiatus on a short term or permanent basis. On a return visit in late August I found only a

City Farming — New York Mag Article

In a recent New York Magazine feature entitled “My Empire of Dirt“, writer Manny Howard takes on the arduous task of growing a farm, complete with flora and fauna in his Brooklyn backyard to explore just what is involved in trying to feed himself locally for one month. The results are a humorous and slightly

City Razes Garden

I walked outside the other day, into the street garden with scissors in hand to clip some flowers intended for the host of a party I was attending. As I bent over to snip a few Black-eyed Susan stems I discovered that the flowers were completely gone. All that remained were the ragged ends of

Food That Hardly Travels at All

A friend pointed me to this opinion piece in the New York Times that looks at the Eat Local concept as a way to mark environmental impact in food production. The article describes a New Zealand study that challenges the assumption that distance traveled automatically means higher fossil fuel consumption. The study doesn’t undermine the

Domino Interview

“I don’t promote myself as an authority. I’m a person who really, really loves to garden. I know a thing or two but there is a ton I don’t know and will probably never know. I make mistakes. I experiment like crazy. I don’t have all of the answers, I don’t believe in that “right”

Veggie Gardening: The Next Big Thing

Quite simply, the Next Big Thing is going to be veggies. Lots and lots of veggies. Heirloom tomatoes, offbeat salad greens and stuff like that. All organically grown, of course. By us. – from Toronto Star “Urban Gardeners Are Growing Local” (July 7, 2007.) Many of us have known it all along by I am

Cold Snap Gums Up the Works

As I type this, one third of my rooftop garden sits on the floor in my living room. A second third of the garden is cluttering up the hallway around our front door. “Come on in friendly visitor! But first brave this minefield of plants, soil, and containers.” The final third remains outside. They were

Risk of Frost

Can you believe this? RISK OF FROST. It is June 5!! We are well past the safe date in this region! And as an aside, ahem, can you believe my awesomely instructive and informative graphic? Fades, arrows, highlights, and drop shadows. I had to reach deep into my USA Today brand pool of design tricks